Women in Athletics
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Joan Benoit, Class of 1979, won the first women’s Olympic marathon in 1984 and the Boston marathon in 1979 and in 1983, when she beat the women’s world record by 2 minutes and 47 seconds with a time of 2:22:42. Because the Bowdoin women’s track team was not established until 1977, Benoit initially trained with the men’s track team. In 1983, Benoit competed in a memorial run for the track coach, Frank “Sabe” Sabasteanski. There, Benoit gave his widow the wreath she had won in Boston and said “When I came to Bowdoin eight years ago, Sabe told me I would have to run with the men, and last Monday I did.”
Joan Benoit, photograph, 1979
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