U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon Archives - ��ԹϺ�� Online

Jenny Simpson Aims for Her Fourth Olympic Team—While Running into the Unknown

ntriolo — Thu, 18 Jan 2024 00:02:29 +0000

When it comes to American running royalty, Jenny Simpson is in a class all by herself.

For more than a dozen years, she was one of the top middle-distance runners in the world, first competing in the 3,000-meter steeplechase in the world championships and the Olympics while running for the University of Colorado, then becoming a top tier competitor in the 1,500-meter run as a professional runner. She won the world championship in the 1,500-meter in 2011 as a first-year pro, then won two world championship silver medals and an Olympic bronze medal over the next six years.

On February 3, when she toes the starting line at the U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon in Orlando, Florida, the 11-time U.S. champion will be a bit out of her element. Not only has the 37-year-old Simpson never run a marathon before, she’s only raced a half marathon once. In fact, she’s never run beyond 24 miles.

“It will be my debut in the marathon and the longest run in my life,” Simpson said with a laugh, from her home near Boulder, Colorado. “All of it is a bit weird to me, and it’s kind of an extreme exercise in faith, you know?”

The top three women in the race will earn a spot on the U.S. team that will compete in the marathon in the . Simpson and those closest to her admit her lack of experience in the marathon make her a dark horse, especially considering the Olympic Trials field might have the best collection of American women ever assembled. But if you’ve witnessed the fierce competitiveness she’s exhibited throughout her career, you know it would be foolish to count her out.

Still, her typical racing effort in a 1,500 race was only about four minutes in duration, but the Olympic Trials Marathon will likely take about two hours and 25 minutes.

“I don’t think I have any advantage, but if there’s anything that I bring to the table, it’s that I just love racing,” she says. “Thinking about race day might be intimidating because it’s something I’ve never done before—I don’t know what it’ll feel like when we’re two hours into it—but I love being competitive. So as far as getting to the starting line goes, I’ll be there and I’ll be ready to race.”

A New Beginning

Jenny Simpson and Nikki Hiltz run in the Women’s 1500 meter heats during the 2020 U.S. Olympic Track & Field Team Trials in 2021. (Photo: Andy Lyons/Getty)

Simpson could have easily given up two years ago after a challenging series of events rocked her world. In the summer of 2021, she had a hard time regaining her form after a year away from racing during the COVID shutdown. As a result, she finished a distant 10th place in the 1,500-meter final of the U.S. Olympic Trials in Eugene, marking the first time in her career—a remarkable span of 15 years—that she failed to earn a spot on the U.S. team for the ensuing Olympics or world championships.

In a surprise move, she ran the U.S. 10-mile championships on the roads that fall and finished second to marathoner Nell Rojas, one bright spot in what was otherwise the only lackluster season of her career.

Then, a few months later, on December 30, 2021, a devastating wildfire destroyed 1,000 homes near Boulder and narrowly missed the restored early 1900s schoolhouse Simpson and her husband, Jason, had purchased two years earlier. Their home miraculously survived, but they were displaced for several months while smoke remediation and repairs were being completed.

Two days after the fire, her contract with longtime partnership with New Balance expired, leaving her without a sponsor for the 2022 season, and her health insurance with the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee was terminated because she hadn’t met the performance criteria to maintain it. Then, after experiencing pelvic pain while training in the early days of January, doctors diagnosed her with a stress reaction in her right hip.

Reduced to cross-training in the pool and on a bike, it all took a huge mental, emotional, and physical toll. Although she was 35 and knew her days of running fast 1,500-meter times on the track were probably behind her, the competitive fire that fueled her to success on the track still burned inside. Retirement was not an option.

Simpson and longtime coaches Heather Burroughs and Mark Wetmore knew she could still be fast enough to compete with the best in the U.S. in the 5,000 or 10,000 meters on the track and aim for the 2022 world championships in Eugene, Oregon, but her difficulty to regain speed in 2021 and a series of injuries gave them pause. That led her to taking an entirely different approach to training and setting her sights on the marathon.

“There was a moment where I thought, ‘Do I want to do something entirely different?’” Simpson recalls. “I just needed a break from beating my head against the wall trying to be a four-minute miler. And so when I did the 10-mile championships, that was really the beginning of this long transition to the marathon.”

Making Transformational Changes

Simpson has been doing fast weekly long runs—typically in the 14- to 16-mile range—as part of her track training for 20 years. But to become a proficient and fluid long-distance road runner, she has had to go through quite a metamorphosis.

Whereas she typically ran about 70 miles per week when competing on the track, she’s been topping out at 100 miles per week for much of the past two years. She’s no longer doing the same kind of speed workouts she did in the past, but instead, her coaches assigned longer intervals and sustained tempo-paced efforts geared toward the marathon. She still does plenty of strength work every week, but not the explosive drills she regularly did to hone her powerful finishing kick down the homestretch of the track.

Simpson has put in a lot of work, and she’s made significant progress over the past two years, even though her chance to run her first marathon was derailed by another early injury last year.

“I don’t know what it’ll feel like when we’re two hours into it—but I love being competitive.”

“She’s got so much will and talent that goes beyond her mitochondria, or her actual running ability,” Burroughs says. “It’ll be intriguing for all of us to see what she can do. It’s a big unknown for anyone, but for someone with her background on the track, it’s a bigger unknown. But she’s really dug her teeth into it, and she’s done a lot of things very well. No matter what happens, she’s thoroughly impressed me with how she’s transitioned to this type of training.”

Simpson has benefited from having a built-in training partner, trusted advisor and race-day pacer in Jason, who’s run 10 marathons over the past decade, including a 2:18:44 personal best that qualified him for the 2020 U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon in Atlanta. He’s not only been able to answer her questions and reassure her when she’s had doubts, but he’s run alongside her for countless training runs and paced her stride-for-stride when she ran her half marathon debut (1:10:35, or 5:23 mile pace) in Houston last January.

Simpson running the Chevron Houston Marathon with her husband, Jason, on January 15, 2023. Photo: Kevin Morris.

While making the leap to the marathon has been the equivalent of “transitioning to a different sport,” he thinks the grit and resilience she honed as a track athlete has paid dividends in this new phase of her career. “I think she is as resilient as she’s ever been, and that’s one thing that’s critical to being a marathoner,” he says. “She’s had several training cycles, several years to get herself ready for this, and now that she’s been healthy since the spring, we’re really pleased with the transformation she’s made. I’m super excited to see how all that translates and how she’s able to execute on race day. I think she’ll be competitive and be in the mix.”

For Simpson, racing in Orlando is a return to her roots. She grew up 20 minutes away in Oviedo—in 2018 her high school renamed its track in her honor—and will have the on-course support of dozens of friends, high school teammates, coaches, and others who played a role at the start of her running journey.

But make no mistake—this isn’t a farewell tour. Simpson hasn’t been training for the marathon just to keep hanging around.

“I think everybody who loves me and cares about me at some point said, ‘Oh, she just can’t let this go.’ And I just felt so strongly the last few years, it’s not that I can’t let it go, it’s that I know I still have something to give,” she says. “It’s not over yet. I’m not holding onto this for dear life because I have nothing else to do. In fact, there are big things in life I am really looking forward to when my running career is over. But I know I have more to give, and I really want it to be in the marathon.”

‘I’m Not Afraid of the Unknown’

After years of racing the 1,500 meters against the world’s best, can Simpson make the U.S. Olympic team in the marathon?

Few middle-distance runners have been able to make that leap so profoundly, although New Zealand’s Rod Dixon famously won the 1983 New York City Marathon and finished 10th in the 1984 Olympic marathon a decade after he had won a bronze medal in the 1,500 at the 1972 Olympics.

The biggest unknowns for Simpson are how her body will feel and perform running just below the red line deep into the race, and how well she can offset glycogen depletion with on-course fueling. That’s something she never worried about during her 15-mile long runs, and she says she consumed only one gel during her half marathon last year.

She’s been practicing taking in carbohydrate-rich fluids and gels during long, simulated race efforts for the past year, but how her body adapts on the fly is undoubtedly still the biggest question mark as she heads to Orlando.

RELATED: Race Weekend Marathon Fueling

Although the physical aspects of racing a marathon will be entirely new to her, she’s banking on her ability to maintain a positive mental outlook and capitalize on her well-honed racing skills.

“I can close my eyes and imagine being in third place with two miles to go and knowing you have to keep running hard because someone is coming,” says Simpson, who signed with Puma in late 2022 and will be racing in the brand’s new Fast-R Nitro Elite 2 shoes. “That’s the easiest scenario to think about because it’s so obvious. But I probably spend as much time or more thinking: There are eight miles to go, and you’re in 12th place. How do you want to finish?”

Aside from that, she’ll be racing against a stellar Olympic Trials women’s field that includes 173 runners, a dozen of whom have run 2:25 or faster. Among the favorites are Emily Sisson (2:18:29), the American record-holder, Keira D’Amato (2:19:12), the former American record-holder, Betsy Saina (2:21:40), who was fifth at the Tokyo Marathon last March, Sara Hall (2:22:10), who was fifth at the world championships in 2022, Molly Seidel (2:23:07), the Olympic bronze medalist in 2021, and Aliphine Tuliamuk (2:24:37), the 2020 U.S. Olympic Trials champion.

Simpson is excited to see how she measures up in a new event against women she’s never raced. She’s appreciative of the tradition and legacy of the marathon, as well as the congenial nature of long-distance runners—something that doesn’t exist amid the feisty intensity of the middle-distance runners on the track. More than anything, she’s grateful to be running at a high level again with an opportunity to be competitive.

“I’m not afraid of the unknown,” Simpson says. “People talk a lot about being afraid of the unknown, and there’s some uncertainty that is frightening for sure. If I knew how it would turn out, I don’t think I would’ve worked as hard. But what else is there to live for? What does tomorrow hold? To me, that’s why you wake up and you do the work the next day. That’s what it’s all about, and that’s the attitude I’m taking into this race.”

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New U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials Start Time Announced After Athletes Raise Concerns

Mallory Arnold — Wed, 15 Nov 2023 18:02:19 +0000

After dozens of elite American runners complained about the proposed midday start time of the U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon on February 3 in Orlando, Florida, and the Greater Orlando Sports Commission announced this morning that the Trials start time will be moved back to 10:00 A.M. ET.

This decision came to fruition in part because of the many athletes who voiced their concerns about the noon start time. Immediately following the 12:10 P.M. start time announcement, a letter was written by athletes Sara Hall, Colleen Quigley, Jared Ward, and Emma Grace Hurley voicing the “Increased risk to athletes’ health prompted by a noon start time.” 84 athletes signed the letter, requesting the Trials start at 6:00 A.M. In October, a group of elite U.S. marathon runners met with USATF CEO Max Siegel to discuss the same concerns

After alternatives were discussed over the past two weeks, a compromise was announced today. The start time has been moved to the earlier time, and contingency plans have been set up should projected weather conditions deem that necessary.

In a press release, Chief of Sport and Athlete Services at the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USOPC), Rocky Harris, says that he only wishes to support the athletes as best as he can.

“By making this adjustment in the starting time, we underline our collective commitment with USATF to support our athletes in their quest for excellence,” he says. “We’ve listened to their feedback and acted accordingly, aiming to create conditions that foster peak performance. Our ultimate goal is to provide opportunities for athletes to truly shine on their journey to represent Team USA at Paris 2024.”

While the new suggested time isn’t what the athletes initially proposed in their petition (“Preferably at 6:00 a.m., but no later than 7:00 A.M.), it’s a compromise. temperatures around 10:00 A.M. averaged about 70 °F, and 80 °F at noon.

The U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon will serve as the qualifying race for the U.S. athletes who will run in next summer’s Paris Olympics.

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How to Run 50 Miles Faster than Anyone Else on Earth

ntriolo — Tue, 14 Nov 2023 18:03:20 +0000

Since he graduated from college, Charlie Lawrence has worked hard to become an elite-level marathoner.

Like hundreds of other American runners, he has his sights focused on the 2024 U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon on February 3, in Orlando, Florida. For the past six years, he’s put in long training miles with elite training groups under the guidance of several top coaches.

But he’s always been intrigued by what lies beyond 26.2 miles. And with a bit of advice and encouragement from two-time Olympian and Boston Marathon champion Des Linden and two-time U.S. champion Fernando Cabada—both of whom have set records for 50K—he found out.

Buoyed by a huge aerobic base of fitness, the 28-year-old Boulder, Colorado, runner qualified for the U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon in mid-October by running a personal best 2:16:10 at the McKirdy Micro Marathon on October 14, in New York’s Rockland Lake State Park. But last weekend, he might have found his true calling by running nearly twice as far.

On November 11, Lawrence broke the world record (pending) for 50 miles while winning the Tunnel Hill 50 ultramarathon in Vienna, Illinois, blazing the course in 4:48:21. Running alone while wearing a pair of bright pink and orange Nike Alphafly 2s, he averaged an astounding 5:46 per-mile pace and surpassed the previous record of 4:50:08, s on a time-trial course in Sacramento, California.

Lawrence fueled his run with Bare Performance Nutrition’s carb mix and Go Gels, and also a few of HVMN’s Ketone-IQ shots. He had been on 5:41 pace for the first 35 miles of the smooth, crushed gravel surface of the Tunnel Hill State Trail, but, as expected, the final 15 miles were a bit of a grind.

“It feels awesome, but it still hasn’t fully sunk yet,” he said. “It had been a goal for a while and I was confident I could do it, so I thought I’d take a crack at it. I knew if I put it together and executed my plan that I had a good shot at it. It was just the unknown after how it might feel after 35-ish miles that I was worried about, but it all worked out pretty well.”

Inspirational Connections

As a middle school runner in the fall of 2008, Lawrence convinced his mom to drive him from their hometown in Foley, Minnesota, to Minneapolis to watch the Twin Cities Marathon, which was doubling as a U.S. championship race. That morning, he watched a 26-year-old Cabada win the race in front of the Minnesota Capitol, which—after buying the same model of Reebok shoes that he saw Cabada wearing—galvanized his interest in wanting to run longer distances. He had no idea that he’d one day become friends with Cabada and be inspired by him to run even farther.

After focusing on the 5,000- and 10,000-meter distances during his collegiate career at the University of Minnesota, Lawrence began increasing his training volume and qualified for the 2020 U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon with a 2:16:12 effort in his debut at the distance. That helped earn him an opportunity to join the Michigan-based Hansons-Brooks Distance Project, one of the best marathon development programs in the country. And that’s when he got to know Linden, who ran for the Hansons program for a dozen years through mid-2018.

(Photo: Zack Lever/@TrailLive)

“We weren’t ever teammates, but I introduced myself after I joined Hansons and we’ve stayed in contact,” Lawrence said. “She’s just been like a big sister ever since. It’s been helpful to bounce stuff off of her and get her input.”

Lawrence had a decent race at the 2020 Trials in Atlanta—finishing 61st in 2:20:40—but knew he could run faster—and longer. After moving to Boulder, Colorado, in 2021 to immerse deeper into training, Linden asked him to be her pacer as she attempted to break the women’s world record for 50K (or 31.07 miles) in an April time-trial event. After running side by side with her as she set a new record (2:59:54), his interest in going beyond the marathon grew even stronger.

“He was a great pacer for the 50K, but I thought the opportunity was more about letting him see all the moving parts that went into the record attempt,” Linden said. ”We chat often and bounce around ideas about training, nutrition, gear—even fashion—and so on. He’s one of the hardest working people I’ve been around, if there’s anything he really needs help with it’s knowing when to back off and when to do less. I’m not surprised at all that he’s found a sweet spot in the ultra world.”

Getting Stronger, Going Further

Lawrence got another taste of ultra-distance racing later that summer when he placed sixth in the 2021 U.S. National 50K Road Championship (3:09:10). But before he could target a 50-miler, he was diagnosed with a sacral stress fracture that took him out of racing action for most of 2022. He went through extensive treatments from Boulder physical therapist Kurt Roeser, also a two-time U.S. Olympic Trials qualifier, and invested in an $8,000 road bike and pedaled like a fiend to maintain his strength and fitness.

His diligence paid off because, when he got back to training with the Roots Running program under the guidance of Richie Hansen last fall, he was strong and able to layer on mileage. By early May of this year, he ran a new personal best for 10,000 meters (30:18.85) and was eager to target a fall marathon. But that’s about the time he decided, after some back and forth with Linden, that his real goal would be to use a fast marathon as part of his training build for a fast—and possibly record-breaking—50-mile effort at the Tunnel Hill race.

With Linden’s inspiration, Lawrence broke away from the Roots marathon-specific program and took a self-coached approach with much higher volume than he’d ever logged in the past.

Starting in late summer, he ramped up his weekly mileage to 135 to 140 miles for an eight-week stint and peaked at an all-time high of 145 miles for one of those weeks. He also did a lot of long runs at a faster pace, including several times running 20-25 miles between 5:24 to 5:45 pace at Boulder’s 5,400-foot altitude. Instead of doing a 5 x 2-mile workout, he extended it to 7 x 2 miles.

“I’ve historically responded extremely well to high mileage and been able to handle a lot of volume,” said Lawrence, who included that he does core strength exercises every day. “If you have that high mileage, it allows you to do the bigger workouts that you need to do to get ready for a marathon and, in my case, to run even longer.”

The Call to Run More Than 26.2

Although the marathon seems to be having a revival since the COVID-19 pandemic has subsided, ultra-distance races—essentially any race longer than the standard 26.2-mile distance—have been booming for the past two decades. For some, it’s just an intriguing novelty, but for others it’s the next frontier of their running career, a new personal challenge to pursue.

According to a report from the , ultrarunning has grown by 1,676 percent over the past 23 years and 345 percent over 10 years, bringing individual yearly participants to 329,584. The data also shows a higher growth rate for ultrarunning than, say, marathons since 2009.

While many marathon runners turn to ultra-distance trail races right away, Lawrence doesn’t think he’ll ever go that route. Instead, he’s interested in pursuing the flat, fast ultras that extend the quick, consistent stride turnover like the marathon, only at slower paces. That’s where runners like Camille Herron—formerly a 2:37 marathoner and U.S. Olympic Trials qualifier—has really made a name for herself, setting numerous American and world records from 50K to 100 miles, as well as in 24- and 48-hour races. (Herron broke the 100-mile world record on the Tunnel Hill course in 2017.)

That’s also where Cabada, now 41, has evolved his competitive running career and coaching business in recent years. Although he’s still a strong marathoner—he ripped a 2:16:52 at Grandma’s Marathon in 2022 after turning 40 to qualify for his fifth Olympic Trials—he began running 50K races in 2021 and set an American masters record for that distance by running 2:57:35, and became the first American to win the Winschoten 50K race (3:09:09) in the Netherlands in early September.

When Lawrence met Cabada in 2018, he told him the story about how he had watched him win the marathon in Minneapolis a decade earlier. They’ve kept in touch and, when Cabada started running 50K races, Lawrence would occasionally pick his brain. As it turns out, Cabada is the one who suggested he should target the Tunnel Hill race for a record attempt, mostly because it’s a fast, flat double out-and-back course at low altitude.

“Over the last couple years, I heard him say he wanted to go after the 50-mile world record, and, whether or not I believed him at the time, that was big and bold,” Cabada said. “But after the race last weekend, I texted him and said, ‘I’m proud of you, bro! It was inspiring that, whether or not anyone believed you, what was important was that you believed in it, and you went after it, and you got it, and that’s pretty awesome.”

What’s Next?

Lawrence is still eager to race in the U.S. Olympic Trials in Orlando on February 3, but he’s realistic about his chances. While he thinks he can take a few seconds off his personal best, he’s aware there are more than 90 runners who have qualified for the event with faster times than his.

He’ll still have fast marathons on his radar next year, but he’s more interested in seeing what other fast ultra-distance races he can pursue in 2024. That might mean the 89K Comrades Marathon or the 56K Two Oceans Marathon in South Africa, or trying to make the U.S. team for the 50K or 100K world championships.

“I’m a 2:16 guy and that’s a good marathon, but it’s not great,” Lawrence said. “There are a lot of guys who have run 2:09, 2:10, 2:11 and 2:12, and I think they could run very good 50-mile races and 50Ks, too, but it’s more than just running longer. I’ve learned that it’s very much between the ears when it comes down to it, because you’ve got to play mental games and convince yourself that it’s not that much farther and that you can hold a certain clip for the remaining miles.”

What’s his advice to other marathon runners who are intrigued about running longer?

“Take a stab at it,” Lawrence said. “You’ve got to start somewhere by putting a race on the calendar and going to see what you can do. If you kind of know your limit at the marathon or at the lower distances, it’s a new challenge to pursue. But start with a 50K. Don’t try to start with a 50- or 100-mile race right away.”

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For Ariane Hendrix, the Olympic Trials Marathon Is Just the Beginning

ntriolo — Thu, 09 Nov 2023 21:58:36 +0000

When Ariane Hendrix, 35, ran her first marathon in Bismarck, North Dakota, in 2012, she started off on a similar trajectory as many new recreational runners. She had one goal, which was to complete the race without walking, and ended up finishing in 3:57:51.

From there, she spent much of the next few years chipping away at her times while conquering other milestones like qualifying for the Boston Marathon (on her second marathon in Los Angeles in 2013) and breaking three hours, which she accomplished with a 2:57:00 finish at the 2018 Ventura Marathon in southern California, near her hometown of Oxnard.

In new territory as a sub-elite athlete, Hendrix set her sights on qualifying for the 2020 Olympic Trials Marathon, held in Atlanta on February 29. She aimed to do so at the 2020 Houston Marathon, which took place on the final day to qualify, and while she didn’t hit the women’s standard of 2:45, she ran a new personal best of 2:54:25. Shortly thereafter, Hendrix, like many runners, had to put her racing goals on hold as the world shut down during the COVID-19 pandemic. She never lost motivation, however, going on to run a 2:44:33 virtual marathon that April.

“It was obviously too late to qualify for the Trials, which were in February, but I wanted the boost of confidence and to prove to myself that I could run that time, especially after trying twice to hit the standard and not getting it,” Hendrix says.

(Photo: Courtesy Oiselle)

Not only did Hendrix manage to stay in it, but she continued to bring down her race times, going on to run a new personal best of 2:42:51 at the 2022 Bayshore Marathon in Traverse City, Michigan. By then, however, the Trials standard had been tightened to 2:37 for women for 2024, which only added fuel to her fire.

Hendrix did a shorter speed segment in the summer of 2022 in preparation for the California International Marathon (CIM) in December, spending more time on track work that was 5K- and 10K-focused. She also brought her overall volume down from the 100-mile weeks she had been doing before, which she believes contributed to three stress fractures (one in her tibia and two in her sacrum) in the previous two years.

“The goal was to try to make my marathon pace feel more comfortable when I would eventually start the CIM block,” Hendrix explains. “I think that change and really figuring out that [lower but consistent] weekly mileage in the 80s worked best for me was key.”

Making the List

The adjustment paid off. Hendrix ran her current PR of 2:35:13 at CIM, not only punching her ticket to the 2024 Olympic Marathon Trials in Orlando on February 3, but also becoming the second-fastest American-born Black woman in history.

While Hendrix was somewhat familiar with of Black women who have run under three hours in the marathon (which is maintained by historian Gary Corbitt, son of Olympian and founding NYRR president Ted Corbitt) since she first went sub-three herself, it’s only been in the last few years that she’s become invested in what it means in terms of representation.

“I know in the last two years especially, the List has become more prominent and more people know about it. I’m really honored and proud to be a representative of not just African American women, but also of the LGBTQIA community,” Hendrix says. “For a long time, I felt like I was trying to prove to myself and the running community that I belonged, that I was fast enough to be around. I’m so excited to be someone who people like me can see themselves in and say ‘Hey, I can do that, too,’ or, ‘I belong there, too.’”

Looking ahead to the Orlando Trials, Hendrix, who lives in Portland, Oregon, with her fiancée, Veronica, has earned the support of women’s apparel brand Oiselle. In September she was named to the brand’s “Year of the Underbird” sponsorship roster, along with Carrie Verdon, Molly Bookmyer, Elena Hayday, and Briana Boehmer. The program serves to support athletes in their build-up to the Trials by providing a monthly $2,000 health and training stipend and $1,000 stipend for Oiselle apparel and gear, as well as covering their travel and lodging expenses in Orlando. Applying for this sponsorship was a no-brainer for Hendrix (who also works as a test analyst for HOKA) not only because she’d been a fan of the brand’s apparel for many years, but because of the conscious efforts she’d seen .

“Qualifying for the Olympic Trials is the biggest thing that I’ve done in my athletic career, and having a brand like Oiselle supporting me like this is just amazing,” Hendrix says. “I check a lot of boxes in that I’m African American and I’m gay, and I’ve seen a lot in terms of community, diversity, and representation from Oiselle, and this is important to me when it comes to who I want to associate myself with and partner with.”

(Photo: Courtesy Ariane Hendrix)

Since running her marathon PR at CIM last year, Hendrix has also brought her half marathon and 5K PRs down to 1:15:50 and 17:20, respectively. She also moved down to number three on the List, which is currently made up of only 31 women, after professional runner debuted at the distance in 2:33:57 at this year’s Boston Marathon. But Hendrix is not only seeking to improve her PR yet again in Orlando—hopefully breaking the 2:30 barrier in the process—she’s hoping to make her way to the top of the List.

“My family has not seen me race a marathon since I first broke three hours, so I’m really excited for them, as well as my three young nieces, to see me running in the Olympic Trials,” she says. “Having them all there cheering for me as I chase these goals is going to be something really special.”

As far as what’s next both before and after the Trials, Hendrix, who is currently self-coached, plans to run some shorter-distance races including two half marathons and a 10K as part of her preparation. Beyond the Trials, she hopes to try her hand at ultra distances and eventually run in the elite field at the Boston Marathon.

“Boston is one of my favorite races, so being in the elite field and having my name on my bib would be really special,” she says.

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The Road to the Paris Olympics Is Four Months Away. Here’s What You Need to Know.

Mallory Arnold — Thu, 05 Oct 2023 16:40:04 +0000

It’s early October, which means it’s the peak marathon season for many runners. But with an Olympic year on the horizon, it also means America’s top marathoners are about to hit the road to Paris.

More specifically, the men’s and women’s 2024 U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon races—scheduled for February 3 in Orlando, Florida—are just four months away. And that means the top U.S. runners hoping to represent their country at next summer’s Olympics are about to begin preparing for the all-or-nothing qualifying race that decides which six runners will represent Team USA next summer on the streets of Paris.

Although several top American runners are racing the Chicago Marathon on October 8, even they have their eyes on a much bigger prize next February.

“There’s nothing in my mind that compares with being an Olympian and being in the Olympic Games,” says 26-year-old Utah-based Nike pro Conner Mantz, who returns to Chicago after finishing seventh last year in 2:08:16 in his debut at the distance. “So putting that first has been the plan for a long time. We’re just putting that first and we’re working backwards through the season with other races.”

Registration will open for the U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon in early November for runners who have surpassed the qualifying times in the marathon (2:18:00 for men, 2:37:00 for women) or half marathon (1:03:00 for men, 1:12:00 for women). The qualifying window extends through December 3—the race date of the last-chance California International Marathon, which for decades has been one of the most popular Olympic Trials qualifying races.

In 2020, a record 708 runners—465 women and 243 men—qualified for the U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon in Atlanta just before the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic. But USA Track & Field lowered the women’s qualifying standard by eight minutes from the more attainable 2:45:00 plateau, which means there will most likely be a much smaller women’s field this year.

But even so, amid the handful of runners who have a legitimate shot at making the Olympic team, there will also be dozens of dreamers, wannabes, and just-happy-to-be-there elite amateurs who have worked hard, put in the miles, and earned the chance to be on the start line of the deepest and most competitive U.S. distance-running races that only happen once every four years.

The men’s and women’s races will run simultaneously with the men beginning at 12:10 P.M. EST. and the women starting 10 minutes later. Runners have complained that a high noon start means they will be forced to race in hot, humid conditions. Over the past decade, the average temperature on February 3 in Orlando has been 69.6 degrees Fahrenheit at noon, rising to 73.3 at 4 PM. But actual temperatures have varied drastically, from 81 degrees Fahrenheit at 2 P.M. last year to 56 at the same time the year before. USATF officials have responded by saying that the start times are to accommodate live coverage on NBC and to match the expected conditions in Paris.

Here’s an update and overview of what’s next, who the top contenders are, the course, and what to expect in the next four months.

The Course

The course runs through downtown Orlando and consists of one 2.2-mile loop and three eight-mile loops. The marathon course will run through several neighborhoods, main streets, and business districts in Orlando, including Central Business District, City District, South Eola, Lake Eola Heights Historic District, Lake Cherokee Historic District, Lake Davis Greenwood, Lake Como, North Quarter, Lawsona/Fern Creek, SoDo District, and the Thornton Park neighborhood. It will then head east to and around The Milk District neighborhood and Main Street. (Notably, the course will come close to Disney World, which is about 15 miles to the southwest.)

Unlike the Olympic Marathon course in Paris, which will challenge runners with significant hills in the middle, the Orlando course is mostly flat. Each loop has a few minor variations in pitch, but only 38 feet separate the high and low points on the course. Ultimately, though, it’s a spectator-friendly route with chances for family, friends, and fans of runners to see the action several times.

Top Women Contenders

From left to right, Emily Sisson, Emma Bates, and Keira D’Amato (Photos: Getty)

The top women—based on personal best times and recent race results—are Emily Sisson, Emma Bates, Keira D’Amato, Saina, and Lindsay Flanagan. But the U.S. Olympic Trials races almost always produce surprises with a few great runners having off days and a few good runners having exceptional days, so there is reason to expect the unexpected.

Sisson lowered the American record to 2:18:29 last year when she finished second in the Chicago Marathon. She’s running Chicago again on October 8 along with Bates, who has said she’s hoping to break the American record. In January, Sisson, 31, chopped her own American record in the half marathon in Houston with a 1:06:52 effort, and most recently won the U.S. 20K Championships (1:06:09) on September 4 in New Haven, Connecticut. Bates, also 31, hasn’t raced at all since her sterling fifth-place effort at the Boston Marathon in April, when she slashed her personal best to 2:22:10.

While Chicago will be another good place to test themselves, both have unfinished business after Bates was seventh at the 2020 Trials and Sisson dropped out near the 21-mile mark.

The same goes for Flanagan, 32, who has been one of America’s best and most consistent marathoners for the past five years. She placed 12th at the trials in 2020. She had a breakthrough win (2:24:43) at the Gold Coast Marathon in 2022 followed by a strong, eighth-place finish (2:26:08) at the Tokyo Marathon earlier this year. In August, she ran perhaps the best race of her career, when she finished ninth (2:27:47) at the world championships in Budapest amid hot, humid conditions.

The 38-year-old D’Amato, meanwhile, just capped off another strong season with a 17th-place showing (2:31:35) at the World Athletics Championships in Budapest, a year after finishing eighth in the world championships and setting an American record 2:19:12 at the 2022 Houston Marathon. She was 15th at the Trials in 2020 in 2:34:24, just two years into her competitive return to the sport after having two kids and starting a career in real estate in her early 20s.

“It’s such a huge goal of mine to become an Olympian,” says D’Amato, who lowered Sisson’s U.S. record in the half marathon with a 1:06:39 effort at the Gold Coast Half Marathon on July 1 in Australia. “It’s really hard for me to put words into this because my whole life, wearing a Team USA jersey has been like a huge dream. And when I left the sport (temporarily), I felt like I said goodbye to that dream and I kind of mourned the loss of being able to represent my country. I feel like it’s the greatest honor in our sport to be able to wear our flag and race as hard as possible.”

Saina, a 35-year-old Kenya-born runner who ran collegiately for Iowa State University, became a U.S. citizen in late 2021. She placed fifth in the 10,000-meters at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro while competing for Kenya. She’s spent the past several years splitting time between Kenya and Nashville, Tennessee, where she gave birth to a son, Kalya, in December 2021.

She’s returned with a strong fourth-place 1:11:40 result at the Tokyo Half Marathon last October and a fifth-place 2:21:40 showing at the Tokyo Marathon in February. In May, Saina won the U.S. 25K Championships in Michigan. Two weeks ago she broke the tape at the Blackmores Sydney Marathon in Australia in 2:26:47.

Other top contenders include but are not limited to Tokyo Olympics bronze medalist Molly Seidel (who’s personal best is 2:24:42), 2022 U.S. Olympic Trials champion Aliphine Tuliamuk (2:24:37, 11th in Boston this year), ullivan (2:24:27 personal best, 10th in London this year), two-time Olympian and 2018 Boston Marathon winner Des Linden (2:22:38), and Sara Hall (2:20:32, fifth at last year’s world championships), plus Kellyn Taylor (2:24:29), Nell Rojas (2:24:51), Sarah Sellers (2:25:43), (2:25:56), Dakotah Lindwurm (2:25:01), Annie Frisbie (2:26:18), Sara Vaughn (2:26:23), Tristin Van Ord (2:27:07), and (2:27:08).

Top Men Contenders

From left to right, Scott Fauble, Jared Ward, and Galen Rupp (Photos: Getty)

The list of potential men’s top contenders isn’t as clear-cut, partially because there are so many sub-2:11 runners and several fast runners who are relatively new to the marathon. But all that suggests a wide-open men’s race where more than a dozen runners are legitimately in the mix for the three Olympic team spots. That said, the top runners on paper, based on both time and consistent results over the past few years, are Scott Fauble, Jared Ward, Galen Rupp, Conner Mantz, Leonard Korir, Matt McDonald, and C.J. Albertson.

The 31-year-old Fauble, who was 12th in the Olympic Trials in 2020 and owns a 2:08:52 personal best, has finished seventh in the Boston Marathon three times since 2019 and also finished seventh in the New York City Marathon in 2018. Ward is a 2016 U.S. Olympian and has three top-10 finishes at the New York City Marathon and a 2:09:25 personal best from Boston in 2019. He’s 35, but he just ran a 2:11:44 (27th place) at the Berlin Marathon in late September.

Rupp, who won the past two U.S. Olympic Trials Marathons and earned the bronze medal in the marathon at the 2016 Olympics, is nearing the end of his competitive career. He boasts a 2:06:07 personal best and has run under 2:10 more than any American in history, including when he finished 19th at the world championships (2:09:36) last year. He’s a bit of a wild card because he’s 37 and hasn’t raced since his lackluster 17th-place showing at the NYC Half Marathon (1:04:57) in March, but the world will get a glimpse of his fitness in Chicago this weekend.

Mantz followed up his solid debut in Chicago last fall with a good Boston Marathon in April (11th, 2:10:25) and solid racing on the track and roads all year, including his recent runner-up showings at the Beach to Beacon 10K in August and the U.S. 20K Championships in September.

McDonald, 30, who was 10th in the 2020 U.S. Olympic Trials, has quietly become one of the best marathoners in the U.S. while serving as a postdoctoral associate in chemical engineering at M.I.T. His last three races have clocked in at 2:10:35 (Boston 2022), 2:09:49 (Chicago 2022), and 2:10:17 (Boston 2023). The only other runner who rivals that kind of consistency is Albertson, 29, who has run 2:10:23 (Boston 2022), 2:10:52 (Grandma’s Marathon 2022) and 2:10:33 (Boston 2022) in his past three marathons and was seventh in the U.S. Olympic Trials in 2020 (2:11:49).

The men’s race will likely have a mix of veteran runners and newcomers who have run in the 2:09 to 2:10 range since 2022. Among those are 2020 U.S. Olympic Trials runner-up Jake Riley (2:10:02 personal best), who is returning from double Achilles surgery; 2016 U.S. 10,000-meter Olympian Leonard Korir (2:07:56), who ran a 2:09:31 in Paris in April; Zach Panning (2:09:28, plus 13th at the world championships in August); U.S. 25K record-holder Parker Stinson (2:10.53); Futsum Zienasellassie who won the California International Marathon last December in his debut (2:11:01) and then doubled-back with a new personal best (2:09:40) at the Rotterdam Marathon in the spring; Abbabiya Simbassa, who ran a solid debut marathon (2:10:34) in Prague this spring; and Eritrean-born Daniel Mesfun (2:10:06) and Ethiopian-born Teshome Mekonen (2:10:16), who both received U.S. citizenship within the past year; and solid veterans Nico Montanez (2:09:55), ibet (2:10:43) and Nathan Martin (2:10:45).

Additional sub-2:12 runners who will be in the mix are Andrew Colley (2:11:26), Clayton Young (2:11:51), Brendan Gregg (2:11:21), Josh Izewski (2:11:26), Jacob Thompson (2:11:40), and Kevin Salvano (2:11:49).

What’s Next

As noted previously, some top contenders will season their marathon legs one final time at the flat and fast Chicago Marathon on October 8. An even more select few will opt for the New York City Marathon on November 5. After that, nearly every American with eyes set on an Olympic berth will double-down over the holiday season for that one final, critical marathon training cycle. Expect to see a wide range in heat training, from sauna protocols, to warm weather training trips, to simply an adjusted race day strategy.

Of course, with the Olympic Marathon falling under the purview of World Athletics, qualifying for the U.S. Olympic Marathon team is not quite as simple as finishing on the podium in Orlando. Any American looking to have a breakout performance and finish within the top three at the U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon will need to have run under 2:11:30 for men and 2:29:30 for women within the qualification window, which spans from November 1, 2022 to April 30, 2024. Given the possibility of oppressively hot and humid temps on February 3 in Orlando, they’re best bet is to secure that time now.

These qualification standards are in accordance with , which allows national Olympic committees to circumvent the typical Olympic qualification process of running under 2:08:10 for men and 2:26:50 for women, or being ranked among the top 65 in the world on a filtered list of the top three athletes from each country. The catch, though, is that three other runners from said country must have met one of these two standards. If this sounds complicated, that’s because it is.

For the hundreds of elite amateurs on the cusp of hitting that coveted U.S. Olympic Trials qualifying time, it’s do or die mode. While a few made the cut at the Berlin Marathon on September 24, one of those opportunities was lost when the Twin Cities Marathon was canceled on October 1 because of excessive heat. Temperatures are shaping up for an auspicious day in Chicago this weekend, and many more will give it a final shot at the Columbus Marathon on October 15; Indianapolis Monumental Marathon on October 28; the Philadelphia Marathon on November 18; and the last-call California International Marathon, a point-to-point race ending in Sacramento, California on December 3.

Ultimately, only six American runners will likely continue on along the road to Paris and next August 10-11. For a handful of younger runners, the 2024 U.S. Olympic Trials will be a motivation to reinvigorate the Olympic dream or keep a faint hope alive, at least until the 2028 U.S. Olympic Trials that will determine the team for the Los Angeles Olympics. But for many runners, the journey to the U.S. Olympic Trials in Orlando will lead to the end of their competitive road running careers as new jobs, young families, a switch to trail running, and other priorities will take hold.

“I think the Olympic Trials is an important part of American distance running,” says Kurt Roeser, 36, a two-time U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon qualifier who works full-time as a physical therapist in Boulder, Colorado. “I’m glad that they kept it the same event for this cycle and hopefully for future cycles because it gives people like me a reason to keep training. I’m older now and I’m not going to actually have a chance to make an Olympic team, but for somebody that’s fresh out out of college and maybe they just barely squeak in under the qualifying time, maybe that’s the catalyst they need to start training more seriously through the next cycle. And maybe four years from now, they are a serious factor for making the team.”

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