First woman to run the Boston Marathon
2016-04-19 00:28:58.384924+02 by Dan Lyke 0 comments
We watched the real-time displays this morning as a coworker finished Boston in 2:41. Fifty years ago, Roberta ‘Bobbi’ Gibb defied social norms when, with a hoodie over her head, she rose from her hiding spot in Hopkinton and ran 26.2 miles into history.
Two months earlier, she had written from her home in San Diego to the Boston Athletic Association to request a marathon application. Race director Will Cloney sent her a terse reply, essentially: No, she could not enter. The Boston Marathon is sanctioned by the Amateur Athletics Union, and AAU regulations prohibit women from racing more than 1.5 miles. Besides, the reply went, women are not physiologically capable of covering 26.2 miles on foot.
How far we've come. And how far we have left to go.