Kathrine Switzer, Marathon Pioneer Quiz

Answer: 1947

Kathrine was born January 5th, 1947 to a father who was an army major. According to her website, she started running at the age of twelve because she wanted to join the field hockey team. It was her father who encouraged her to run a mile a day as a way to train for the team. By the time she was twenty years old, she had run her first marathon.

Answer: Germany

Kathrine was born in Amberg, Germany where she spent the first two years of her life. In 1949 her family moved to Virginia, USA and as a teen she attended George C. Marshall High School in Fairfax County, Virginia. After graduating high school she attended Lynchburg College.

Answer: Syracuse

Kathrine studied journalism and English literature at Syracuse University. She transferred there from Lynchburg College in 1967. She received a Bachelor's Degree in 1968 and a Master's Degree in 1972. She wanted to be a sports writer and while studying at Syracuse, she started running with the men's cross-country team as there was no women's running team at the time.

Answer: K.V. Switzer

When Kathrine registered for the 1967 Boston Marathon, female competitors were not allowed. Her coach at the time thought women were too fragile to run long distances and so she ran the marathon distance of 26.2 miles during training to prove him wrong.

She signed up for the marathon under her initials instead of her name because her name was always spelled wrong. Because of this it was not obvious that she was a female competitor. Her participation in the race, however, got her noticed. At the two mile point in the race, the Boston race manager came at her, grabbed her bib and tried to physically stop her from running the race.

Her then-boyfriend stepped in and shoved the race official. Despite having a terrible start to the race and having to run twenty four miles after that, she finished the marathon in four hours and twenty minutes.

She ended up being disqualified from the race and was expelled from the Amateur Athletic Union. Five years later, in 1972, the Boston Marathon opened up the race to female runners.

Answer: New York

Kathrine won the New York City Marathon in 1974 in a time of three hours, seven minutes. This was a major improvement over her time of four hours twenty minutes at the Boston Marathon in 1967. Her personal best marathon time was another huge time improvement and came at the Boston Marathon in 1975.

It was her seventh time running Boston and she ran it in two hours fifty one minutes. She finished in second place. She's also a champion of other women runners and was part of the team that lobbied to get the women's marathon into the Olympic Games.

Answer: Runners World

Kathrine has many accomplishments and accolades for running. "Runners World" named her the Female Runner of the Decade for 1967-1977. They also named her one of the Visionaries of the Century in 2000 and a Hero of Running in 2012. She is one of the first inductees into the National Distance Running Hall of Fame.

When she won the New York City Marathon in 1974, she beat the second place female finisher by twenty-seven minutes which set a record for margin of victory between first and second place runners.

In 2011, she was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame.

Answer: Emmy

Although Kathrine lobbied to get the women's marathon into the Olympic Games, she never ran the marathon at the Olympics. She was a broadcaster at the first Olympic women's marathon in 1984, watching American Joan Benoit take the Gold in that event. Kathrine became a television commentator for marathon events and for her excellence in broadcasting, she won an Emmy award.

Answer: Marathon Woman

Kathrine has written a number of books including "Running and Walking for Women Over 40" which she wrote in 1998. In 2005 she co-authored "26.2 Marathon Stories" with her husband Roger Robinson. In 2007 she wrote her memoir "Marathon Woman" and in April 2008 she was awarded a Billie award for journalism for her portrayal of women in sports.

The Billie awards celebrated the positive portrayal of women in journalism and entertainment.

Answer: 261 Fearless

Kathrine Switzer started the not for profit organization 261 Fearless as a way for women to live healthily, gain self-confidence and find fearlessness through running. The charity name was inspired by the bib number Switzer wore during the 1967 Boston Marathon that race official Jock Semper tried to rip off her shirt.

It has come to symbolize 'fearlessness in the face of adversity.' 261 Fearless is a global organization with clubs in North America, Europe and Africa.

Answer: Retired her bib number

The race official who attacked Switzer on the course of the 1967 Boston Marathon never apologized to her for his behavior but he did give her a kiss when she ran the 1972 Boston race. The two became good friends after that and Switzer has run Boston several times.

In 2017 to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of her historic run, she again ran Boston with the same bib number 261 that she wore in 1967. When she ran Boston in 1967 she was the sole woman on the course. When she ran Boston in 2017 there were over thirteen thousand women runners.

After the 2017 Boston Marathon, the Boston Athletic Association announced that it would not issue bib number 261 to any other runner in the future as a way to honor Switzer.