Nov 4, 2021
“They [the men] didn't like it when we beat them, but they were very accepting and very encouraging. It was always the officials that were the problem, you know, and it's just two different classes of people. And they get their kicks from enforcing the rules. We got our kicks from being in shape.”
Judy Shapiro-Ikenberry ran in her first track meet at age 12, and her first Olympic Trials, in the 800 meters, at age 17. She continued to train and took on longer distances while working as a teacher. She won her first marathon, the 1967 Las Vegas Marathon, in 3:40:51, and in 1974 won the first U.S. marathon championship for women in 2:55:18. She later moved to ultrarunning and won the national 50-mile track championship in 1977. In the late 1970s, she and her coach/husband Dennis Ikenberry started Race Central, a race timing company that helped put on some of the biggest races in the U.S. and around the world.