How did they find out, and what happened when they did? GARCIA-NAVARRO: The race organizers realized there was a woman on the course, of course. And when the entry form went in, they thought it was from a man. The only thing that challenged it was how I signed my name. We signed up using the correct entry form and had our travel permits and our AAU cards. And, you know, when I told him that I really wanted to try and he said he didn't believe a woman could do it, I was bound and determined to prove him wrong. And he didn't believe a woman could do it, but he loved running with me and telling me stories about the Boston Marathon. SWITZER: Well, I entered the race simply because my coach had been a 15-time Boston Marathon runner. Tell us a little bit about how you did that and what - and the story behind that.

So people were afraid and they just went about their lives that way and restricted themselves. And, of course, when people hear myths, they believe them because to try otherwise might mean damaging yourself. You'll never be - ever have children, they said. GARCIA-NAVARRO: Really, that they were going to turn into men or that their uterus would be damaged? It was feared that anything longer was going to injure women, that they wouldn't be able to have children or they somehow turned into men. There was nothing about gender in the rulebook in those days because everybody assumed a woman really couldn't run and didn't want to run, and why even bother with it in the rulebook or on the entry form?Īnd in sports, the longest distance in the Olympic Games, in fact, was just 800 meters. SWITZER: In 1967, when I pinned on that bib number, I really wasn't trying to prove anything because a woman had actually run the Boston Marathon the year before by just jumping out of the bushes and running. GARCIA-NAVARRO: So it's hard to imagine these days that women would be banned from running in a marathon. Kathrine Switzer joins me now from Boston. Now she's prepping to run it again at the age of 70. As with many sports, it used to be a men's-only event until 50 years ago, when Kathrine Switzer became the first woman to wear a Boston bib number and race.

The Boston Marathon is tomorrow, one of the marquee events for distance runners around the world.

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