DAVID ISAACSON | Gerda may break Frith’s time, but outshining her feat will be something else

Kenya’s incredible Faith Kipyegon ran an amazing women’s 1,500m world record in Florence last Friday night, clocking 3 min 49.11 sec.

It’s been pointed out that the reigning Olympic and world champion was faster than the winning time of the men’s final at the 2016 Rio Olympics, the 3:50.00 by Matthew Centrowitz of the US.

The men’s decider in Brazil was an absurdly slow race, as was the women’s final, won by Kipyegon in 4:08.92.

The heats and semifinals in the men’s and women’s events were quicker. In fact, Kipyegon’s time would have been too slow to advance out the first round of racing. 

You’d have to go back to London 1948 to find the next men’s final that Kipyegon would have won, when Sweden’s Henry Eriksson came first in 3:49.8. 

And then one has to go to the early 1930s — more than 90 years ago — to find an era where her world record would have consistently beaten the men. At Los Angeles 1932 Italy’s Luigi Beccali won in a 3:51.2 Olympic record.

Two-time Olympic champion Caster Semenya, by the way, would have to go back to 1908 just to get a men’s 800m medal with her 1:54.25 personal best, and to 1904 for gold. 

The gap between men’s and women’s sports is commonly measured in decades and in the 100m freestyle it is closer to half a century.

Australia’s Emma McKeon won the women’s crown at Tokyo 2020 in 51.96, which would have landed her the men’s title every year up until and including Mexico City 1968.

Remember Johnny Weissmuller, the winner of five Olympic golds from 1924 and 1928 who went on to gain further fame playing Tarzan in Hollywood? He won the 100m free titles in Olympic records of 59.0 and then 58.6, but he would have got smashed by McKeon. 

Weissmuller wouldn’t even have made it out of the women’s heats in Tokyo. 

It took Mark Spitz, clocking 51.22, at Munich 1972 to stop McKeon’s run (she would have finished fourth). 

Another great female performance was delivered by Billie Jean King in the famous Battle of the Sexes tennis match in 1973 when she downed the misogynistic Bobby Riggs, winner of six Grand Slam singles titles from 1939-1949.

While that proved to be a terrific win for women’s tennis, it’s worth bearing in mind that Riggs was 55 years old. 

I would argue that the single greatest performance by a woman against men must be Frith van der Merwe’s 15th place overall at the Comrades Marathon in 1989.

Her 5hr 54 min 43 sec best time for a women’s Down run would have won every men’s Down run up until 1961, with the exception of 1953. Her effort was just 28 years behind the men.

That day Van der Merwe overtook four-time winner Alan Robb, who went on to finish 17th overall, and Johnny Halberstadt, another legend of local road-running.

With about 30km to go, as she closed in on Graham Fraser, the favourite for the veteran’s title, he suddenly packed it in, turning around and heading in the opposite direction, my old colleague, Larry Lombaard, wrote in Business Day.

Van der Merwe was elated. “One thing is for sure, the day is fast approaching when a woman will claim gold among the top 10.”

Time has shown that her optimism was, well, over-optimistic.

The best women’s result since then was Gerda Steyn’s 17th position as she set the 5:58:53 best time for the Comrades Up run in 2019 (that would have won the 1968 race, 51 years earlier). Since then the winning woman has placed as low as 275th overall.

After Steyn, Caroline Wostmann’s 25th in 2015 was next best, and most have been inside the top 100.

Steyn returns to the race this Sunday with pundits, including Van der Merwe, tipping her to lower the women’s Down mark.

Steyn has swept into road-running like a breath of fresh air and there is probably nobody more deserving and more capable of lowering Van der Merwe’s mark, especially on Sunday, on a course that is 1,899m shorter than it was in 1989.

Steyn has a faster marathon personal best than Van der Merwe, who clocked 2:27:36 in Port Elizabeth in 1990. Steyn has been quicker on three occasions — 2:26:51 in London in October 2020, 2:26:25 in Cape Town in October 2021 and her 2:25:28 SA record in Siena in April 2021.

But breaking Van der Merwe’s Down mark is one thing, matching Van der Merwe’s achievement will be another. 

For one thing, Steyn will have to finish at least 15th overall, which is not impossible.

Another is going to be the pace. Frith averaged just over 3 min 57.5 sec a kilometre on her 1989 run, which over the shorter distance on Sunday will translate to a 5:47:11, if my poor maths is to be believed.

But the toughest of all will be equalling Van der Merwe’s 28-year female-to-male-winner gap which would entail going faster than victor Shaun Meiklejohn’s 5:34:02 from 1995. 

That would require Steyn running an average of 3 min 48.625 sec a kilometre, which seems a stretch given that her best average over 42.195km is 3 min 26.849 sec.

Then again, Van der Merwe surprised herself in 1989 by running 20-odd minutes faster than she had expected. If Steyn were to go 20 minutes faster than the fans are anticipating she could get frighteningly close.

But she will need to produce magic to get there, just as Van der Merwe did 34 years ago.