alt Hacker NewsI think you're confusing limited participation and what such a small group of people doing these events means for single individuals to "win" an event. Women are more like to win in these events then others because there is less competition overall so you get more anomalous results rather then the male biological differences stop dominating the outcome.
You are right in that "strength" isn't the dominating factor for these events or why males go so much faster/farther but rather VO2 max and for peak athletes males normally maintain a good 10% lead due to biological factors.
The male vs female 100 meter:
9.58 vs 10.49 = female record is 9.5% longer to run
Male vs female 200 meter:
19.19 vs 21.34 = female record is 11.2% longer to run
Male vs female 50km
2:38:43 vs 2:59:54 = female record is 13.35% longer to run
The difference also doesn't really change once we start going really long either
6 hour: 98.5km vs 85km male ran 15% farther
12 hour: 177.410 vs 153.600 male 15.5% farther
24 hour: 319.614 vs 278.621 male 14.7% farther
48 hour: 485.099 vs 436.371 male 11.17% farther
6 days: 1045.519 vs 928.577 male 12.6% farther
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultramarathon scroll down to the male vs female records.
Replies
The wiki you linked is "women" and "men" marathon. There is no "female" marathon!
And this differences are only possible because best women athletes are excluded!
I don't know why you brought up records, especially sub-ultra. I admitted that: "Women semi-regularly win multi-day and 100+ mile races, even if women don't have course records at these times/distances."
I've run dozens of marathons, multiple 100 milers, and several 12-hour and 24-hour events. You can be the strongest, most prepared person in the world, and it very much might not matter because of how many things can go south in such an event compared to shorter races.
Yes, these events have fewer participants, but nonetheless, even at the most of elite of these events, sometimes women win, and it's not always because the best man didn't show up that day. Big's Backyard Ultra attracts the best in the world, but it was won by a woman in 2019 and 2020.