Based upon previous research, we hypothesized that increasing air temperature impaired running performance in both elite and sub-elite runners. These effects were analyzed together with sex, country of origin and calendar year. head wind, side wind, tail wind) and barometric pressure (hPa). We considered the effects, over the hours of the event, of average air temperature (☌), total precipitations (mm), wet-bulb globe temperature (WBGT) (☌), wind speed (km/h), wind direction ( i. The aim of the present study was to investigate the role of weather conditions, together with sex and country, on female and male performance in the Boston Marathon from 1972 to 2018 since in 1972 the first women officially participated in a marathon. Therefore, an analysis since the first women entered the race in 1972 and with all female and male finishers including the aspect of nationality is missing. However, the longest investigated period for this race was 36 years and concerned elite and sub-elite performances instead of all finishers. The Boston Marathon has the longest tradition in marathon running (it started in 1897 and the first woman participated in 1972) and several studies investigated the influence of environmental conditions on race performance. However, influences on environmental conditions have been mainly investigated only for limited time periods, whereas no study has covered a period of longer than 36 years. The influence of environmental conditions such as air temperature has been investigated in different marathon races for different performance levels such as top three runners, top ten runners, elite to sub-elite runners or all finishers. Moreover, performance is more negatively affected by environmental conditions for slow runners. It is well-known that environmental conditions have an influence on marathon running performance where unfavorable weather conditions such as high ambient temperatures impair performance in both slow and fast marathoners. To date, the influence of different environmental conditions such as ambient air temperature wind, precipitations, barometric pressure, humidity, dew point, cloud cover, solar irradiation and atmospheric pollutants have been investigated in marathon running performance. Our findings contributed to the knowledge of the performance in Boston Marathon across calendar years, considering as main effects weather conditions, country of origin and sex. The sex differences (men faster than women in all groups) were the largest in near elite groups. Kenyans and Ethiopians were the fastest nationalities. Increasing wind speed was also related to worsened performances in all finishers and near elite groups. Increasing precipitation was significantly ( p<0.05) related to worsened performances in all groups except annual winners. Tail wind improved performances of all groups. Also, the pressure and wet-bulb globe temperature, when increasing, were related to worsened performances. The average temperature, when increasing by 1☌, was related to worsened performance (by 00:01:47 h:min:sec for all finishers and by 00:00:20 h:min:sec for annual winners). These effects were examined in a multi-variable model, together with: sex, country of origin, calendar year, an interaction term country:sex and a spline smooth term in function of calendar year and sex. Weather conditions, over the hours of the event, were average air temperature (☌), total precipitations (mm), wet-bulb globe temperature (WBGT) (☌), wind speed (km/h), wind direction (head wind, side wind, tail wind) and barometric pressure (hPa). Different groups and subgroups were considered such as all runners, near elite 101:200 finishers, near elite 21:100, annual top ten finishers and annual winners. A total of 580,990 observations from 382,209 different finishers were analyzed using Generalized Additive Mixed Models. This study examined the relationship of weather conditions, together with sex and country of origin, with running performance in the Boston Marathon from 1972 to 2018.
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