Imagine: Rocky mountains, hidden in the overcast gloom of the Welsh countryside. Days of merciless rocky terrain, with a daily trek of nearly 65 km and a 3000 m elevation gain. The grand total? 300 km over the course of five gruesome days. This is the Dragon’s Back Race, an ultra-marathon that has competitors running for anywhere from 8-15 hours a day to complete the course.
The most surprising part? The women who enter are three times more likely to finish it than the men. Not only that, but they are expected to win. And this isn’t a freak occurrence – in almost every ultra-distance race, women runners are competitive with their male counterparts for the entire duration of the race.
When I first learned about this ultra-distance phenomena, I was hiking with some teammates in the San Gabriel foothills. We had been discussing the idea of humans as a predatory animal; in ancient times, our only advantage to hunting was the fact that we could literally walk animals to death. Humans would simply follow mammoths until they dropped dead from exhaustion or became weak enough to pick off. Somehow, we diverged from this topic of prehistoric hunting techniques to the incredible feats of ultra-marathon runners, and a friend brought up the fact that at a certain distance (~100 miles) women started to keep pace or even surpass men in endurance.
This surprised me because all of my life I had been kinda bummed at the fact that women could simply never compete with men at certain sports. Sure, as a gymnast my shorter frame was an advantage for fast turns and spins, but as a rower and sprint swimmer it was the complete opposite. You were only competitive if you were tall – at or above 6 ft for girls – and built like an Amazonian warrior. At a very hopeful 5’5, this was disappointing. (Luckily for me, I discovered lightweight rowing – a place for genetically-cursed, pint-size athletes like myself) But even if I were built like Hippolyta, I would be hard pushed to keep up with males of similar size.
But in ultra-distance, something starts to happen. Physiologically, men still have bigger hearts, lungs, muscles, and higher VO2 maxes, which means they are still more likely to win a lot of the races. However, they are also far more likely to drop out and be passed by women towards the end of the race.
Women have a few very distinct physical advantages. First of all, their size. Typically, women runners are smaller than men and as a result, their muscles don’t fatigue as fast. This is coupled with the fact that women’s muscles typically consist of more slow-twitch fibers, which are utilized long-duration, low-intensity activity, while men have more fast-twitch fibers for short, explosive movements.
And while a smaller size is a disadvantage for the ascent portions of long runs, there are huge benefits for the downhill – with less mass and shorter legs, and subsequently a higher running cadence, women have a more efficient stride with less strain on their quads and joints.
The other big key is metabolism. While running, women can end up burning 75% more fat than men, who rely more on carbohydrates as their source of energy, especially given their typical higher start speeds. Fat burns more slowly as a fuel than carbs, so it lasts longer and women can avoid hitting “the wall” with the same splat that some male athletes do.
Interestingly enough, it also appears that confidence plays is a huge reason as to why why women perform better than men at these distances. A quick professional digression: In a study sponsored by Hewlett-Packard, it was revealed that men will typically apply to a higher level management job when they only meet 60% of the requirements, while women will not apply unless they meet 100% of the criteria. This same trends shows itself on the scene of ultra-distance running – women won’t sign up for a race unless they are truly confident in their training and their abilities, while men are more likely to sign up with bravado.
That being said, the differences can also be linked to cultural conditioning. Women tend to be more detail-oriented, and will focus on the upkeep part of distance running – route planning, hydration, proper footcare, and other fine details that can make or break a race.
All of these factors – the small physiological differences, a higher metabolic efficiency, and the attention to detail in preparation – have allowed women to stay in the running with their male counterparts during ultra-distance races.