Fast Women: Hawi Feysa has a breakout race, Natosha Rogers leads the U.S. in Chicago
A big win for Lauren Gregory, and a big step forward for Athlos
Issue 376, sponsored by Bakline
At the Chicago Marathon, Hawi Feysa moves to No. 5 on the all-time list
Much of the talk heading into this year’s Chicago Marathon was about the men’s race. With three-time champion Ruth Chepngetich of Kenya serving a provisional doping suspension, the race was unable to attract a big-name star to lead this year’s field. For U.S. running fans, Ethiopia’s Hawi Feysa is not a household name, but she used the opportunity to introduce herself. The 26-year-old came in with a marathon best of 2:17:00 and had a breakthrough performance to win in 2:14:56, which moves her to fifth on the world all-time list.
By 10K (32:08), Feysa and Tanzania’s Magdalena Shauri had opened a small gap on the rest of the field, which they maintained through 25K (1:19:59). But 91 minutes into the race, when the broadcast returned to the women, Feysa had dropped Shauri and was all alone. Ethiopia’s Megertu Alemu was still within striking distance, but over the final 10K, Feysa pulled away and won with room to spare, earning $100,000.
Alemu took second in 2:17:18, and Shauri bravely held on after her fast start, taking third in 2:18:03 and shaving 38 seconds off of her own Tanzanian record. Kenya’s Loice Chemnung had the top debut of the day, taking fourth in 2:18:23. And Kenya’s Mary Ngugi-Cooper finished fifth in 2:19:25, taking 57 seconds off of her three-year-old personal best.
There was a big gap back to the rest of the field. Aside from Feysa, every other woman in the pro field positive split the race. And you can tell from the way they started that almost all of them had higher hopes.
Dakotah Popehn led the U.S. women early on. But by 30K, Natosha Rogers, who had been 26 seconds back at 15K, reeled Popehn in by maintaining a mostly steady pace. Rogers slowed after 30K, but everyone around her was slowing as well. She finished sixth in a 23-second personal best of 2:23:28, and Popehn took seventh in 2:24:21, a 19-second personal best. Rogers seemed happy to PR and lead the U.S. women, and hopefully, for her sake, this will be enough for Puma to sign her for another year. (This is something she expressed concern about on a recent episode of I’ll Have Another.)
Popehn, on the other hand, was hoping for more. “You know when training goes really well so you decide to take a really, really big swing at your PR and it just doesn’t go the way you wanted? Yeah, me too,” she wrote on Instagram. But one consolation is the fact that she raised more than $18,000 for the American Cancer Society in conjunction with her race, in honor of her mother.
Chicago seemed to have more tracking issues than usual this year. I didn’t even know Argentina’s Florencia Borelli was in the race until she finished eighth in 2:24:23. Gabi Rooker earned her highest finish at a major marathon, taking ninth in 2:26:32.
Notable DNFs included Ethiopia’s Hailu Haven, whose last recorded split was at 21 miles, and Great Britain’s Calli Hauger-Thackery, who made her exit after halfway. Hauger-Thackery said she made the call to drop out around 16 miles because she was getting severe shooting pains down her leg.
Most of the Americans in the pro field knocked out their qualifiers for the 2028 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials. As a member of the 2024 Olympic team, Popehn was already qualified, but Rogers, Rooker, Aubrey Frentheway (13th, 2:28:56), Makenna Myler (14th, 2:29:26), and Maggie Montoya (15th, 2:29:50) are now in. In an Instagram story, Myler mentioned that she had to make four bathroom stops along the way.
And out of the mass field, Rachel McCardell (16th, 2:34:31), Maria (Cicero) Lindberg (17th, 2:34:59), Anna Kenig-Ziesler (18th, 2:35:25), Maddie Meyers (20th, 2:35:37), Rachel Hyland (21st, 2:35:41), Kristin Dailey (22nd, 2:36:08), and Alana Levy (23rd, 2:36:53) all ran under the 2:37:00 qualifying time. And Ashley Heidenrich had a fantastic performance, but missed out by four seconds (24th, 2:37:04).
Many people had an eye on how Ethiopia’s Ejgayehu Taye would run in her marathon debut, given that she has run 14:12 for 5,000m and 29:50 for 10,000m. She went through halfway in 1:07:38, not far off the lead. But she faded significantly after 30K. Most pros in that situation just exit the race, but Taye continued on and eventually finished in 2:51:35. If she ever decides to run another marathon, she has set herself up to run a big PR.
Emily Venters ended up in a similar boat, and she must have a story to tell. She went through halfway in 1:13:46 and presumably stopped soon after. It took her 47 minutes to get from 20K to 25K. But she kept going, often running a quick pace. (She posted a watch shot that indicated her moving time was about 2:31:35.) She eventually finished the race off with a 5:36 mile and ran 3:26:32 in her debut.
“A really hard day,” she wrote in an Instagram story. “A few med tent stops. No bottles. But no matter what, I was going to cross the fu**** line. And we did. Only up from here.” Venters is a childhood cancer survivor. When she was three years old, she was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia, a type of blood cancer. And she ran the race to raise money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. (Results | Race replay)
Other Chicago Marathon Notes
Susannah Scaroni had a strong performance to win the wheelchair race in 1:38:14. And Switzerland’s Manuela Schär and Tatyana McFadden were less than a minute back, taking second and third, respectively, in 1:39:03 and 1:39:04.
Time-wise, this wasn’t really a banner year for the U.S. women in Chicago. But I was impressed by the depth in the field. According to the preliminary results, 32 women from all over, but mostly the U.S., broke 2:40. Sixty-one broke 2:45, and 389 broke 3:00.
The following athletes won their age groups: Spain’s Marta Galimany (40-44, 2:28:23), Heidi Peoples (45-49, 2:39:30), Italy’s Barbara Diquigiovanni (50-54, 2:58:14), Canada’s Maria Zambrano (55-59, 2:49:47), Yong-Son Basta (60-64, 3:13:12), Gwen Jacobson (65-69, 3:18:43), Grace Wasielewski (70-74, 3:40:04), Joan Gerold (75-79, 4:13:50), and Tamerra Buckhanan (80+, 5:56:27).
Joan Benoit Samuelson celebrated 40 years since her Chicago Marathon win by running 3:36:11 this year, at age 68.
I haven’t seen any updates either way about ICE’s presence, or lack thereof, during the race, but I really appreciated this Runner’s World article from Cindy Kuzma about the ways in which local runners were affected leading up to the race.
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Some goals take years to reach. For many of you, everything came together in Chicago. For others, it might have slipped away by a few seconds, a few miles, or in ways that only you can feel. It’s easy to forget that most of us are not elite athletes. We don’t do this for a living. We train through heat, wind, doubt, and hope.
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Lauren Gregory wins the Golden Golden Trail World Series Grand Finale
In what I think was one of the more overlooked performances of the weekend, Lauren Gregory came from behind to win the Golden Trail World Series Grand Finale in the Trentino region of Italy. She covered the 21K course, with more than 5,000 feet of climbing, in 2:22:51 and won by 2:31 over Romania’s Madalina Florea.
Florea took the race out hard and built a significant lead, but Gregory, who hung back early in the race, caught her shortly after the 95-minute mark, and quickly opened a gap. After finishing second at this event a year ago, Gregory moved up a spot and finished third overall in the Golden Trail World Series.
Florea managed to hold off third-place finisher Sara Alonso of Spain by 32 seconds, and she secured the overall series win in the process. Anna Gibson was the other U.S. finisher in the top 10, taking 10th in 2:35:40 after dealing with an allergic reaction heading into the race. It’s been fun to see young runners like Gregory and Gibson come out of the NCAA and have an immediate impact on the trails. It makes me wonder who will be the next NCAA standout to do so.
Perfection is impossible when it comes to race coverage, but given the challenges of covering a race that goes up and down a mountain, I thought the footage the broadcasters captured was excellent. You can watch the full replay on FloTrack’s YouTube channel. At the finish line, there was signage that read, “Make trail running an Olympic sport.” And if trail running keeps outdoing road racing with its coverage, I could almost see it happening. (Results)
In year two, Athlos takes another big step in the right direction
Women’s sports are more popular than they’ve ever been before. People are catching on to the fact that it’s cool to be a fan, and an increasing number of initiatives are aimed at elevating and cashing in on women’s sports. But until now, I don’t get the sense that track & field and road racing have seen as many of the benefits as some other sports have.
Individual athletes might feel a positive shift in their sponsorship opportunities or follower counts, but because women’s and men’s track & field and road racing tends to happen simultaneously, it’s unlikely that a sponsor is going to come into the world championships, a national championship, or a major marathon and have the opportunity to increase just the women’s prize money, for example.
Combining men’s and women’s running and track & field events has meant there’s been greater parity over the years in general. It was eye-opening when players and coaches highlighted the disparity between the men’s and women’s weight rooms at the 2021 NCAA basketball tournaments, held in separate cities. That would be a lot less likely to happen in NCAA cross country and track & field, where the championships take place together.
But with Athlos, Alexis Ohanian and company have created an opportunity for brands and fans to focus solely on women’s track & field, and ride the current wave. The concept of a women’s track meet is an easy-to-package story, and Athlos appears to be doing a lot of things right. They’ve brought in some big-name sponsors that, to my knowledge, aren’t otherwise involved with track & field. No other track meet has Serena Williams handing out awards, a mini Ciara concert at the end, or such a high density of non-T&F celebrities in attendance.
And they are paying the athletes well. The winners received $60,000 plus a Tiffany crown, with $25,000, $10,000, $8,000, $5,000, and $2,500 going to the next five finishers. Plus 10 percent of the event’s revenue is distributed among all the participants, and they have made a point of paying athletes nearly instantaneously, while highlighting their partnership with CashApp.
Athlos has brought glitz and glam to track & field, complete with a red carpet. And this year, they added the long jump and held the preliminary round of the event in Times Square, which looked epic. What the Athlos team has done in less than two years is impressive. I thought the broadcast was significantly better than last year. And though the pace of the competition is intentionally slow—seven short events in about two hours—I thought they did a better job of filling the air time this year.
I messaged with about 20 people who attended the event and almost all of them said they had a great time, the event was more polished than last year, the energy was high throughout, and they’d show up again in the future. They also had some constructive criticism, most of which would be easy to fix. Most commonly mentioned was the fact that the stage was too tall, so it was hard to see the backstretch.
A couple fans were uncomfortable with the expectation that all of the athletes would want to dance when receiving their awards. (Keely Hodgkinson understandably declined to do so.) And some commented that Williams should have had someone feeding her information as she interviewed the athletes, or that that could have been a two-person job shared with someone who has a track background. But also, how cool to receive one’s award from a legend.
On a broader scale, I think Athlos is going to have to figure out their desired balance between sport and spectacle, and that will determine the type of audience they attract. The plan is for Athlos to continue to take place at the end of the track season. As a one-off event, it’s been challenging at times to find six healthy and ready athletes per event. I imagine that’s only going to get tougher when Athlos becomes a multi-meet league next year.
While the athletes were certainly competing hard on Friday night, and I wanted to see who would win, it also felt like some of them were running on fumes, and this was far from their most important event of the season. Details about next year’s league format have yet to be revealed, but Ohanian said on Friday’s broadcast, “I want to see Team Nike vs. Team Adidas, vs. Team New Balance vs. Team Puma, and that’s what we hope to bring to life next year for our league.”
I am also curious how financially stable Athlos can become, and whether the league will be able to draw the crowds it needs to last. Ohanian told Front Office Sports that Athlos has yet to make a profit, but the event would bring in millions of dollars this year. I assume the majority of the income is coming from sponsors at this point. Fortunately, all of Ohanian’s remarks suggest that he’s in this for the long term.
Though Grand Slam Track did well with its turnout in Philadelphia, other quality events have repeatedly shown us how difficult it can be to get people to attend track meets in the U.S. Athlos had a year to try to sell out a 5,000-person stadium. And while they claim they did, I am skeptical. On Wednesday night, I counted that there were 487 tickets still available, and less than 24 hours later, they made their announcement about selling out. Some of the areas of the stadium that had the most tickets available were the ones that were consistently empty on Friday night. Perhaps there’s another explanation that I haven’t considered, but some of the people who attended the meet independently expressed skepticism about the sellout as well.
I understand why they would want fans and sponsors to believe that they sold out. But I also want a realistic snapshot of what the starting point is. I am encouraged by how many people said they would be back next year. I appreciate the ways in which Athlos is changing the game, and I hope that with time, the outcome of the competition will be the part of the event that gets the headlines.
Great Britain’s Hodgkinson looked great in winning the 800m in 1:56.33, and her teammate, Georgia Hunter-Bell, was a distant second in 1:58.33. In the mile, Ethiopia’s Gudaf Tsegay took the first quarter out in a speedy 60.52 seconds, but Kenya’s Faith Kipyegon stayed with her through a slower middle 800m before kicking to win, 4:17.78 to 4:19.75. Everyone else in the race hung back, competing for place rather than time. Nikki Hiltz ran a 58.85-second final lap to take third in 4:32.51.
Brittany Brown won the 100m (10.99) and 200m (21.89), Masai Russell won the 100m hurdles (12.52), and Marileidy Paulino of the Dominican Republic won the 400m (50.07). But the most impressive winner and star of the meet was Tara Davis-Woodhall, whose outgoing personality is a perfect match for Athlos. In her final jump of the competition, she tied her world-leading mark of 7.13 meters.
I appreciate that Athlos is paying athletes promptly, but it made me wonder if they were really drug testing. According to Front Office Sports, USADA did random testing at the meet, and all of the athletes and agents agreed in advance that if they test positive, they will return their prize money. That hasn’t gone well for other events, but hopefully Athlos won’t have to learn any of that the hard way. (Results)
Other News and Links
Femke Bol of the Netherlands announced last week that she’s moving up to the 800m. It’s a bold and brave move for a runner who is pretty much guaranteed to get first or second every time she races the 400m hurdles. I have no doubt that she can be very good at the event, but she’ll need to get used to racing in a pack and a lot more unpredictability. I’m looking forward to covering more of her races. Citius Mag has more on her decision.
On last week’s episode of the Las Culturistas podcast, Jennifer Lopez briefly talked about her track background. She said she started running around fifth or sixth grade, and she ran the 800m and 1500m. You can listen to the extended clip at the 5:00 mark of the episode, or a shorter version here. It’s obvious that she wasn’t terribly clear on her time and she might have been using the terms 1500m and mile interchangeably. But she said she thought her best mile time was 4:49. That got a lot of track fans digging into the archives in an attempt to verify her claim. I haven’t seen any proof that Lopez ran quite that quickly, but MileSplit dug up a few of her times, and I loved this photo Nnenna Lynch, who went on to become a professional runner, shared of a race she ran against Lopez at the 1983 Colgate Women’s Games. The fact that Lopez was a runner seems to be “rediscovered” every once in a while. It happened in 2015 and it will probably happen again.
After winning gold in the marathon at the world championships, Kenya’s Peres Jepchirchir will return for the Valencia Marathon on December 7. Ethiopia’s Amane Beriso and Kenya’s Joyciline Jepkosgei also headline the field. We already knew that Keira D’Amato was planning to run, but fellow Americans Emma Bates and Lindsay Flanagan are also entered.
I appreciated this article from The Athletic (subscription required) about street meets in track & field. While Athlos holding its long jump qualifying round in Times Square was fantastic, it was far from the first time a T&F event has been held outside of a stadium, and the article did a good job of putting it into context.
Ireland’s Sophie O’Sullivan, who finished out her collegiate career by winning the NCAA 1500m title for the University of Washington, has signed with Adidas.
I still have a lot of questions about Dorcus Ewoi’s path to a world championship silver medal in the 1500m, but I appreciate that this article helped answer a couple of them.
I’m only vaguely aware of Mr. Beast, and I haven’t heard great things. But DyeStat reposted his video of Melissa Jefferson-Wooden racing 100 men. It went about how you would expect.
Additional Results
One day before her 34th birthday, Emily Sisson ran an event record of 31:05 to win Saturday’s Boston 10K for Women, earning $10,000. (Previous record: Weini Kelati, 31:18, from 2021.) This was Sisson’s third victory at this event; she also won in 2016 and 2018. She was on her own from the start, with only the press truck to chase. Annie Rodenfels (32:45) and Sara Hall (32:48) hung back in the chase pack for much of the race before pulling away to take second and third, respectively. (Results)
Australia’s Izzi Batt-Doyle won the Melbourne Half Marathon in 1:08:55, and in her debut, Australia’s Caitlin Adams won the Melbourne Marathon in 2:30:26.
Great Britain’s Lily Partridge won the Manchester Half Marathon in 1:09:34. (Results)
Kellyn Taylor won the Snohomish River Run half marathon in 1:11:31. (Results)
It was exciting to see Makena Morley dip her toe into the ultra world with a 4:03.20 win at the Kodiak 50K. Alicia Vargo, 43, took second in 4:14:35. Mary Denholm won the 100K in 9:28:28. (Results)
Rachel Schilkowsky won the Hartford Marathon in 2:38:15, and Anna Oeser won the half marathon in 1:12:09. (Results)
Keira D’Amato, who was part of the Chicago Marathon broadcast team, ran the event’s accompanying 5K the day before and won by nearly two minutes, in 16:00. (Results)
Diane Neubauer won the Mohawk Hudson River Half Marathon in 1:13:49. (Results)
Michelle Vaccaro won the Army 10 Miler, which still took place despite the government shutdown, in 56:45. (Results)
Oregon easily won the Bill Dellinger Invitational, with Diana Cherotich taking the win in 18:58.81, Juliet Cherubet taking second in 19:42.93, and Dalia Frias, who is returning after a serious injury, taking third in 19:57.05. (Results)
Podcast Highlights
Melissa Jefferson-Wooden was on the Ali on the Run Show, and it was fun to hear about some of the opportunities she’s getting after winning three golds at worlds. She was also on the Citius Mag podcast last week.
I haven’t gotten tired of hearing Canada’s Gabriela DeBues-Stafford talk about her return to top form yet, so it was good to hear from her on the Run Canada Podcast.
Kenya’s Faith Kipyegon, who doesn’t do a lot of podcast interviews, was on Citius Mag.
Sifan Hassan of the Netherlands made an appearance on the Feel Better, Live More podcast.
I appreciated the opportunity to learn more about short trail world champion Tove Alexandersson of Sweden on The Sub Hub Podcast.
It was interesting to hear from Athlos co-creator Kayla Green on the Podium Athletics podcast. She comes on around the 39:00 mark.
Additional Episodes: New Olympic Marathon Trials qualifiers Megan O’Neil and Jane Bareikis on Road to the Trials | Keira D’Amato on I’ll Have Another | Great Britain’s Calli Hauger-Thackery on the Podium Athletics podcast | We Loved to Run author Stephanie Reents on The Lane 9 Podcast | Aubrey Frentheway discussed being a runner and a part-time teacher on Getting Chicked | Past Olympic Marathon Trials qualifier Rosa Moriello on Conversation Pace with FRE | Pepperdine coach Lauren Floris discussed coaching, parenting, and going after ambitious running goals on The Rambling Runner Podcast | It was interesting to hear from Welsh 2:26 marathoner Natasha Wilson, another international runner who didn’t have the greatest experience in the NCAA, on the Beyond the Track Podcast
I put myself in a bit of a hole this weekend by spending Saturday morning at the Boston 10K for Women and then editing photos. (I posted some here and here.) It was nice to soak in the positive energy at a running event, but it made for a long day today, and I barely have any words left.
Thanks to Derek Call for kindly sharing his Chicago Marathon photos, and to Felipe Guajardo for shooting Athlos for Fast Women before running a half marathon the next morning!
And thanks to Bakline for their support, which helps make this newsletter possible. I hope you all have a good week.
Alison
Great newsletter! Another fun thing to do at the Chicago Marathon (my wife ran her first ever!) was attend the taping of the podcast “Nobody Asked Us” hosted by Des Linden and Kara Goucher. They are really engaging to listen to, generous and honest with their advice, and seem to complement each other well.
Some Athlos tickets were offered to local clubs on Thursday I believe. My niece runs for a local track club and they were offered tickets which would explain the sellout(and disappointingly my inability to get tix on Thursday).