The world of running is getting a little more inclusive, thanks to the efforts of nonbinary athletes.
The Boston Marathon will allow runners to register in a separate nonbinary division for the first time in the race’s 125-year history, the Boston Athletic Association announced on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the London Marathon followed suit, with organizers announcing a nonbinary registration option in the race’s mass participation division. Both races are scheduled to take place in April 2023.
According to the BAA’s updated guidelines for qualification, runners who have completed a marathon “as a nonbinary participant” within the qualification window (September 1, 2021 through September 16, 2022) may apply to run in the new division during the Boston Marathon.
“While we do not currently have qualifying standards for non-binary athletes, we are working on ways non-binary participants are accepted into the event,” the organization stated, noting that the first qualifying standards will match the BAA’s standards for female runners, which vary based on age group.
“As we prepare for future races, participants can expect non-binary times to be updated accordingly,” the guidelines currently read, emphasizing that “discussions are ongoing” with nonbinary runners as to the best way to proceed. “We view this first year as an opportunity to learn and grow together.”
On social media, transgender and nonbinary athletes celebrated the news as another step towards full inclusion of LGBTQ+ people in sports. “EXCITING NEWS!” enthused Jake Fedorowski, founder of the Guide to Non-Binary Inclusion in Running. Nikki Hiltz, a nonbinary runner and gold medalist at the 2019 Pan American Games, echoed the sentiment on Twitter, writing “[t]here’s still so much work to be done but I’m thrilled that nonbinary runners are being acknowledged by the Boston Marathon and BAA.”
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The announcements are the latest in a series of falling dominoes over the past year for runners with genders outside the binary. With the Boston and London Marathon announcements, five out of six of the World Marathon Majors races — a group comprising some of the world’s largest road races — have established nonbinary racing divisions; the only remaining holdout is Tokyo.
In 2021, the Philadelphia Distance Run became the first U.S. road race to welcome nonbinary runners up to the elite level, followed swiftly by the NYC Marathon; earlier this year, the Brooklyn Marathon and Half-marathon also included separate categories for nonbinary runners. Some participants in those races criticized the qualifying standards used, which were often calculated by splitting the difference between the male and female standards. That approach, nonbinary runner Jake Caswell told Runners World, “kind of perpetuates the stereotype that nonbinary and gender nonconforming individuals fall within the spectrum, within this middle ground.” But we can expect such guidelines to continue to evolve over the coming years.
Registration for next year’s Boston Marathon closes September 16, and opens for the London Marathon on October 1.
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