Switzer won the New York City Marathon in 3:07:29, becoming the women's champion during the era when the race looped through Central Park.
On September 29, 1974, Kathrine Switzer won the women's division of the New York City Marathon, finishing with a time of 3 hours, 7 minutes, and 29 seconds. At the time, the New York City Marathon was still run as multiple loops within Central Park, prior to its expansion into the five-borough course that would debut in 1976.
This victory represented the peak of Switzer's competitive running career and further established her credentials as a serious elite athlete, not merely a symbolic figure. Her win came at a pivotal moment in the growth of women's distance running in the United States, as more women's divisions and sanctioned events were becoming available following years of advocacy by Switzer and her contemporaries.
Switzer's success in New York, combined with her earlier historic role at Boston, reinforced her credibility as both an advocate and a competitor, lending weight to her ongoing campaign to have the women's marathon included in the Olympic Games. Her NYC Marathon title is frequently cited alongside her Boston Marathon achievements as evidence of the broader legitimacy and competitiveness of women's marathon running during the 1970s.
The win also coincided with Switzer's growing involvement with organizations like the New York Road Runners, through which she helped expand opportunities and events for women runners nationally and internationally.