The Friday File: In 1960, the male marathon record was 135 minutes and the female record was 220 minutes. By 1980, the male record was 129 minutes while the female record was 150 minutes. Today the male record is 2:00:35 while the female record is 2:11:53, which would have been a male marathon record as recently as 1967. The time gap is 10% down from 61% in the 1960s.