Kathrine Switzer

Kathrine Virginia Switzer (born January 5, 1947) is an American marathon runner, author, and television commentator.

Her family returned to the United States in 1949.

She graduated from George C. Marshall High School in Fairfax County, Virginia, then attended Lynchburg College.

In 1957, race officials had to dissuade local police from arresting him for attempted assault after he made a flying tackle at a racer running in webbed snorkeler's shoes and a grotesque mask because "the guy was runnin' with the good runners."

at the 6.5 mi mark.

To Semple, women competing were as out of line as the costume-wearing pranksters he attacked and decried as "weirdies."

Semple ran at Switzer and tried to rip her race number off to prevent her from continuing as an official competitor.

In her memoir, she wrote:

Semple's attack removed one of Switzer's gloves, but not her race number.

When Switzer's slightly-built 50 year old coach Arnie Briggs attempted to protect Switzer, Semple knocked him to the ground.

In the mid-1960s he chased a contestant running in an Uncle Sam outfit, repeatedly dashing cups of water in the runner's face.

In 1966, Bobbi Gibb had tried to enter the race officially but had been rejected by BAA Director Will Cloney who claimed women were physiologically incapable of running 26 miles.

Gibb completed the 1966 race ahead of two-thirds of the runners with a time of 3:21:40, having entered the course near the starting pen in the middle of the pack.

But Gibb was not an official entrant.

Kathrine Switzer had decided she would run as an official competitor.

Switzer registered using her assigned AAU number, and paid the full race fee.

The required certificate of fitness and the application signature she provided were both submitted under the name 'K.V. Switzer.' Switzer later said she signed the application "as I always sign my name."

She also stated that her name had been misspelled on her birth certificate, so she often used her initials to avoid confusion.

She had a male runner collect her bib - number 261 - before the race.

Switzer's father was supportive of his daughter's entry into the race, and on race day, other runners assembling for the start greeted her with support and enthusiasm, leading her to feel "very welcome".

She ran among others from her running club, including coach Arnie Briggs and her boyfriend Tom Miller.

As Gibb had the year earlier, Switzer wore a hooded sweatshirt, but a few miles into the course, the hood slipped off and it became clear that a woman was running the Boston Marathon as an official entrant.

At this point according to a Sports Illustrated report, race co-director Jock Semple jumped off the following press truck and charged after Switzer.

Semple did much of the actual organizing of the race, processed most of the applications, and wrangled the mob of runners to the start of the course on race day.

He was also a strict traditionalist who considered the marathon to be "sacred," and was infamous for charging angrily after participants he found insufficiently serious about the race.

In the year 1967 she became the first woman to run the Boston Marathon as an officially registered competitor.

During her run, the race manager Jock Semple assaulted Switzer, trying to grab her bib number and thereby remove her from official competition.

After knocking down Switzer's trainer and fellow runner, Arnie Briggs, when he tried to protect her, Semple was shoved to the ground by Switzer's boyfriend, Thomas Miller, who was running with her, and she completed the race.

As a result of her run, the AAU banned women from competing in races against men.

She transferred to Syracuse University in 1967, where she studied journalism and English literature.

By the winter of 1967, Switzer was training for the upcoming Boston Marathon, tackling courses in Syracuse and on the roads between Syracuse and Cazenovia, New York, 20 miles away.

The rule book for the Boston Marathon made no mention of gender.

The AAU, which governed the Marathon, declared that women could not compete in AAU-sanctioned races over a mile and a half.

This exclusion of women from a premier athletic event was already drawing high-profile challenges.

She earned a bachelor's degree there in 1968 and a master's degree in 1972.

After transferring from Lynchburg to Syracuse, Switzer sought permission to train with the men's cross-country running program.

Permission was granted, and cross-country assistant coach Arnie Briggs began training with her.

Briggs insisted a marathon was too far for a "fragile woman" to run, but he conceded to Switzer: "If any woman could do it, you could, but you would have to prove it to me. If you ran the distance in practice, I’d be the first to take you to Boston."

It was not until 1972 that the Boston Marathon established an official women's race.

Switzer was born in Amberg, American-occupied zone of Germany, the daughter of a major in the United States Army.