I have to say the Female runners I come across running in foul conditions appear to be a long way short of suffering any pain and invariably seem to be revelling in there battle with the elements and almost always have some jovial aside to make as we pass each other, whereas the blokes seem to be suffering some sort of angst and can barely manage a grunt of acknowledgement as we pass.
As to getting women to race I don`t know the answer to that, but maybe treating women as equals in sport might help i.e. same incentives as the men get.
The older I get the Faster I was
Women have more fat than men. I don't mean they're fatter, I mean they naturally have greater amounts of subcutaneous fat (I seem to remember from A-level biology).