But others have made similar predictions of what seems to be a diminishing gender gap in athletics. In 1992, Brian Whippand Susan Ward carried out a similar study based on the winning times of five Olympic running events that took placebetween 1900 and 1992, from the 200-meters sprint to the 26-mile marathon.They found that, over the shorter distances, women were improving at about double the rate of the men.Over the longer distances the rate of improvement of the women was even faster.Whipp and Ward went on to conclude that by 1998 the gender difference in some races, notably the marathon, will all buthave disappeared - something that did not happen despite the valiant efforts of Paula Radcliffe who last year shaved almosttwo minutes off the world record she set in 2002.The problem for any armchair analysis of world records and Olympic running times is that it cannot get round the fact thatmen and women are fundamentally different in their physiology and build.
Women of the Future Are On Track to Run FasterThan Men
Women of the Future Are On Track to Run Faster Than Men - Women's Sports Foundation Page 1 of 2
mhtml:
Ok, in 2014 the men ran a 2:02:57 in the marathon, the women a 2:20:18
The woman was 5-5 119, the man 5-7 126
So in an event like the marthon we won't see the big differences because it takes a particular size to be a great Marathoner, well that's not true in sprinting. There the difference in size and power between a man and a woman will be very obvious.
Carl Lewis was 6-3 185 pounds, of the top 10 female sprinters in the world in 2014 the biggest one was 5-10 150 and she is huge for a female 100m sprinter.