Can women compete with men in running?

Join us in an exploration of running data from the Finse Piste in Leuven to uncover both differences and similarities between men and women in amateur running and find out whether a fair competition between the sexes is possible.

Running equality between sexes?

Distinctions between men and women in society are disappearing left and right. However, the distinction remains in sports, especially in running. Of course, there are physical differences, but are there other factors which contribute to the difference in performance between men and women? And can we reduce the gap one way or the other? We use data from the running app Strava to find out.

Running habits

Men and women run on the same days

Is it likely that women don’t run on Wednesdays because the kids are home from school? Could it be that women run more on weekends because their partners are at home? There seems to be no clear relation between the runners’ sex and day of the week.

Men and women run at the same times

The solitary nature of running might put women in a more vulnerable position, especially at night. Could this mean that women prefer to run at safer hours of the day? Note that the graph on the right only reflects data from a well-lit running track.

Men and women prefer the same weather

Do men favor colder temperatures? Are women fond of the heat? The graph on the left shows minimal differences between men and women when it comes to running in different weather conditions.

🏃‍♀️ = 🏃‍♂️

Habits are comparable

It does appear that male and female runners have a lot in common. The performance gap between men and women, however, remains. Does this mean that the differences in performance can only be attributed to physical aspects?

Meet our women

Katrien

Katrien is a 35 year old woman from Antwerp. She is an Olympic athlete and, on average, goes for a run three times a week. She totals over 30 kilometers a week and enjoys competition.

Linsey

Linsey is a 24 year old woman from Tienen. She is an aspiring runner, but she does not yet have a consistent running routine. Both her pace and the distances she runs vary. That being said, she does enjoy a social run with friends.

Katrien and Linsey are two regular runners of varying skill levels. Can they compete in a fair competition against men?

Analysis

To analyse the performance of men and women, we need to know how fast they run. The plot below shows the distribution of 1000m running times for men and women. The peak around 5' shows that the majority of men can run 1 km in around 5 minutes, while the same peak is around 6'30" for women. On average, women are thus a minute and a half slower per kilometer. We also see that the distribution for women is more spread out. Our professional runner is at the fast end of this spread-out distribution, while our aspiring runner is quite slow. The performance variety among women may indicate that there are proportionately more beginner runners among women than among men. Another possibility is that the female runners in general are less competitive. We will explore these possibilities further below.

You can explore how our men and women would fare in a race against each other below. Notice that when we pit men and women against each other "as-is", only one woman will reach the top 20. Click the button below to see the fictional race play out before your eyes.

Where does the difference in performance between men and women come from?

Physical differences

While running habits may not affect performance, one aspect that has been proven to play a role is the physical differences between men and women. Click the flashing dots to find out what those differences are and how they impact running performance.

Competitiveness

Competitiveness may influence how hard runners are willing to push themselves in order to outperform others. It can also have an effect on the motivation to break your own records and reach beyond your limits. We relate competitiveness to Strava premium memberships, since you need a premium subscription to get into the nitty-gritty details of your running performance. Drag the slider to estimate the ratio of Strava premium memberships across sexes. Who do you think is more competitive?

Different goals

What someone wants to achieve through running may very well influence their training schedule, training load and overall performance. Who do you think these different goals belong to? Drag the different goals to try and match them with the correct sex. These goals are based on research by Larsen et al. (2021).

Ready, set, go

Let’s organize some races! As a reminder, this is what would happen "as-is" if we let men and women run in the same competition.

Closing the gap based on age

We explore two different ways of organizing a fair competition between the sexes. The first method is to match younger women with older men, who might have become slower by age. Try to find age groups across sexes which lead to a fair competition. Pick an age group for the men on the left and for the women on the right of the graph. Do their running times match up? You can also watch your two groups run against each other in real-time on the map below and see what the leaderboard would look like.

Can you close the performance gap based on age alone?

Boost women

What would happen if we subtract a fixed amount of time from women’s performances?

Move the slider underneath the graph to the left to give the women a fixed advantage per kilometer and try to close the gap! Watch the leaderboard change as the boost increases.

Problem solved?

Men and women have the same interests in running and share the same habits. Still, men outperform women as a result of physical and other differences. Though we propose some solutions to close the gap, it remains an open problem with no ideal solution.

Can you think of a better way for men and women to compete together?