Fast Women: Lindsey Butler’s unexpected bronze
Where things stand with the USATF Half Marathon Championships.
Issue 398
How Lindsey Butler earned a surprise 1500m bronze at the USATF Indoor Championships
Few people expected Lindsey Butler to be part of the conversation in the 1500m final at the USATF Indoor Championships on March 1. Thirteen runners were accepted into the race, and she and her training partner, Rachel McArthur, who had identical qualifying times, were the last two to make the cut.
Because the race began slowly, all 10 athletes who started the race were still in contention with two laps to go. Emily Mackay, who had won the previous day’s 3,000m, made a move to the front, and Butler followed. But instead of playing it safe and sitting on Mackay’s shoulder, Butler went around her, took the lead with about 350 meters remaining, and opened up a small gap.
Her move broke open the race, and most impressive was how long she kept the lead, given the strong competition. Butler covered her last 400m in 59.57 seconds, and she was less than 15 strides from the finish line when Nikki Hiltz went by her on her right side and Gracie Morris went by on her left. Hiltz won (4:11.34), Morris took second (4:11.39), and Butler was third (4:11.52).
Butler, who is 25 and works as an industrial engineer, missed making the U.S. team for the World Athletics Indoor Championships by 0.13 seconds. Earning a spot on the team was so far from her mind that she didn’t know until afterward that only the top two qualify for Worlds.
Even with the near miss, it was a huge day for Butler. Despite being the only unsponsored runner in the field and a first-year pro, she earned a bronze medal. And the $2,500 in prize money that came along with it meant that she came out ahead for the weekend, which doesn’t usually happen. And, hopefully, she inched herself a little closer to her goal of securing a pro contract.
An all-around athlete
Ten years ago, Butler never could have imagined herself trying to make a go as a professional middle distance runner. When she began high school in Corning, New York, she was a lacrosse and volleyball player, with her sights set on attending William & Mary on a lacrosse scholarship. In the fall of her junior year, she was ready to commit to the school when she found out that the coach had given the scholarship and roster spot to someone else. “At 17 years old, that was the worst thing that had ever happened to me,” Butler said. “But I look back now and I am so grateful that it didn’t work out.”
Because collegiate lacrosse operates on an earlier recruiting timeline, it was late in the game to find an opportunity elsewhere. “I spent probably a week feeling bad for myself,” Butler said. “And then the high school track coach called me into his office and said, ‘If you do indoor track and take it seriously, and think about doing outdoor track, I could get you to William & Mary on a track scholarship, and then you can play lacrosse there.’ I think he knew in the back of his head that if I took track seriously, I would forget about lacrosse. Smart man.”
Butler had done indoor track during her freshman and sophomore years, but mostly for social reasons. She focused on the long jump, triple jump, high jump, and 55m hurdles. She knew that she might have some talent for the sport because her grandfather was a pole vaulter and track coach at the University of Maryland, her father had been a star decathlete and pole vaulter there, and her older sister was a distance runner for Appalachian State.
During her junior indoor season, she ran the open 400m and 600m for the first time and found she was even better at those. Outdoors, she tried the pentathlon. She was above average in the first four events, but when she closed out the competition by running 2:17 in her first-ever 800m, she and her coach realized she might be a middle distance runner.
By the end of that season, she had run a 2:10 800m and narrowly missed out on winning a state title. During the fall of her senior year, she ran cross country for the first time. It wasn’t her favorite, but her results that season drew the interest of higher-caliber programs. William & Mary was an option, but by then she had moved on, and she knew she wanted to compete in the ACC, like her father and grandfather had.
Some of the coaches Butler talked to were willing to offer her money, but said they were hoping to see more from her as her senior year progressed. Eric Johannigmeier, then the coach at Virginia Tech, offered her a good package with no strings attached. She signed during the winter of her senior year. “He told me, ‘I have so much faith in you and I’m so impressed by what you’ve done. You don’t need to do anything more to earn this,’” Butler said. “I don’t know if that’s how he talks to every girl, I hope it is, but I was running so stress-free my senior year.”
And with that lack of stress, Butler lowered her 800m personal best to 2:06 during the 2019 outdoor season, won a state title, and anchored her team to a national title in the 1600m sprint medley relay, splitting 2:05 in the 800m.
Highs and lows at Virginia Tech
Butler trained more like a sprinter during high school and maxed out at 10-15 miles per week, so making the jump to 20-25 miles, plus about four hours of cross training per week, at Virginia Tech was an adjustment. But Butler ran well right off the bat. She and her teammates qualified to race the distance medley relay at the 2020 NCAA Indoor Track & Field Championships, before the meet and the outdoor season were canceled due to the pandemic.
The unexpected pause gave Butler the opportunity to take a much-needed breather, because the increase in her training volume and intensity had caught up to her.
By the start of her sophomore year, her body had better adjusted to college training and she was able to get more out of it. During indoor season, she was floored when she lowered her 800m personal best to 2:04.00. But a few weeks later, at the 2021 ACC championships, she won the 800m in 2:01.96.
By the 2022 indoor season, her junior year, Butler had learned a lot about racing. She repeated as ACC 800m champion and was part of the winning distance medley relay. And at the NCAA indoor championships two weeks later, she had the confidence to let the leader go when she went out at an unsustainable pace in the 800m final. Butler caught her on the final lap and won the national title.
What should have been the highest moment of her career was bittersweet, however, because after the 800m prelim, her foot—which had bothered her since her lacrosse days—began throbbing. Adrenaline got her through the final, but she found out a couple weeks later that she had a stress fracture in her second metatarsal, and there was no hope of coming back in time to compete during the outdoor season.
It was a turning point in her career. “The first half of college, I was a big party girl,” Butler said. “I felt like I could do it all, like go out and go very hard, and then turn around and show up for the long run. When I got injured, it was a wake-up call. I immediately knew that it was a direct result of my choices.”
She returned to competition in the fall of 2022 with a renewed focus. But in her brief time away, the NCAA had only gotten faster. She had improved, too, but she was finishing farther back in races. For roughly the next year and a half, she lost her happy-go-lucky approach to racing. She repeatedly felt like she was falling short, even though she was running personal bests in several events. The spring of her fourth year was the only time she qualified for an NCAA championship and failed to make the final.
Because of the pandemic, she had a fifth year of eligibility, which she planned to use at Virginia Tech, but she felt like something needed to change. That change came in the form of Ben Thomas’ return to the school in the summer of 2023. Thomas had previously coached at Virginia Tech for 17 years, but he left from 2018-2022 to coach at Oregon. In his first year back, Thomas worked alongside Johannigmeier, and the intensity of Butler’s training went way up. It was just what she needed, and she began to regain some momentum.
During the 2024 season, she won her third ACC indoor 800 title, lowered her 1500m personal best to 4:07.96, and finished seventh in both the 800m indoors and the 1500m outdoors at the NCAA championships. At the time, Butler thought her NCAA career was over. That summer, she was hoping to go pro, and she had her heart set on New Balance Boston, but it didn’t work out.
Because of her injury in 2022, Butler had one more season of outdoor track eligibility remaining. When plan A didn’t work out, she made a late decision to return to Virginia Tech. She had already earned a bachelor’s degree in industrial engineering, and returning to school gave her the opportunity to finish her master’s in information technology.
The fall of her sixth year, she was thrilled to sign an NIL deal with On. Among other perks, the brand paid for her to travel to races during the indoor season, because she wasn’t representing Virginia Tech, and they also supplied her with support from a dietitian. That’s how, in early May, Butler learned that she was anemic. The end of her collegiate career was solid—she repeated as the seventh-place finisher in the 1500m at NCAAs outdoors—but the work she had put in didn’t really show up until the summer, when her bloodwork was back to normal. She finished her NCAA career as a seven-time first-team All American and a four-time ACC champion.
Over the summer, Butler ran PRs of 4:06.28 for 1500m at the Ed Murphey Classic, 4:25.85 at Sir Walter Miler, and a 4:20.9 to finish sixth at the Fifth Avenue Mile.
Making an impact at USAs
Butler has long known that she wanted to work in addition to being a professional runner—she’s found that she runs her best when she has other things going on in her life. So when an opportunity to work 25 hours per week as an industrial engineer came up last April, she took it, despite the overlap with the NCAA season.
Getting the support of a running brand has proven to be a little more challenging. Butler was thankful for her NIL experience with On and would have liked to continue working with the company. But by the time her agent relayed the news that it wasn’t going to work out, she felt that she had missed a key window of opportunity. Her agent told her that they were working on some possibilities, but wanted to re-sign her before getting into any details. She opted not to continue the relationship, so she went without an agent from June to September.
“Having Cole (Hocker), Cooper (Teare), and Rachel as my teammates, I’ve learned that there’s a lot of value in having a good agent,” she said. “So I wanted to wait until I could earn that.” After a solid summer of racing, Butler signed with Hawi Management.
Butler has remained in Blacksburg, she is still coached by Thomas, and in addition to McArthur, she also trains with fellow Virginia Tech alum Grace Boone. Most days, she does a morning workout, goes to work for five hours, and then trains again in the afternoon. Her days are packed, but the schedule works for her.
And she managed to get to the USATF Indoor Championships and back without having to take any time off from work. Because she was the last seed, Butler went into the race feeling like she had nothing to lose. “The morning of the race, my coach called me and said, ‘I just want you to be in the race at 1K to 1200m. I don’t care what happens after, but we’ll know what we need to work on.’”
The approach worked for Butler, who kept thinking, “I owe it to myself to make it to 1200m.” After that, she had no plan, but her instincts told her not to hold back.
“Over the years, in too many races, I have wasted energy being nervous about how I am going to feel at the end if I do something now,” she said. “And those are the most defeating races because you walk away thinking, ‘Why didn’t I just trust my intuition?’”
When Butler took the lead, she was certain someone was going to go around her, and she was surprised it took as long as it did. “Now that I’ve had time to reflect on the race, I know that is ultimately why I didn’t pull it off, because I didn’t have the deep belief that it was something that I could do at that time,” she said. “If I had seen what the field was looking like, it would have instilled a little bit more confidence in me on that last lap.”
Butler has continued to race in her On kit, because she loves its Virginia Tech colors, but she concedes that it has caused some confusion about her sponsorship status, so she will be retiring it. She doesn’t yet have any races planned for the outdoor season, but her training will be geared toward running well at the USATF championships.
“Physically, there are a lot of things that I need to work on, but I think one of the really big things I needed, that I lost long ago, was the happy-go-lucky confidence that helped me win my national title,” Butler said. “I was getting it back in ways over the years, but I think last weekend was truly the first time [I saw] how close I am to all that again, because it definitely felt very far away for a long time.”
Where things stand with the USATF Half Marathon Championships
First, if you missed my recap of what happened at the USATF Half Marathon Championships on March 1, that’s in last week’s newsletter. Since then, the Atlanta Track Club has released their account of what happened on race day and announced that they would be awarding first-place prize money ($20,000) to Jess McClain, and that Emma Grace Hurley and Ednah Kurgat would split the second-place prize money ($12,000 + $7,500, so $9,750 each), because they were together when they were led off course.
It’s worth looking at their full timeline, but the ATC said that a police officer working the race was struck by a vehicle while riding a motorcycle, and the resulting response left the key intersection inadequately staffed for a short period of time. The officer was alert, conscious, and breathing at the time of the incident and was released from the hospital the same day.
On Thursday, USATF said via a statement that they sent an emergency request to World Athletics, but learned that it will require a vote by the World Athletics Council, which will meet March 18-19. But they said they have alternative plans, should the vote not go their way. I am curious what USATF has asked for, but I don’t think speculating is productive at this point. I am glad they have a plan in the works, and I expected that would be the case all along. I don’t think there’s any outcome that can undo what happened, but I think people are trying their best.
USATF also announced that they will name an honorary podium, with McClain winning and Hurley and Kurgat tying for second place. They will all receive the corresponding USATF Road Running Circuit points, and USATF is sending letters of support to the athletes’ sponsors, explaining that the result does not reflect their performance.
And throughout all of this, the athletes have been class acts. The official top three, Molly Born, Carrie Ellwood, and Annie Rodenfels, have expressed their desire for the would-be top three—McClain, Hurley, and Kurgat—to be named to the team. Even though that’s not enough for it to happen, the sentiment is nice.
Should the selection come down to world ranking in any way, Kurgat is in a tough spot. Hurley is still ranked third and McClain is still ranked seventh. But because she didn’t race much last year, and not all of her races were rankings-eligible, Kurgat still isn’t in the rankings. She would need three good races between now and May to get close to the top. Currently, she is scheduled to run The TEN at the end of the month, which wouldn’t help her road racing ranking at all.
Sarah Lorge Butler talked to Hurley for the Fast People podcast last week, after the ATC’s announcement and before USATF’s. We thought Hurley would have some interesting insights as a former Atlanta Track Club runner who is coached by Andrew Begley, whose wife, Amy Begley, works for USATF, and she did. The entire episode is worth a listen, especially since I don’t want to quote her out of context here on some of the tougher topics. It was interesting to hear her talk about her past experience on a USATF committee, which has helped her understand that resolving matters like this one take time. The thing that comes across most is how understanding (and lovely) she is, despite the pain that the error has caused
I was impressed to hear her say that her sponsor, Asics, watched the race footage and decided to give her the first-place bonus, with the logic that the race wasn’t over yet. Kudos to them.
Hurley was also on the Ali on the Run Show, which was recorded prior to both the ATC and USATF’s announcements. From that, I learned that Hurley turned down an opportunity to race the World Road Running Championships in 2023 to be in her friend’s wedding. And now, two years in a row, things have gone awry. She also said that the race official who had to make the initial ruling to deny the athletes’ protests is a family friend who she has known since she was 14. “For him to have to be the one to deny that request to us was absolutely heartbreaking,” she said. “It was horrible to have to watch him do that, and I’m glad he did, because that was his job in that moment.”
It’s been wild to watch an event that usually doesn’t get all that much coverage become a topic that makes People magazine, and many worse outlets. It’s gotten a ton of attention on social media. For me, it mostly highlighted how flawed our current media and social media environment is. It turns out that letting local media die, relying heavily on AI, and building algorithms that reward hot takes and big reactions has consequences. And the person with the biggest megaphone is the one who gets heard, regardless of whether they have all of their facts straight. As we’ve seen, this has had much bigger consequences beyond running, but the running community has gotten an extra dose of it recently.
Other News and Links
If it weren’t for the reporting that the Lexington Herald Leader has done on coach Hakon DeVries’ departure from the University of Kentucky, he’d probably have a good shot at getting another NCAA coaching job. Their most recent article, which details some of the accusations against him, is eye-opening.
I really loved the honesty and the detail in this Q&A Nadia Neophytou did with four-time U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials qualifier Caitlin Phillips. It’s an especially good read for anyone who is struggling with running postpartum, but it’s informative for all.
In recent years, young Ethiopian runners have produced some mind-blowing performances, but it turns out that many of them were too good to be true. Journalist Bizuayehu Wagaw pointed out that a recent World Athletics newsletter (which I haven’t been able to find online) indicates that five U20 world records set by Birke Haylom, Melknat Wudu, and Medina Eisa will not be ratified because, in Haylom and Wudu’s case, their dates of birth have not “been established to the satisfaction of the Athletics Integrity Unit.” And in Eisa’s case, it turns out she was born in 2002, not 2005.
I wrote about Nikki Hiltz’s seven consecutive U.S. 1500m titles last week, but I love this reel they put together with footage from all of them. I also appreciated Hiltz’s latest YouTube video, which recaps their most recent win. They said that they were racing with a bruised tailbone after plopping down on what looked like a couch but turned out to be two joined chairs in the hotel lobby. (It must have been an aggressive plop.) Thank goodness the faux couch didn’t come between Hiltz and their seventh title, because that would have been an annoying reason to lose.
I missed the fact that there was a big pileup at the start of last month’s Castellón 10K, but if you swipe to the last slide in Alicja Konieczek’s post about the race, you can see a video of what happened. Konieczek, who represents Poland, said that she will miss several races she planned to run as a result of the injuries she suffered at the race, and watching the video, I imagine she’s not alone in that.
Emma Bates announced last week that she’s expecting her first child this summer. Yes, there’s definitely been a baby boom among pro runners this year, thanks in part to the fact that there’s no summer Olympics or outdoor world championships.
Femke Bol of the Netherlands got married last month but just announced it on Instagram last week.
The fields are set for the NCAA DI Indoor Track & Field Championships, which begin on Friday in Fayetteville, Arkansas. In every event from the mile up, it was harder than ever to get into the meet. You can find the schedule and results here, and the meet will stream live on ESPN Select (what ESPN+ is called now).
According to The Times, UK Athletics has told British women who hope to compete internationally to pay for their own SRY gene tests, which cost £185, “to avoid delays around selection” for teams. Bringing back sex testing was World Athletics’ bright idea, so I think they should be footing the bill. And on that note, 34 academics have “sharply criticized” the testing in a report submitted to the British Journal of Sports Medicine.
Grand Slam Track’s vendors are understandably furious at the league’s plan to pay most of them only 1.5 percent of what they are owed.
Athletics Kenya put out a statement last week saying that activities organized by Scholarbook International are suspended due to non-compliance with AK’s anti-doping regulations and event organization requirements. Scholarbook is one of the companies that has helped bring many international athletes to the NCAA. It seems like there’s more to the story here, so I’ll be curious to see what comes of this.
Kenya’s Rita Jeptoo, 45, who was banned from the sport for using EPO in 2014, has been banned again, after testing positive for a steroid.
Results Highlights
Ethiopia’s Tsigie Gebreselama won the Lisbon Half Marathon in 1:04:48. (Results)
Ftaw Zeray, also of Ethiopia, won the Paris Half Marathon in 1:05:12. (Results)
Kenya’s Sheila Chepkirui successfully defended her title at the Nagoya Women’s Marathon, narrowly holding off a challenge from Japan’s Sayaka Sato, 2:21:54 to 2:21:56. (Report | Results)
Belgium’s Chloé Herbiet pulled away shortly after 10K and won the Gate River Run 15K, running 47:58 in warm conditions. Fiona O’Keeffe took second in 48:22 and in the equalizer race, both made it to the finish before the first man. Herbiet earned $10,000 for the win plus the $5,000 equalizer bonus. And O’Keeffe earned $5,000 for taking second plus another $5,000 for being the top American. The results are impressively deep, given that the race was not a national championship.
It was not easy to follow the LA Marathon because the live results were spitting out clearly bogus splits for one runner in the race, while mostly missing the actual leader, Kenya’s Priscah Cherono, altogether. The TV coverage was helpful, but there were a lot of human interest stories. Cherono, 45, whose story might sound familiar because she won the Marathon Project in December, went out hard and held on to win the race in 2:25:19. A world championship medalist, Olympian, and mother of three, Cherono retired from the sport during the pandemic, but now she’s back at it, coached by American Distance Project coach Scott Simmons. Kellyn Taylor, mother of four (since I’m listing everyone’s kids), took second in 2:27:36. (Results)
Australia’s Claudia Hollingsworth, 20, dominated the 1500m at the Box Hill Classic, running a personal best of 3:58.09. (Results)
The PRTC Indoor Classic, at the University of Pennsylvania’s Ott Center, attracted a fun mix of athletes. Some used it as a last-chance meet to earn their world championship qualifiers, and Michelle Rohl used it to reclaim the 60-64 age-group world record in the 3,000m. Rohl broke the record back in December, running 10:41.68. In January, Great Britain’s Clare Elms lowered it to 10:37.53. And on Saturday, Rohl lowered it by nine seconds, running 10:28.43. Italy’s Laura Pellicoro, who runs for the Brooks Beasts, won the 800m in 2:00.93, just missing the World Indoor auto qualifying standard by 0.03 seconds. (Results)
Cassidy Heaton, who has already qualified for the U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials, won the Myrtle Beach Marathon, and $4,000 in prize money, running 2:44:22. (Results)
Sara Lopez, also a Trials qualifier, won the Lake Sammamish Half Marathon in 1:14:45. (Results)
At the NAIA Indoor Track & Field Championships, Olivet Nazarene’s Heidi Heldt won the mile (4:43.33), Taylor University’s Jaynie Halterman won the 5,000m (15:52.27), Life University’s Emeline Delaville won the 800m (2:08.38), Milligan’s Ellen-Mary Kearney won the 3,000m (9:45.69), and Marian University’s Katie Woods won the 1,000m (2:47.68). (Results)
Podcast Highlights
I appreciated Molly Seidel opening up about how hard it was to admit to herself and others that she was gay, and the ripple effects that that had, on Alexi Pappas’ Mentor Buffet podcast. And for a completely different side of Seidel’s story, she was recently on the Where the Climate Things Are podcast, where she talked about her interest in environmental issues.
It was good to hear from Puma Elite’s Gracie Morris on Citius Mag after her runner-up finish in the 1500m at the USATF Indoor Championships.
And I always enjoy hearing more from Valery Tobias, who finished second in the 800m. On the House of Track podcast, she said that thinking about being a proud daughter of immigrants helped dissolve her nerves as she lined up for USAs last week.
I’m a big fan of Jadyn Keeler, who is from Canada but runs for the University of North Dakota. Her trajectory in the NCAA has been incredible. In her first year, she ran 16:59 for 5,000m, and now her PR is down to 15:14. I enjoyed hearing more of her story on The Kick: A Runner’s Podcast, and I was surprised and touched by the way in which Fast Women came up.
Additional Episodes: Uruguay’s Julia Paternain, who’s getting ready for the NYC Half and London Marathon, on C Tolle Run | Canada’s Ceili McCabe on Run Canada | Anna Gibson and Cam Smith talked about their Olympic ski mountaineering experience on The Freetrail Podcast | Olympic Marathon Trials qualifier (and new Saucony pro) Felicia Pasadyn on Road to the Trials | Jenn Lichter and Anne Flower discussed their Black Canyon 100K showdown on The Trail Network Podcast | Ellaney Matarese, who finished seventh at Black Canyon, on Women of Distance
Thanks to the time change, it’s almost midnight as I’m wrapping this up. I should write this part of the newsletter earlier in the day, when my brain is still working, but I never do. Because something fell through, this newsletter is unsponsored this month, so I am extra appreciative to all of you who help keep this going with your support via Venmo or Patreon.
I hope you all have the best week you can. If you’ve made it this far, that’s some serious dedication.
Alison
As someone who was apart of Kentucky's XC team, genuinely thank you for giving this issue space on your platform. You speaking about this has made the rounds of UK TF/ XC group chats..... Shout out to all who spoke up
Thanks again for another good newsletter!! I also listened to Molly Seidel’s podcast with Alexi Pappas. It made me really think about how much someone’s own self esteem and how they feel comfortable in their own skin really impacts their performance, and how the whole person matters so much more than just the athletic side. There’s a lot to unpack.