March 15, 2024

The Mount Marathon Race has added a non-binary division, joining a growing number of events nationwide that include an option for those who identify with a gender beyond the binary categories of male and female.

The non-binary option was added to registration on March 15.

“The Mount Marathon Race has a long history addressing inequities among women, girls, older racers and other groups,” race director Matias Saari said. “But this is the first time we’ve created a policy that benefits the LGBTQ+ community. Runners who identify as non-binary deserve to be recognized and have a welcoming space for participation.”

Anyone who completes priority registration or a lottery application through March 31, 2024, will now have the option to select non-binary. Those who have already registered may switch to non-binary by emailing register@mountmarathon.com

The non-binary division will have its own results and non-binary participants will receive the same overall and age-group awards as participants in the men’s, women’s, boys’ and girls’ divisions.

Because the event has separate gendered races, adult non-binary entrants will need to choose to participate in the men’s or women race and will be placed in a start wave that corresponds with their ability.

Non-binary juniors will simply join the juniors’ race because boys and girls run together in a single wave.

Zoe Dohring, 34, of Anchorage plans to enter the Mount Marathon lottery and hopes to participate as a non-binary entrant in 2024.

“I’ve dreamed of running in Mount Marathon for all the 10 years that I’ve lived in Alaska, but I’ve chosen to not join the lottery in recent years, knowing that I no longer fit in the category devoted to my sex assigned at birth,” Dohring said.

Dohring was the first participant in the non-binary division when Anchorage’s Mayor’s Marathon added that option in 2022, but their options as a non-binary racer in Alaska have been extremely limited.

“The point was never to win (at Mayors),” said Dohring, who teaches gender studies at the University of Alaska Anchorage and has long advocated for greater safety and acceptance of transgender people in Alaska. “I wanted to be seen. I wanted to belong, to feel accepted. I wanted to know I was just as worthy of being in community as anybody else, and that is still my desire.”

The new Non-binary Runner Policy was recently approved by both the Mount Marathon Race Committee and the Seward Chamber Board of Directors.

According to the Non-Binary Racing Database, more than 300 events in the United States now allow non-binary registration. Some of the world’s biggest events, such as the Chicago, New York, Boston, London and Berlin Marathons, have growing non-binary divisions. For instance, the Chicago Marathon had 70 non-binary entrants when it first offered the option in 2022 and the number rose to 242 a year later.

To view the full Non-Binary Policy, visit https://mountmarathon.com/non-binary-runner-policy/

The race committee welcomes constructive feedback; comments may be sent to race director Matias Saari at director@mountmarathon.com and/or race committee member Amy Haddow at akhaddow@gmail.com