Year: 2012 | 2011 | 2010 | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 |

Boston Qualifiers in the USA/Canada - 2012

The Boston Marathon is the only mass-participation marathon that requires qualifying times and those times become goal times for many runners. The times are, to some extent, age-graded, with those 35 and over given easier standards.
See: Boston Marathon Qualifying Times

We're often asked what courses are good Boston qualifying courses and where do people qualify for the Boston Marathon. While there is no specific answer for each individual, and while different races may be easier or harder in any given year due to weather or other factors - following is a factual list of those marathons that have the highest percentage of Boston Marathon qualifiers in their field and those with the largest overall number of qualifiers.

Note that different years may show different results as weather, course changes and other factors can affect the performance of a race from year to year.

The marathons below had the highest percent of Boston qualifying finishers in 2012 (year-to-date). These courses will undoubtedly be among those ranked the fastest of all courses - but there are other factors that might cause a marathon to appear on this list or to cause a race to fall off this list. For a point-to-point course, a tailwind or headwind might make the difference from one year to the next. Some races (such as Boston itself) simply attracts faster runners, so the fact that a marathon is on this list might be an indication of the type of runner it attracts even more than the quality of its course. But, you can be sure that any marathon on this is not slow.

Rank	Marathon	Boston Qualifiers	Qualifying Percent*
1.	Houston Marathon (1/15/12 - Houston, TX)	997	13.2%
2.	Carlsbad Marathon (1/22/12 - Carlsbad, CA)	124	11.7%
3.	Louisiana Marathon (1/15/12 - Baton Rouge, LA)	66	11.0%
4.	Charleston Marathon (1/14/12 - Charleston, SC)	83	10.1%
5.	Rock 'n' Roll Arizona Marathon (1/15/12 - Phoenix, Scottsdale & Tempe, AZ)	284	7.8%
6.	Miami Marathon (1/29/12 - Miami & Miami Beach, FL)	260	7.1%
*This list is limited to marathons with 250 or more finishers and percentages calculated ignore finishers over 6:00.

The races that have the most Boston Marathon qualifiers are, obviously, going to be skewed to those that have the most participants. Below is a list of the races that qualified the most people for Boston in 2012.

Rank	Marathon	Finishers	Boston Qualifiers
1.	Houston Marathon (1/15/12 - Houston, TX)	7,637	997
2.	Disney World Marathon (1/8/12 - Orlando, FL)	13,467	483
3.	Rock 'n' Roll Arizona Marathon (1/15/12 - Phoenix, Scottsdale & Tempe, AZ)	3,863	284
4.	Miami Marathon (1/29/12 - Miami & Miami Beach, FL)	3,906	260
5.	Carlsbad Marathon (1/22/12 - Carlsbad, CA)	1,099	124
6.	Charleston Marathon (1/14/12 - Charleston, SC)	850	83