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Notes -
I know very little about the topic, but isn't there a fourth possibility: that getting a good absolute ranking in the race is what motivates people to try really hard? A woman in the race you described could kill herself training and still not crack the top 50, which might be a disincentive. If this is true, then having separate events for men and women (or, at least, separate rankings) might result in more serious female competitors.
Good addition! I never even considered that, to be honest. I don't think it's particularly likely, because the guys that are relatively high still aren't actually all that high in the running world and can only finish somewhere like 25th because it's not a big deal of a race (and there's no money involved). Someone finishing in that range would expect to finish out of the top thousand at marathon majors and really isn't even competitive with the guys a few rungs higher. But sure, I could see there being some demotivating aspect for women knowing that you have to be very, very good to beat mediocre guys, so you're never going to get the experience of being close to the absolute lead. This would also match up with my anecdotal impression that basically all of the competitive women ran in college - that gave them the opportunity to develop in an environment where they actually were leading.
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