Fast Women: Marathon Monday edition
Mary Cain discusses her book, This Is Not About Running.
Issue 405, sponsored by SOAR
To avoid covering the Boston Marathon a week after it happens, I’m planning to send out an extra issue of Fast Women in the next day or two. This newsletter will return to its regular Monday-only schedule after that.
Wishing you a wonderful Marathon Monday
While I realize that the majority of you are not running the Boston Marathon today, I like to imagine that some of you will be reading this on your bus ride to Hopkinton, or as you try to stay warm as you wait for the start of the race. I hope that those of you racing have a fantastic time and get the day you’re hoping for. But if it doesn’t turn out the way you want, hopefully the experience makes up for it in other ways.
To those of you volunteering, cheering, or working the race, thank you. In many ways, today is one big team effort to get about 30,000 runners across the finish line as quickly as possible, and hopefully in decent shape. And fortunately, the weather is doing its part this year, which is a major stroke of luck given that we’ve had snow, thunder, and temperatures in the high 80s recently.
I’ve spent so much time in recent weeks going all in on writing about pro runners and pregnancy that the marathon snuck up on me this year. I’m less informed than usual about certain details surrounding the race. I have not trained properly for race day (evidenced by the fact that my arm got a little sore after photographing the 5K). But it’s here, and I’m going to do my best :)
Assuming all goes to plan, I’ll be in my usual spot before halfway, getting photos of as many fast women as I can. But far more exciting is the fact that the B.A.A. has given Amy Roberts, who you might know as @runninphotog, the opportunity to ride on the women’s lead vehicle for the second year in a row, and she will undoubtedly get some fantastic shots for Fast Women, which we’ll share on Instagram.
As I was writing this, I got the email saying Fiona O’Keeffe is out of the race due to a recent hamstring issue. (I was apparently quite invested in this because I gasped.) Based on her recent resume, especially her phenomenal run in New York, I would have called her the U.S. favorite. And she sounded really ready to go. This sport can be so cruel sometimes. She shared more detail here. (Even before this news, I’d been wondering why we’ve been hearing about so many hamstring issues among pro women recently.)
Some things I’ve been thinking about heading into Boston, and other race-related news
Kenya’s Sharon Lokedi, the defending champion, goes in as the favorite, but almost all of the chatter has been about Lokedi and the U.S. women. There’s definitely a little less depth in the international field this year, but I assume that at least one of the women who has broken 2:19 in the past 15 months (Kenya’s Irine Cheptai and Loice Chemnung, and Ethiopia’s Workenesh Edesa and Bedatu Hirpa) will put together a good day. Chemnung ran 1:03:57 (chip time) to win the Barcelona Half in February, so she’s clearly fit.
Des Linden will be the official starter for the pro women’s race. Linden is also running the race, wearing bib 2018, and it will be interesting to see what she can do, given that she’s had so little recovery time following the Marathon des Sables. And defending women’s wheelchair champion Susannah Scaroni will be the starter for the women’s and men’s wheelchair divisions. Scaroni is sitting this one out because she’s pregnant and due in August. She shared over the weekend that she was newly pregnant when she won Boston last year, but sadly, she later miscarried.
Great Britain’s Calli Hauger-Thackery will be a fun one to watch. She’s a 2:21 marathoner, and she’s currently 22 weeks pregnant. Her baby is already an accomplished marathoner. Hauger-Thackery won December’s Honolulu Marathon when she was unknowingly four weeks pregnant. And then she won January’s Houston Marathon in 2:24:17, eight weeks into her pregnancy. (And if you need a reminder that this kind of achievement during pregnancy is the exception, not the rule, read the article I published on Friday about pro runners’ recent experiences with pregnancy.)
Chelsea Clinton will be racing, and it’s not a secret like it’s been in NYC, but her bib number has not been published in advance. In past years, many of the VIPs have started at the back of wave one. I’d love to see astronaut Suni Williams, who will be wearing bib number 608.
Erika Kemp will unfortunately not be racing. “Sometimes when it rains it pours and right now it’s really coming down,” she wrote in a post on Thursday. “A sudden series of unfortunate events is putting it incredibly mildly but I’m in no place mentally, physically or emotionally to toe the line on Monday.”
Looking at the age/gender breakdown of who runs the Boston Marathon, the 18-39 age group is the only one where women outnumber the men. In all of the masters age groups, women are significantly outnumbered. As an older person, I have some theories as to why that is, but I’d love to see those numbers even out over time.
How to follow the Boston Marathon
There will be national coverage on ESPN2 from 9:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., and WCVB will have local coverage all day. If I were solely watching the race from home, I would probably access the international broadcast via a VPN, because it’s going to have far fewer interruptions (and bonus, Kara Goucher will be commentating).
Helpful links: Live results (also available via the B.A.A. racing app) | Start lists | Uniform guide | The media guide (if you really want to study)
Select start times:
9:06 a.m. ET Men’s wheelchair division
9:09 Women’s wheelchair division
9:37 Professional men
9:47 Professional women
9:50 Para athletics division
10:00 Wave 1
10:15 Wave 2
10:28 Wave 3
10:41 Wave 4
11:01 Wave 5
11:21 Wave 6
Thanks to SOAR for supporting Fast Women this month
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Catching up with Mary Cain in advance of her book launch
Mary Cain’s memoir, This Is Not About Running, comes out April 28. When I received a PDF of the book in November, I opened it planning to read just a few pages. But the opening paragraphs made it clear she wasn’t going to hold back, and they drew me in. I ended up putting off much of what I intended to do that day and reading it in one sitting. (It’s also a quick read because most of the chapters are only one or two pages.)
I think a lot of people have stories about their experiences in the running industry that they mostly keep to themselves, especially because they plan to remain in that world, and it’s a small one. But Cain, who is in her second year of medical school at Stanford, wrote her book like someone who has other plans for her life. Cain is critical of Alberto Salazar and Pete Julian, and the running media, but also some of the women she encountered during her time in elite high school running and pro running. But I hope her central message, about building a healthier culture in sports, has a real impact.
We spoke on December 28, while Cain was on break from school, but I didn’t have permission from the publisher to share the details of our conversation until now, even though I’ve avoided spoilers. This has been edited for length and clarity.
What feelings do you have as you prepare to put this book out into the world?
Honestly, I just feel really proud of it. It was a really interesting and unique experience sitting down and writing it. I recorded the audio book a couple weeks ago, and I enjoyed that, even though it’s hard to read. It’s cool being able to put something out in the world that I feel very proud of creating.
The emotions are very positive, and I recognize that there might be a curiosity [whether I have] any concern or fear or anxiety. There’s a little bit of that, but I think that’s just a normal thing at this point for me, any time that I have to be somewhat public facing.
Did you have any help writing the book?
No, I didn’t have a ghost writer. Writing has always been one of my favorite hobbies, and everyone in my family was a big reader. I purposefully wrote the first draft of the manuscript before selling it, because I wanted to really make it clear that I was going to tell my own story.
It’s no surprise that a publisher would be interested, but did you know anything for sure when you wrote the draft?
After the New York Times piece came out, I had an agent, literary publishers, and editors reach out to me saying they would love me to write a book. At the time, I was so new to coming to terms with anything, so I said, “Thank you but no, I will write this when I’m ready to write this.” But I reached out to agents decently early in the writing period, so I had a team member well in advance of when I ultimately sold the memoir. And because of that, I kind of had a feeling [publishers] would be interested.
I think some people were a little surprised by the book when I sold it, and it’s a little bit more personal and emotional than some folks expected. So I wondered how people would react to it, but I was only going to create something that I wanted to write.
And how long did it take to write that first draft?
I started in January of 2024. A month later, I got my first acceptance into medical school, so when I started, I was hopeful I would be going to medical school the next year. I was still working at the time, so over the course of six months, I wrote the first draft and then sold it. Then there was a year of going back and forth and having random bursts of very intense editing work, and I was in school by then.
Had you documented many of the experiences you wrote about in real time? What were you working from—training logs, memory, anything else?
Especially for some of the things that happened in my younger years, I did have more documentation of certain events. I was also able to pull from emails. So there was a pretty big chunk of it where there was research involved, whether it was email documentation or training logs, and then other things were more just based on memory.
Was the legal side of things complicated at all? Were there things you wanted to include but couldn’t?
Not really, it was maybe more just semantic changes, which are not, to me, a big deal. I think honestly the most difficult piece is the stuff from my younger years, just based on the nature of some of the individuals involved. There’s never been any culpability over what happened, and there’s never really been a reckoning, if you will. So I’m kind of approaching that piece of it with a little bit of curiosity about what happens. But I actually have more documentation of some of that because we were going to school at the time.
What you wrote about your high school experience was one of the parts that surprised me the most.
It’s always made me a little sad, because there were so many moments where I was still kind of treated like I did something bad by not continuing to run for my team. The track world is small and everyone’s pretty interconnected. In some ways, that’s always been kind of difficult because even though I never spoke about it, I think a lot of people were aware of what was going on.
There’s this tendency, especially in women’s distance running, to promote the idea that everyone gets along, and people love the idea of women supporting women. But it sounds like throughout your career, you rarely had that experience. It seems like, with this book, you made a decision to speak up about some of those things. Why was that important to you?
I feel like there’s a false sense of safety for a lot of young women that when you enter a room where maybe you have an older female teammate, or whatever, you are going to be safer. And there are absolutely situations where that is true, but not [necessarily].
I didn’t talk about this in the memoir, but the only part of my New York Times article that I did not want to include was the specific language that we used to talk about needing more women in coaching. And it’s not that I didn’t believe that, but we need a culture that wants more women coaches. Because those are two different things. When there’s a culture of perpetuating bad behavior—and it’s often from fear or your own trauma in women’s sport—I think it creates this opportunity for people to be like, “We have a woman in the room, things can’t be that bad.” Instead, [we should] have a culture where this is valued and we [hire women] because we believe in it, versus just doing it to check a box.
So I think for me, it was having people sit with the slightly uncomfortable reckoning that a bigger systemic cultural change involves women’s behavior also changing and standing up. But also creating systems where you don’t feel like the crazy person because you’re looking around and being like whoa, other women are condoning this.
Compared to the New York Times piece, I think this level of nuance is going to make a lot of people very uncomfortable, and there’s not quite the same level of quick fix. But if I’ve learned anything over the last five or six years with the work I do to help end abuse in sport, it is not easy or quick. There’s a lot more uncomfortable stuff we have to sit with. And so that’s part of the reason I felt it was really important to just be really honest.
I think about the stories I’ve heard throughout my career and how few consequences some people face.
In one of my final chapters, I have that laundry list of things that current professional coaches have done—and they’re stories that we’ve all heard. And I’m just like come on, guys. If I could stand up for myself at 24, I’m hoping to embolden some people to maybe do the same thing and actually make sports better, instead of there being this smoke and mirrors of like look, we caught one person once, everything’s good now, instead of taking a look at the whole culture.
The book made me think a lot about the fact that it’s possible to have good intentions but still be part of the problem. I’ve tried to adjust as I’ve learned more, but when I started covering the sport and coaching, I had zero training to do either one of those things. And the more I cover women’s running, I realize it’s easy to praise and promote people’s accomplishments without realizing you’re praising unhealthy behaviors and systems.
I understand that. Something like an eating disorder is not always obvious—they’re not like, one shape, one size. But sometimes they are really obvious. And then there are other things like someone failed a drug test, and maybe they’ve served the time, but they were never honest about their culpability, and things like that. I think it can be very difficult for the media to figure out how to navigate that.
But one thing that I rarely see—and it’s part of the reason that I’ve stopped following running—is broader think pieces. Have a conversation about the ways in which eating disorders are still a problem in the sport. Have a conversation about how we feel about athletes returning to sport (after doping bans). Those sorts of conversations often fall more to like, the LetsRun forums of the world, the Twitters of the world, the Instagram comments, and aren’t necessarily reported by the big media sites.
I feel like social media is only making the media environment worse. At times, I’ve seen people clamoring to get content with young star runners. Do you have thoughts on how people can responsibly cover the careers of young runners?
When I recorded the audiobook, I cried a decent amount. But the only chapter that I actually sobbed during is the one about the Runner’s World article (titled Teen Star Mary Cain Returns Home Amid Disappointing Track Season, from 2015). There were a lot of really, really horrible articles written about me but that was one that, to this day, still affects me.
I think pieces like that, where we are questioning what a young person looks like, in terms of their weight, and why they’re not running as fast, and all of those sorts of things, I just don’t think ever have a place. If a kid who ran really well in high school has a bad race, I don’t think we need to report on that. Report on the person who won, report on the person who had a good race. I don’t think that has to be a news story.
But I think the other thing, too, is I do feel sometimes like we want more from young people than we do from pros. Like, I used to watch other people’s interviews after races, because I really used to really love track and field. But I think what was odd was I felt there were so many more questions directed at me. With the pros, it would be low key, like, “Hey buddy, how was the race?” And the athlete would be like, “I didn’t do too good.” And everybody would be like, “Wow, insightful.”
But then to a kid, it would be like, “What are you going to major in? Where are you going to college? Do you like your teammates? Are you mean?” And it would be like why are we reaching for more personal information from a young person than an adult? And so I think just like taking a step back and, especially if someone’s a minor, it’s okay to report on, like, hey, they had a really good race, they ran this time, and they’ve committed to insert college.
I was the sort of kid who would always set goals for myself before interviews, and I would try to say like one SAT-level word and make a couple jokes. I would try to make it kind of fun. And if a kid wants to offer that, they will. And if a kid doesn’t really want to, then keep it to the race stuff specifically.
What is your involvement with Atalanta NYC these days?
I’m on the board of directors. Our executive director is now Devon Martin, who runs the organization in the way that I did for the first three years, which is day to day, on the ground. And now I work more on the bigger picture, with the other board members. It’s been amazing seeing the ways that it’s continued to adapt and grow.
Right before I read your book, I listened to Linda Flanagan’s Take Back the Game. It touches on some of the ways that adults get way too caught up in young people’s success and how you gain status as a parent if your kid is good at sports, and stuff like that.
We do put such a burden on children in that sense. Part of the reason that the title is This is Not About Running is that it’s s a book that, if you’re a soccer parent or your kid is a really good cellist, you can learn something from this. This is the entertainment industry, this is academia, this is competitive music, this is a lot of different things. I hope this resonates beyond running in the same way that the New York Times piece did. And I hope there are more people [who will read it] and maybe be like, “How can I leave with some action items for myself after this, even if I’m not a sports marketing executive?”
How’s medical school going?
I’ve absolutely loved med school. Day in and day out, I’m surrounded by really good people who are funny, incredibly talented, and intelligent. And then the ability to embark on this career is such an honor, and even when it’s hard, it’s just so cool, because you learn so much, and it’s really amazing. I know that’s so cliché, probably, but it also just feels like it’s so real for me.
And is running still part of your life these days? And what form does it take
Yeah, since my surgery (for functional popliteal artery entrapment syndrome, in 2023), I’ve been able to do it again and it’s been really fun. It’s been really nice just exploring it and kind of just seeing what happens. Right now, I do it because I want to want to do it, and there’s something very satisfying about being like I think I can be a healthy runner. That’s my first goal, and anything that goes beyond there, I’m only going to do it if I think it’s fun.
I run before class some days and cross train other days. And I’ve weirdly gotten some of my classmates to start aqua jogging with me. They think it’s a lot more fun than any runner does, except for me. I don’t feel like I have anything to prove. I’m just kind of doing it if I like it, and I will see where that goes.
Results Highlights
I looked to see what I wrote in this newsletter the past several Marathon Mondays, and last year’s newsletter included a news item about Jane Hedengren running 14:57 and destroying the U.S. high school record at the Bryan Clay Invitational. She’s in college now, but not much has changed, because she ran 14:50.50 on Friday to win the 5,000m at Bryan Clay, and shaved 1.68 seconds off of Parker Valby’s outdoor collegiate record from 2024. Hedengren also holds the indoor/outright record of 14:44.79. Washington State’s Rosemary Longisa dominated the 1500m, winning in an NCAA-leading 4:02.55. Notre Dame’s Sophie Novak won the steeplechase in 9:24.95, which also leads the NCAA. Alabama’s Caren Kiplagat won the 10,000m in 31:40.74, and Kansas’ Emmaculate Jemutai won the 800m in 1:59.88. (Results)
Four NCAA athletes—Duke’s Lauren Tolbert (1:59.58), Arkansas’ Sanu Jallow-Lockhart (1:59.70), Indiana’s Veronica Hargrave (1:59.79), and Jemutai (mentioned above)—broke 2:00 over the weekend at three different meets. I’m too short on time and space to go into detail, but you can learn more by looking at the NCAA’s descending order list.
Victoria Bossong won the 800m at the Tom Jones Memorial meet in 1:59.56. (Results)
South Carolina’s Salma Elbadra won the 1500m at the Wake Forest Invitational in a speedy 4:02.63, which was an NCAA-leading time until Longisa ran faster at Bryan Clay. NC State freshman Sadie Engelhardt took second in a big PR of 4:03.28. Clemson’s Gladys Chepngetich won the 800m in 2:00.67. (Results)
Ethiopia’s Gela Hambese repeated as champion at Saturday’s Boston 5K, running 15:28. Rachel Smith summoned a nice kick and edged Katie Izzo for second at the line. Both were timed in 15:33. (Results)
Dorcus Ewoi, of Kenya and Puma Elite, won her second straight B.A.A. Invitational Mile in an event record of 4:29.73. Rachel McArthur took second in 4:34.36. (Results)
Because a couple versions of the Rotterdam Marathon results didn’t include the sub-elite field, I missed one of the more fun stories of the week last week. Erika Fluehr was the top U.S. finisher in the race. Paced by her twin sister, Kathryn (who has already qualified for the Trials), for 20 miles, she ran 2:37:00 chip time and hit the Olympic Trials qualifying time right on the nose. (Results)
Ethiopia’s Tigist Gezahagn (2:20:06) and Haftamnesh Tesfaye (2:20:18) went 1-2 at this morning’s Vienna City Marathon. And running her first marathon in 18 months after returning from a hamstring tear, Lindsay Flanagan finished seventh in 2:28:34. (Results)
Hannah McGovern won the Jersey City Marathon in 2:33:39. I wish I could say with confidence that it’s a qualifier for the 2028 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials, but there are a couple of questions I haven’t been able to answer yet, so I’ll have to get back to you on that. (Results)
Other News and Podcast Highlights
This was already apparent from Mark Coogan’s Instagram posts, but Roisin Willis officially announced last week that she has joined New Balance Boston.
Sweden’s Mia Barnett, who most recently raced collegiately for Oregon and has run 4:05 in the 1500m, announced that she has signed a pro deal with Nike.
In an Instagram post, Krissy Gear said that she will have to miss the 2026 track season due to injury.
I meant to mention last week that Laurie (Barton) Fierer of Atlanta Track Club Elite is also pregnant. Had her announcement come about a week earlier, I would have tried to include her in my recent articles.
Hannah Borenstein was great on The End of Sport podcast last week discussing the hidden labor of Ethiopian runners. She raised a number of topics that should be discussed more but simply aren’t.
Uruguay’s Julia Paternain was really good on Run With It and though I’ve heard her recount her experience winning a surprise bronze medal at the world championships last summer, these were the most detailed reflections I’ve heard from her yet on how the race played out and everything that came in the aftermath.
Sara Hall’s book, For the Love of the Grind, is coming out on Tuesday and she was on the Ali on the Run Show and LetsRun’s podcast last week. So far the consensus seems to be that everyone is most surprised by her use of magic mushrooms.
Bailey Kowalczyk’s appearance on The Fueling Forward Podcast drove home what an important role coaches play in athletes’ lives, and how misguided advice can affect athletes for a long time to come.
Additional Podcast Episodes: Jane Hedengren on The Running Effect | Gordon Bakoulis on Starting Line 1928 | Tayler Peavey on Women of Distance
Because it took me most of last week to write Friday’s newsletter and I spent Saturday doing photo-related work, I’ve written all of this newsletter in much more of a rush than I would have liked. Thanks to my editor, Sarah Lorge Butler, for working overtime these days.
Thanks so much to SOAR for sponsoring Fast Women this month, and don’t forget to enter their giveaway. This newsletter would not exist without reader support, so a huge thank you to all of you who help keep it going with your support via Venmo or Patreon.
I hope you all have the best day and week possible.
Alison
As always thanks for such a lovely newsletter. The stat about women only outnumbering men in the 18-39 category is interesting and a bummer. I’d love to hear your theories! I have my own, as a masters runner.