Howdy, Stranger!
Categories
2010 Ballot entry is up
The materials in this website are in no way intended to replace the professional medical care, advice, diagnosis or treatment of a doctor, qualified personal trainer, therapist, dietitian or nutritionist Runners's World, Part of the Hearst UK well-being network © Copyright 2017
Comments
Feeling for you guys that may still have to chase this up...sigh.
thanks Nick, only some of us aren't in even though we've paid the money as yet, the guy was helpful when I phoned so I live in hope.
Thanks for the update though
Sally, you should have recived an email from VLM to confirm and give you a reg number.
See the posts above about others that have not received the VLM email. When they made calls to VLM, tey were told their forms were incomplete. Best to call and check.
I got both WorldPay and VLM within seconds of each other when I booked last night at about 11.20pm.
Runnerman,
you are right it is a big event which could have a bigger field, I did the Great North Run for the first time last year, 52000 runners I believe and it ran really smoothly, I was even able to get city centre accomadation ( at a price and booked well ahead) another 15000 runners surely can't be that big a deal for the capital city.
So come on Virgin and Mr.Bedford how about it?
the issue is not one about IT - its because there is a limit on the ballot places ( or at least I understand there is one ) - if that limit was removed and we had say 2 weeks to get an application in, there would be no rush, no frustration and no staying up to the early hours to get a clear run at the process - however I suppose the price you'd pay for a greater number of applicants in the ballot is a smaller chance of getting an actual entry
I have been trying the phone number for ages as I entered last night and have not recieved conformation yet. How long has it taken people to get through?
1 wasted day pressing f5 + 1 wasted day pressing redial= a not very happy bunny!
He is saying that a max capacity of 10,000 per second was exceeded more than 20 times.
That means 200,000 people per second. I doubt that somehow.
Hi Nick
Having read your post I couldnt control myself and had to sign up and reply.
Having spent the DAY trying to enter the race yesterday and part of this morning (This morning was more to see if I could, I had given up wanting to run the race by at least 10am yesterday morning) your response has knocked me for 6. I dont know what your job is at the London marathon but I suspect it is something to do with PR judging by the SPIN you are trying to put on this. I am not a technical person but I know enough to know that you should have been prepared for the numbers coming to the website, especially after the mess that was the online entry last year.
"Last year at peak we were receiving over 300 concurrent requests per second" last year the system didnt work and you had to take it down for at least a week so not sure how you can use that traffic as a bench mark. Did you look at other races and how they deal with large number of entries (Not just running races but there are lots of events who cope with large numbers in a short period of time).
Did you have a back up plan in place? (Other than just shuting it down and putting up a message saying "try later or maybe tomorrow"). Some of the phone operators seem to think the sysem would go live again at 5pm which it clearly didnt. Having been through the mess of last year was the plan just to increase the server space and hope for the best?
"Our providers have worked throughout the day and night to add capacity and have managed in a very short space of time to add the necessary capacity to cope with these unimagined levels of demand" so the fact that it has taken me till at least 12pm is due to them working through the night? Have the hits per second stayed the same all day? As far as I can see and what I have read the only difference today is that you can enter the website by clicking refresh a 100 times on each application. Yes that is a big step forward and compared to yesterday makes the system look like something NASA has put together.You might not be the person to speak to about this but seeing as you have kindly come foward as the face of this mess I think its only fair to ask you these questions. I would have had more repsect if you held your hands up and said you got it wrong rather than trying to make out that noone could have expected this or dealt with the numbers.
And your final comment "Thank you for your patience and perseverance" would be accepted if I had any patience left after spending what is not far off 24 hours trying to get a website to work.
A very very very unimpressed customer who expects more from the largest race in the world and Virgin.
I finally managed to get registered at 11pm last night , after starting at 0730 - what a difference to this morning my boy did his at 0630 without any probs what so ever
PS - CRAZYHAINSY YOUR A STAR THANKS FOR THE LINK
Of all the suggestions on here to address this problem, the only one that I think is plausible is to allow some breathing space between the end of the marathon and the opening of the ballot. If people really want to do it they will make a note of the date - say June 1 - and apply then. I bet there would sill be a 120 thou 'sell out' but it would be a more manageable flow and would go some way to satisfying this test that some seem keen on - that of weeding out those that get carried away with the day itself without really wanting to do it.
Otherwise, like it or not, I am afraid we have to accept the business model behind this product. It is difficult morally to remove the earning potential for charity and simple demand and supply economics mean that this is too big a cash cow for both VLM and the charitiees. The year golden bonds do not sell out is the year they may redress the balance with ballot applications - I do not see that ever happening. Also, all of us who have run it know that increasing numbers is not practical - it is already too crowded and solutions such as staggered starts would be too complex and therefore too expensive. So with apologies for meekly accepting the current system with all its flaws, I think this is about as fair as they can make it IF you accept VLM is a business.
I've just registered for the 2010 London marathon. I ran it in 2005 and 2007, so if i get in next year it will be London Marathon number 3 for me.
Here's hoping!
And while I wait for your reply Nick, just looked up unimagined in a dictionary:
Unimagined
Adjective - not imagined even in a dream
The biggest race in the marathon calendar, the day after the race, full coverage on BBC including a highlights programme, photos in all the major papers yet no one imagined that lots of people would want to enter the race the minute the race entry opened. Of course not, its not like the race has to offer a ballot system because it is vastly oversubscribed, or this is what happened last year when the race first went online.
I might be making light heart of it all but I think I have put across my point. You should have expected the numbers because everyone else had (including those people clever enough to enter early that morning even though the system was due live until 9am).
Having continually been trying to get through on the website (including trying without the 's' on https) I get to the last page to be confronted by:
Mod_python error: "PythonHandler django.core.handlers.modpython"
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/usr/lib64/python2.4/site-packages/mod_python/apache.py", line 299, in HandlerDispatch
result = object(req)
File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/django/core/handlers/modpython.py", line 228, in handler
return ModPythonHandler()(req)
File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/django/core/handlers/modpython.py", line 201, in __call__
response = self.get_response(request)
File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/django/core/handlers/base.py", line 128, in get_response
return self.handle_uncaught_exception(request, resolver, exc_info)
File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/django/core/handlers/base.py", line 160, in handle_uncaught_exception
return callback(request, **param_dict)
File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/django/views/defaults.py", line 23, in server_error
t = loader.get_template(template_name) # You need to create a 500.html template.
File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/django/template/loader.py", line 80, in get_template
source, origin = find_template_source(template_name)
File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/django/template/loader.py", line 73, in find_template_source
raise TemplateDoesNotExist, name
TemplateDoesNotExist: 500.html
WHAT IS THIS?! Is this a fault with my computer or a secret message advising me just to give up?
I registered last night at around 11pm, just tried again and got straight on to the registration page (didn't complete it, multiple entries are mega frowned upon!). Keep trying folks, you will get there eventually.
BTW, look back through this thread and you'll find a link to a quicker way to enter than going through the VLM homepage.
Good luck everyone.
i got in pre 09:00 on 27/04/09 - did anyone else manage this?
Was up early, thought I'd log in to save to favourites, the button was there and - hey presto! Entered the ballot.
Tell you what I find frustrating? When people ask "what charity are you running for" (I've never got in yet by the way this being my IIIrd attempt) and I say I'm not, the look of disgust at running this without raising £2K+ ! I think - try it yerself mate!
Just got through!
VLM 177338 ?????
Is it now oversubscribed?
Got confirmation email and funds look like they have been removed from account!
But no email from Virgin with confirmation of ballot place!!!!!