Selecting a marathon team is an unenviable task at the best of times — an issue that has reared its head in a big way for Australia’s women’s team ahead of the Paris Olympics.

Athletics Australia named Sinéad Diver, Genevieve Gregson and Jessica Stenson to its women’s team after weeks of controversy and recriminations.

With six athletes all running under the qualification standard, Athletics Australia has had to make some tough calls, breaking the hearts of three athletes while fulfilling the dreams of three others.

Realistically, nobody was ever going to be happy.

Yet the debate in Australia has reached near-poisonous levels, with former Olympians wading in with their opinions and families being left “heartbroken”.

Here’s how it’s come to this.

What are the Olympic qualification requirements?

National bodies are allowed to select as many as three runners in their marathon squad, as long as they all have achieved a time under the qualification standard within the allotted period — in this case by running a time of 2 hours, 26 minutes and 50 seconds between November 6, 2022, to May 5, 2024.

Incredibly, six Australian women all ran under that time: Diver, Gregson, Lisa Weightman, Isobel Batt-Doyle, Stenson and Eloise Wellings.

Objectively, the fairest way would be to select the three fastest runners to the squad.

But in marathon running, that’s not always so straightforward.

After all, the very best runners only race two or three times a year — and not always against each other.

Simply put, there are too many variables on the road.

For example, a women’s only race will overall be slower than a race in which men start at the same time, the men in the field essentially pace-making the women to a faster time (the women’s only marathon world record is 2:16:16 — set by Peres Jepchirchir in London this year, with the fastest ever Tigst Assefa’s 2:11:53 from Berlin in September last year).

Then there are weather conditions, the difficulty of the course, and the level of competition.

It makes selection something of a poisoned chalice.

Which Australians were selected?

Athletics Australia has named Diver, Gregson and Stenson as the three-woman squad to compete at the Games of the 33rd Olympiad. 

However, it caused quite a stir, with Weightman — who ran the third-fastest time in the qualification period — particularly aggrieved.

Had Weightman been selected, she would have become the first Australian athletics competitor to compete in five Olympics.

“I am of course disappointed by the decision given that I fought hard and fair to gain my qualification time,” Weightman said in a statement.