Be a Badass

While I was running this morning, I got to thinking about the history of women in running. Did you know that just 53 years ago, in 1961, the Amateur Athletic Union banned women from participating in all U.S. road races? This was in an era when women were expected to be feminine, calm, weak, slender, and submissive. Women were strongly discouraged from strenuous activity, being told that exercise and running would give them masculine physiques and cause reproductive problems (did you know running can make your uterus fall out?!). The longest sanctioned race available to women was 1.5 miles.

Can you imagine, in this day and age, being told you aren't allowed to do something because you are a woman? Luckily, most of us grew up knowing we could do anything we wanted, and we probably take that for granted most of the time. Of course we still face challenges in certain areas of life as a result of being women -- I changed my college major from Geography to Sociology because I felt so unwelcome in the football-player-dominated Geography Department -- but we know that we would never be actually prohibited from doing something we wanted to do.

Women who tried to enter marathons back in those days were actually told that women were  incapable of running such long distances. They had doctors backing them up with medical advice that distance running was detrimental to the health of women. Women who just wanted to run and participate in prestigious events like the Boston Marathon were politely, or impolitely, told they were not welcome.

Enter the badass. Roberta ("Bobbi") Gibb loved running and ran up to 40 miles per day in her normal life. When she attempted to register for the Boston Marathon, she was rejected. Instead of accepting that fate, she hid in some bushes at the start line in 1966 and ran the entire course unofficially, finishing in the top 1/3 of the field. Then she returned and ran again in 1967, where she was one of two women to finish (she finished an hour ahead of the other woman, Kathrine Switzer). In 1968, there were 5 women. In 1972, the race organizers finally created a women's division. For the 100th anniversary of the Boston Marathon in 1996, she was given three gold medals for winning the yet-to-be sanctioned women's division in 1966, 1967, and 1968, and her name was inscribed on the Marathon Memorial in Copley Square, along with all the other winners.

Kathrine Switzer got a race bib in 1967 by registering under the name KV Switzer. She lined up at the start with all the other runners, and started the race. When the race manager, Jock Semple, saw her running, he became enraged and actually assaulted her, trying to tear her race bib off. Her boyfriend came to the rescue and pushed Semple off the course. (Semple has since said he was fine with women running the course, but was angry because he felt he had been tricked by her.) Switzer became quite famous as the first woman to finish the Boston Marathon, but Roberta Gibb was actually the first a year earlier.

Regardless of the details, these two women were badasses. I can't even imagine the fear and uncertainty they faced when doing something so outrageous in that sexist climate. They faced being unwelcome, shouldered-out of the race, physically harmed, and even arrested. But they loved running, and felt it was unfair that they had to do it alone or in secret or just for "fun."

Running is so hard. It is a huge physical challenge. And these women had to not only prepare for the race physically, but also muster the courage to face these huge obstacles. When I'm at home preparing to go out and run, debating about how far I'll go, kind of feeling sad and dreading this really hard thing I'm about to do, I am going to remember these two women and the enormous challenges they faced, and overcame, just so they could run.

Why do I run? Because I can.