Nina Kuscsik

Nina Kuscsik (born January 2, 1939 ) is an American pioneer of marathon running for women.

Live and act

In 1967 Kuscsik started running. Since women were not allowed to take part in long-distance races by association regulations at the time, she ran unannounced in the Boston Marathon in 1969 and took 3:46 hours for the distance.

In other unofficial starts the following year, she finished in Boston in 3:12:16 h and at the Yonkers Marathon in 3:16:02 h. In September she was the only female participant in the premiere of the New York City Marathon , but was in poor health and did not reach the goal. In October, the Road Runners Club of America held an in-house championship that also allowed women. Kuscsik was second with a time of 3:15:07 h, behind Sara Mae Berman .

In 1971 it ran unofficially in Boston for the third time and improved to 3:09:00 h. In the second edition of the New York City Marathon, the three-hour mark was beaten for the first time in a competition by women; however, Kuscsik had to admit defeat in 2:56:04 h to the owner of the world record, Beth Bonner , who triumphed in 2:55:22 h.

In 1972 women were first admitted in Boston. Kuscsik won in 3:10:26 h and was also ahead in New York City this year. In 1973 she was second in Boston and won again in New York City. In 1974, she finished fifth at the premiere of the US Women's Marathon Championship and third in Boston. In the International Marathon in Waldniel, organized especially for women by Ernst van Aaken , she came in eighth. In 1976 she was seventh in the New York City Marathon , which was first held as a city ​​run . In 1977 she finished third in the US championship with her personal best of 2:50:22 h, and set a US record over 50 miles (80.5 km) on November 5 in New York City with 6:35:53 h and finished fourth in the Honolulu Marathon .

In the following years she turned to cycling and running up stairs . From 1979 to 1981 she won the Empire State Building Run-Up three times in a row .

In 1999 she was inducted into the National Distance Running Hall of Fame .

Nina Kuscsik is a nurse and works as a patient counselor at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City. She has written numerous articles on women's running for trade and fitness magazines; She was also instrumental in changing the official association rules to enable women to participate in long-distance races on an equal footing and to make the women's marathon an Olympic discipline. She is a member of various committees for long distance running for USA Track & Field and was on the board of the New York Road Runners. The divorced mother of three lives in Huntington's disease .

literature

• The History of Women's Participation in the Marathon. In: Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. Volume 301, October 1977, pp. 862–876 ( doi : 10.1111 / j.1749-6632.1977.tb38253.x )
• Gordon Bakoulis: First Steps. A Handful of Female Marathon Pioneers Inspired a Generation of Women Runners . In: Marathon & Beyond. July / August 2001
• Karl Lennartz : marathon run. Volume 3: Women - Born Marathon Runners. Verlag Werbung UM Sport, Lohmar 2007, ISBN 978-3-9811512-1-3 , p. 762ff.

Web links

• Entry into the National Distance Running Hall of Fame
• Climbing the Empire State Building , portrait of Jen Murphy in The Wall Street Journal , February 3, 2009