How much do professional distance runners get paid?

Question

I notice that many races offer $50,000 prizes for accomplishing first place or even setting a world, or course record. If they run a race almost every week for a period of over three to five months and win every single one, including their regular salary, don't they receive over millions of dollars or am I exaggerating a bit? Do they receive more money than football players? If you happen to know I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you for your time and advice.

Answer 1

Running for a living is extremely hard, by itself that is. There are not a lot of oppertunites to win money. Better off being a professional football player. Good luck, but choose the one you love to do more!

Answer 2

not all races pay that muchh. Also, those are not the races that you can run every week (ie marathons) not 5 or 10ks. No one can win a race every week like that! Also-how often do you think people set course records, let alone world records? Its not like HS where records get broken all the time.

Answer 3

To put in the simplest form, runners really don't get paid c**p........an example the Peachtree Road Race 10K, which always draws 55,000 runners only pays $30,000 to the winner and second/third prize money drops by a huge percentage.  Only 1 wins and more than likely they will only win 1 more big race that year if their lucky.  For the full time amount they give training and wearing their body down it isn't anything to get rich at all.  Why do you think there are no American runners finishing in the top 3 usually......it's b/c they can't make a decent living doing it.  The Kenyans win a $30,000 race and their rich in their country.  Even the small local races that will have say $300 to the winner, the fastest guys come from the whole area and only 1 can be the winner!  Let's face it the big sports make the millions of $$ b/c people watch them and they draw big money.  As a runner, sad to say but not many really watch running.  Hope this helped explain your ?

Answer 4

A former college teammate of mine makes $20,000 a year for professional running. He runs on a team through a running shoe store. He is also employed by the shoe store. In addition to his 20k a year, they pay for his housing, race entry fees, and any doctors visits he needs for injuries he might have. All in all, I would say a decent deal for a young runner. It's like having 20k in the pocket, not too many other expenses.

Answer 5

To give you an idea, the Boston Marathon awards $150,000 to the male/female winners and $1,500 to the 15th-place finishers. The Bloomsday run (50,000 strong 12K in Spokane, Wash.) awards $7,000 to the winners and $200 to the 15th-place finisher.

Also, it's really hard to win every single race, but on the other hand top runners do get endorsement deals. Not sure what elite runners average for total salary though.