SANTA BARBARA, CA. - With the Flora London and Boston Marathons this weekend and the spring marathon season in full stride, it is time again for USATF Road Running Information Center's annual marathon report.

Monday's 108th Boston Marathon illustrates how much marathon demographics have evolved since the 1970s Running Boom era. In 1975, female finishers were only 1.5% of the field (28 of 1,846 overall finishers). The female percentage continued to increase impressively to 11.7% in 1985, 35% in 2000 and 37% in 2003 as the absolute finisher totals grew respectively (3,930, 15,668 and 17,030). Boston has also experienced a gradual increase in the age of marathoners, although its very large masters pool (53% - up from 48% in 2000) is affected by the qualifying entry process.

A more general look at all 2003 marathons that provided results to USATF RRIC shows consistency over the last 6 years (see charts below). The median age for marathon finishers (39 for men, 34 for women) has not changed since 1998 and the overall median age has only increased by 1 year to 38. Also, the percent of women (40%), masters (43%) and juniors (2%) has not varied by more than one percentage point. Younger women are still the majority of runners under-30 (55%) while men comprise 69% of the masters group (40 and over).

Of course from city-to-city and year-to-year, marathon fields vary more significantly. The 2000 New York City Marathon, for example, had the lowest percent of female finishers (28.4) of the larger U.S. marathons tracked that year but in the 2003 ING- sponsored edition, 34% of the finishers were women. Another large marathon with significant increases in female participation was Honolulu which increased from 42% in 2000 to 48% in 2003. The highest female percent for both 2000 and 2003 occurred at Portland with 58% and 57% respectively. The large marathon with the smallest percent of masters was LaSalle Bank Chicago (33% both years) and the largest number of juniors (19 and under) can be found at the City of Los Angeles Marathon (8.5% in 2000 and 11% in 2003) which has the successful "Students Run L.A." training program.

As the Median Times chart below illustrates, marathoners were a little faster in 2003 (4:19:52 for men, 4:52:55 for women) compared to 2002, but still significantly slower than in the 1980s and 90s. The data also shows that there is a much bigger difference between men and women's times than between older and younger runners. An average male masters runner could expect to run about 7 minutes slower than an under-30 male, whereas the typical female masters runner might run 15 minutes slower than her under-30 counterpart.

DEMOGRAPHIC BREAKDOWN 1980-2003

Year----1980---1995---1998---1999---2000---2002--- 2003
Women---10.5%---26%----34%----36%----38%----40%----40%
Masters--26%-----41%----40%----42%----44%----43%----43%
Juniors--5%------2%-----1%-----1%-----2%-----2%-----2%

MEDIAN TIMES
--------1980------1995------2002------2003
Males---3:32:17---3:54:00---4:20:01---4:19:52
Females-4:03:39---4:15:00---4:56:46---4:52:55

MEDIAN AGE
------------------1980---1995---1998---2000---2002--2003
Males--------------34-----38-----38-----38-----39----39
Females------------31-----35-----34-----35-----34----35
Median Age Overall-na-----na-----37-----37-----37-----3