Background/Purpose: In cross country, women compete over shorter distances than men with little justification for this difference. This study was to assess gender differences for the spread of finishing times and examine the appropriateness of shorter race distances for females.
Method: Forty-six cross country national championship data sets (nmales = 10,788; nfemales = 10,884) from the NCAA (1999-2011) and NAIA (2005-2011) were utilized for analyses. Several measures of variation were computed to assess data spread of finishing times (i.e., coefficient of variation [CV]; interpercentile ranges [IPR], and rates of separation [RS--IPR divided by the distance of the race]).
Analysis/Results: Independent and dependent t-tests revealed significant gender differences on all three variation measures. Males and females differed on CV (Mmales = 3.93, SD = 1.04; Mfemales = 4.84, SD = 1.05, p < .01), as well as each percentile range for IPR and RS. For brevity, one difference is provided for gender differences on IPR and RS. Specifically, males and females differed on IPR5%-95% (Mmales =227.27, SD =68.53; Mfemales = 207.44, SD = 48.23, p < .01) and RS5%-95% (Mmales = 24.84, SD = 6.68; Mfemales = 36.14, SD = 8.56, p < .01). For women, a race distance at 68.6% of the distance of the men could generate equivalent variations between genders.
Conclusions: Finisher times for women's races were more spread out than for men's races when adjusted for distance and time. The spread of finishing times may statistically justify shorter distances for women to increase spectator excitement and efficient race management.
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