This article is about selected issues in women’s sports, and above all the modest participation of women in so-called leisure sports. Statistical data concerning Poland and other countries (particularlyWestern Europe) is presented. The fashion for jogging, which is currently being seen in Poland as well, is analyzed. The author’s own research, done in 2013 and involving 865 participants in the Łódź ‘I Care About My Health’ Marathon, documents the smallness of women’s interest in participating in marathon struggles.On the basis of the information collected in the study’s survey questionnaires, it was possible for the author to create a socio-demographic portrait of the female Polish long-distance runner. It was also possible to note the sociologically interesting and elucidating difference between men and women in the sphere of training and in their running careers/biographies.

Footbridges, like all building structures, must be designed in a way that ensures their safe and comfortable use. Steel footbridges characterised by low vibration damping often turn out to be a structure susceptible to the dynamic influence of users during various forms of their activity. For these structures, the impact of running users may be a key type of dynamic load for the verification of the serviceability limit state due to vibrations. In the literature, there are several proposals for models of dynamic load generated by runners (models of ground reaction forces – GRF). The paper presents the characteristics, analyses and comparisons of selected GRF load models. The analyses were performed using the GRF recorded during the laboratory tests of runners (tests planned and carried out by the author) and the GRF determined using various load models. In order to illustrate the accuracy of the estimation of the dynamic response of the structure, depending on the GRF model used, dynamic field tests and dynamic numerical analyses of the selected steel footbridge were carried out. The obtained results were analysed and compared.