Women in Athletics
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