In 1967, an irate race official, Jock Semple tried to forcibly remove Kathrine Switzer from the then all-male Boston Marathon simply because she was a woman. Luckily for Switzer, it was the official who was bounced out of the race (by her boyfriend), and she went on to finish.
Switzer was inspired by the incident to create running events for over a million women in 27 countries and led the drive to get the women’s marathon event into the Olympic Games in 1984. Switzer is also the winner of the 1974 New York City Marathon, an Emmy Award winning TV commentator on marathons, and author of the best-selling memoir Marathon Woman, Running and Walking for Women Over 40 and co-author of 26.2: Marathon Stories.