Outside: She's In My Rear View

Are Women Closing in on Men at the Boston Marathon?
Alex Hutchinson/Outside, Jan 28, 2019

A detailed analysis of historical Boston results wades into the long-running debate on sex differences in endurance

Back in 1992, scientists at UCLA made a surprising prediction in Nature. Since women’s marathon times were improving more quickly than men’s, they forecast that women would surpass men in 1998. While that didn’t come to pass, the idea that women might be closing the gap in endurance races persists, thanks to the feats of athletes like Jasmin Paris, the ultrarunner who shattered the overall course record in the 168-mile Montane Spine Race in Britain earlier this month, and Camille Herron, who beat the entire field while setting a women’s 24-hour running record in December.

But you can only learn so much from individual stories, no matter how remarkable. That’s where a new analysis in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research comes in...

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NYTimes - Anything You Can Do She Can Do Better

The Woman Who Outruns the Men, 200 Miles at a Time
Rebecca Byerly/NY Times, December 5, 2018

Courtney Dauwalter specializes in extremely long races. But her success in winning them has opened a debate about how men’s innate strength advantages apply to endurance sports...

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Outside Online: Pain and Getting Chicked

The Longer the Race, the Stronger We Get 
Meaghen Brown//Outside Online, Apr 11, 2017

 At the outer edges of endurance sports, something interesting is happening: women are beating men. 

Among the world’s most celebrated long-distance footraces, the Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc is known for being particularly brutal.

The 106-mile course through the French, Swiss, and Italian Alps climbs more than 33,000 feet as it loops around its namesake peak. The weather can be savage—heavy rain, frigid nights, hot and humid days. In August 2013, Rory Bosio took off from the start line without grand expectations, having never won a major event. She trailed well behind the leaders for the first six hours. But as the race stretched into the evening and most competitors slowed, ­Bosio held her pace. When the lanky, brown-haired American runner in pink shoes and a blue running skirt crossed the finish line in 22 hours 37 minutes, she’d destroyed the women’s record by two and a half hours. Bosio took seventh place overall, becoming the first woman to crack the top ten at the event and beating dozens of elite pro men...

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