In a New Nonbinary Category, One Marathoner Finally Feels at Home

This Chicago Marathon felt different for Cal Calamia. More than a homecoming, it was an opportunity to prove a point about enduring resilience and finding one’s true path.

“When I come back here, I remember what it felt like to grow up in a place where queerness was not talked about even neutrally,” said Calamia, who was raised in a Chicago suburb and ran this race in 2018 and 2019.

“It was spoken about negatively, and this was not very long ago. A big part of being here and running this race is reclaiming this place, which left me with a lot of emotional scars.”

On Sunday morning, Calamia, 26, a former college cross-country runner who finished the San Francisco Marathon in July in three hours flat, ran Chicago’s fast, flat course surrounded by thousands of runners.

Down Michigan Avenue and Lake Shore Drive. Through Chinatown and Lincoln Park. Everything felt achingly familiar.

There was a major difference this year, though. Calamia competed in a newly created category for nonbinary runners.

After spending years sorting out the deepest questions of their identity, Calamia, in 2019, began hormone therapy and had chest masculinization surgery. Today, they identify as nonbinary transmasculine.

Calamia uses both he and they pronouns. Their brown, wavy hair falls an inch or so below the nape of their neck. Calamia’s wide, easy smile is the constant as the rest of their body changes — “Every couple of months, I just look back on who I was a couple months before and I’m like, ‘Oh my goodness, who is that?’”

This year, just as Calamia is feeling more and more confident with this new self, the Chicago Marathon for the first time featured not just men’s and women’s groupings but also a category for runners who identify as nonbinary. Calamia and about 70 others signed up.

The Chicago race is now part of a movement that deserves notice from anyone who cares about expanding the old limits of gender identity and creating more opportunities for athletes of all identities in sports. The New York City Marathon added a nonbinary division in 2021. Berlin featured the category at its race last month. Boston and London plan to add the category to their major races next year.

And it’s not just the biggest races. Over 200 smaller road races throughout the United States have opened up in the same way, according to a database established by a nonbinary runner, Jake Fedorowski.

These steps toward inclusion in distance running have taken place quietly. They have received little fanfare and occurred without the polarizing debate seen in several other sports, where the fight by trans athletes to compete on equal footing has become a significant battlefront.

As just one example, swimming’s global governing body in June barred athletes who have experienced any part of male puberty from competing as women. Trans women must now compete in a category of their own, a move many read as discriminatory and stigmatizing.

Trans runners have long been able to choose their gender category in road races, but until recently, the choices were only male or female. The nonbinary division adds a strong measure of complexity, and opportunity, to the mix.

Nonbinary people, Calamia said, are “demanding to be seen, in spite of those who do not want us to exist.”

Being seen, though, comes with risk. In the run-up to the Chicago race, Calamia received a smattering of news media attention, which prompted the usual gutter dwellers to deliver unhinged froth to the runner’s social media accounts.

“I hope you rot in hell,” said one post.

“Face it, you are NOT normal, and that is not something to celebrate, single out and take pride in,” barked another.

The hatred only steeled Calamia’s determination to make new memories.

Growing up in a Chicago suburb, they had done everything right — excelling in the classroom, playing soccer, basketball and softball, and running on a high school state championship cross-country team. Calamia eventually ran for St. Louis University.

None of this was easy. Not moving through childhood and teenage years feeling trapped in their own body.

Not hiding who they really are.

Not growing up with little support for their emerging identity, in a place where smirking, hateful attitudes toward gays and lesbians were often spoken without hesitation, and transgender issues were not even on the radar.

Calamia, who now lives in San Francisco and teaches health and journalism courses at a high school, tried to put all those memories aside during the race. There was a goal to attain: Finish in under three hours.

Doing so would once again mean putting up a qualifying time for the Boston Marathon in the men’s, women’s and nonbinary categories, a feat Calamia achieved while placing first for nonbinary runners in the San Francisco Marathon this summer.

It helped that there were welcome distractions during Sunday’s race. The magnificence of Chicago, for one, plus friends and a few supportive family members who gathered on the side of the course every few miles.

They cheered, cajoled, and proudly held up bright green signs with hand-drawn phrases of encouragement for Cal and the roughly six dozen others in their category:

FAST HAS NO GENDER! read one.

CATCH ME IF U TRANS! read another.

Calamia felt confident, keeping up their light stride while heading ever closer to the finish line.

Then came Mile 20, the danger zone for all marathoners. Each step suddenly felt like a slog, as if there were hot cement in Calamia’s shoes.

Calamia noticed handfuls of runners slowing to a walk, a few of them collapsing on the pavement.

Calamia searched deeply for motivation.

Mile 23. This is for everyone watching to see what happens to nonbinary runners in these races.

Mile 24. This is for my younger self and the struggles I faced.

Mile 25. This is for my uncle, supportive through it all.

Finally, there it was, Mile 26. Crossing the finish line, Calamia raised their arms and looked skyward. Searing pain ripped across their legs and chest.

Finishing time: 2 hours 58 minutes 50 seconds.

Calamia’s goose bumps, a sign of euphoria and joy, gave way to a measure of frustration with the details surrounding the race.

Winners in the men’s, women’s and wheelchair divisions were able to run through the customary champion’s tape at the finish line. There was no tape for the nonbinary winner.

Calamia placed second in the division, but there was no prize money or any other kind of recognition other than the same brushed silver medal given to each of the race’s finishers.

Still, Calamia’s race felt like a fresh beginning.

“I felt like my body is capable,” they said. “Like I am out here with this body that some would consider wrong in whatever way, and you know what? I am good at running. Good, despite the criticism from people who try to keep me from doing what I love or being what I am.”

And good enough to keep going. “For me,” Calamia added, “this is just the start.”