The writer Amanda Parrish Morgan is also familiar with the high costs of this culture; in her review, she recalls the glamorization of disordered eating and collapsing on the track. When she and Fleshman were running in the 1990s, women were expected to be not only fast and strong, but also thin, no matter what it took.

Or maybe it was about being the fastest person there but I guess that’s not melodramatic enough for women.

Their experiences demonstrate that while sports may seem objective—there’s a winner and a loser, someone is the best, someone worked the hardest—society’s judgments still seep in.

Victims abound!