Fast Women: Past champions rule USAs, mostly
Nikki Hiltz, Nia Akins, Emily Mackay, Lexy Halladay-Lowry, and Sydney Vaught win national titles.
Issue 413
A huge thank you to Marcy Withington. She is sponsoring this week’s newsletter in memory of her late husband, David Uprichard, whose encouragement carried her through so many workouts and races, and Parker Morse, whose support helped make this newsletter possible.
Eight straight for Nikki Hiltz, with their closest winning margin yet
Nikki Hiltz knows how to put on a show, and on Saturday at New York City’s Icahn Stadium, they eked out their fourth consecutive 1500m win at the USATF Outdoor Championships in dramatic fashion. Hiltz might have preferred a little more breathing room, but they timed their kick to perfection, running 4:06.92 to Addy Wiley’s 4:06.96 and Emily Mackay’s 4:06.98.
As they battled Wiley and Mackay in the homestretch, it looked like Hiltz’s win streak might come to an end, but they drew on their years of experience and mental toughness and found a way to prevail. “That was honestly probably, out of all my titles, the hardest one, so I feel really really happy with that one,” Hiltz told reporters afterward. “I was the three-time defending champ, and I think the weight just gets heavier and heavier and heavier, so I feel a lot of relief right now.” (I thought Hiltz’s entire post-race interview was really good.)
The race started slowly, with the pack hitting 800m in 2:20, and finished at a blistering pace. Hiltz covered their final 400m in 58.80 and their last 800m in 2:01.45.
Hiltz has now won the last eight U.S. 1500m championships, sweeping the indoor and outdoor titles from 2023–26. One day, someone other than Hiltz will win a U.S. 1500m title again. In the meantime, I’m appreciating this era, and the incredible athleticism, mental toughness, and consistency that has gone into their win streak.
After the race, someone in the stands tossed Hiltz a trans pride flag, and in a time when trans people in the U.S. are facing an increase in legislative restrictions, harassment, and violence, it was powerful to see them celebrate with the flag draped over their shoulders.
The following day, they wrote on Instagram, “Lately I’ve been feeling mentally exhausted from the consistent hate I experience online on a daily basis. SUPER fun to be a member of a community people are so hyperfixated on dehumanizing right now. Honestly yesterday, standing on the start line, I just felt so drained. Which makes this win so much sweeter.”
Rachel McArthur, who has parted ways with Ben Thomas and is now being coached by Josh Seitz, emerged as the best of the rest, running 4:09.59 for fourth, her highest finish yet at a national championship on the track.
And Claire Stegall, a rising sophomore at the University of Florida, bounced back nicely after missing out on the 1500m final at the NCAA Outdoor Championships, taking fifth in 4:10.24. Stegall, who will also compete at the World U20 Championships in early August, has put together an incredible freshman campaign. Despite her success, she’s flown somewhat under the radar, allowing her to develop without quite as much pressure as some other young stars have faced. (1500m replay | 1500m results)
Against the odds, Nia Akins earns her fifth national title
The 800m final was full of surprises. There was no heavy favorite going in, but if I had to pick one based on the 2026 season thus far, it wouldn’t have been Nia Akins. And to be fair, she, too, seemed surprised by her win. She got a late start to her season after suffering a concussion in a hit-and-run accident, which required her to take time completely off from training. Though she’d won several low-key races, her best time this season was 2:00.79, and she was up against four women who had run 1:57 or 1:58.
The second surprise was how conservatively the race went out. Roisin Willis led through 400m in 58.55 and 600m in 1:30.11. With 200m to go, Akins was in seventh place. She was hugging the rail and running the shortest distance, but she was also boxed in. She ran the first 600m like someone who wasn’t feeling the pressure to win, but when a path to the front opened up, it was like her muscle memory kicked in, and she knew exactly what to do.
She broke the tape in 1:59.25, with Addy Wiley (1:59.40), Meghan Hunter (1:59.67), Willis (1:59.68), and Makayla Paige (1:59.72) all close behind. Akins, who also won U.S. 800m titles in 2023 and 2025 indoors and 2023 and 2024 outdoors, earned her fifth national title. And Wiley, who raced every day of the four-day meet, between prelims and finals, earned her second runner-up finish in two days, this time coming within 0.15 seconds of the win. High schooler Paige Sheppard, who ran 2:00.99 to make the final, finished ninth in 2:02.78. (800m replay | 800m results | Akins’ post-race interview)
Emily Mackay bounces back with a 5,000m win
Before Sunday afternoon’s 5,000m final, it was pretty easy to guess how the race was likely to go. Big kickers like defending champion Shelby Houlihan and Emily Mackay would try to rely on their finishing speed, and Parker Valby, who has run the fastest time by a U.S. woman this year, would push the pace in an attempt to take the sting out of their kicks. And the race pretty much went to script.
Valby set a steady pace, hitting 1K splits of 3:01.02, 3:00.52, 3:01.87, and 3:03.16 on an 84 degree afternoon, but that wasn’t enough to shake her biggest competitors. With around two laps to go, it was down to the expected three, and with just over one lap to go, Houlihan and Mackay began to pull away from Valby.
The final lap became the battle of the kickers, and it turned out Mackay had much more left. She sat on Houlihan until she appeared to get a signal to make her move with just under 200m to go. She went around Houlihan on the turn, blasted away from her over the final 100m, and won in 14:55.82. Mackay made her 61.9-second final lap look easy, and covered the last 100m in 13.85 seconds. Houlihan took second (14:57.88), and Valby, who had trouble changing gears on the final lap, held on for third in 15:06.25. Vaught doubled back nicely after her 10,000m win and took fourth in 15:08.41.
Mackay won the USATF indoor 3,000m title in February, and she was thrilled to earn her first U.S. outdoor title. The feat was all the more impressive considering that she had two rounds of the 1500m in her legs, and she took a pretty hard fall across the finish line in the previous day’s 1500m final. Mackay called her 5,000m “a little bit of a redemption tour after yesterday.”
Houlihan, last year’s champion, has had an up and down season, but she said that she’s hoping to compete at the World Athletics Ultimate Championships in September. Valby gave herself a grade of B or B- afterward and said that she’s dealt with some minor setbacks recently. But given where she was a year ago, unable to compete at all, she’s done an excellent job of working her way back this season. (5,000m highlights | 5,000m results)
A convincing repeat for Lexy Halladay-Lowry
A year ago, fresh out of the NCAA, Lexy Halladay-Lowry surprised some people by winning her first national championship in the steeplechase. On Saturday, she pulled off a tougher feat, successfully defending her title. Halladay-Lowry made her move with 700m remaining and won comfortably in 9:12.54.
She said after the race that she’s had a tough season, because she’s been battling a nagging calf injury, but she’s finally feeling better, and as a result, it feels like her season is just getting started.
Gabbi Jennings, who led most of the race, narrowly held on to take second—her highest finish yet at USAs—in 9:17.42. And Maddie Boreman, who had been stuck in the 9:30–31 range so far this season, had a breakthrough when it mattered most, emerging from the chase pack to take third in 9:17.68. Boreman, who is unsponsored, shaved 4.3 seconds off of her two-year-old personal best. Angelina Ellis, who finished fourth in 9:18.84, was the only other athlete in the race to set a personal best.
I thought some of the camerawork at this meet was quite good, but I was frustrated that the broadcast showed only Halladay-Lowry finishing. One of the things I appreciate about coverage of trail racing is that there’s more focus on who finishes in the top 10. This is my informal petition to make track and road racing more like that. Maybe it’s not the top 10 for every race, but we want to know how the people the commentators have been talking about for much of the race fare.
Speaking of which, Emma Coburn was clearly disappointed with her seventh place finish (9:29.68), but it was good to see the 10-time champion in this event back out there again after a three-year hiatus. Marisa Howard was also back after having her second child less than a year ago. Knowing all that goes into getting to a multi-day meet across the country when one has young kids and no sponsor, it was tough to see her take a hard fall going over a barrier in the middle of the race. But she got back up and finished ninth in 9:42.78. (Steeplechase highlights | Steeplechase results)
In her first pro track championship, Sydney Vaught delivers
With the country’s top seven ranked 10,000m runners sitting out the USATF Outdoor Championships, a new name was guaranteed to emerge atop the podium. And Arkansas graduate Sydney Vaught (née Thorvaldson) took control of the race and made sure it was hers.
No one wanted to lead for 25 laps on a warm evening, so the race went out at a pedestrian 18:09 for 5K. But right around halfway, Vaught went to the front, started hammering, and made it a 5,000m race. Initially, only Katie Izzo, Allie Buchalski, and newcomer on the pro scene Mikayla Reed went with her. Reed was the first to drop off, around four miles in, then Buchalski, who fell back with three laps to go.
Izzo hung with Vaught for another lap, but with about 700m to go, Vaught took off and pulled away to win 33:30.60 to 33:36.98. Vaught’s winning time was the slowest since 1998, but the way she did it—running 15:21 for her second 5,000m—was impressive. Buchalski took third (33:42.29), Cailie Hughes moved up to take fourth (33:46.75), and two weeks after finishing sixth at the USATF 6K Championships, Reed improved to fifth here, in 33:49.23.
Vaught, 23, was a SEC champion for Arkansas, but her highest finish at an NCAA championship was seventh in the 10,000m in 2024. In February, she impressed at the SEC indoor championships, soloing a 15:02.52 5,000m. But she was sick by the time the NCAA indoor meet rolled around. Vaught had no outdoor eligibility left, and in April, she announced that she had signed with Nike.
She is still working with her college coach, Marc Burns, and she said after the race that she’s exploring her options as far as training groups go. Her husband competes professionally in rodeo as a team roper, so Vaught has some additional factors to consider as she determines where she will be based. (10,000m Results)
Other USATF Outdoor Champs Notes
One thing that I enjoyed about USAs this year was seeing a more developmental group of athletes get opportunities, because some people skipped the meet. And it was fun to watch a new group of athletes step up and unexpectedly make finals. In the 1500m, Teagan Schein-Becker of the Brooks Beasts lowered her 1500m personal best from 4:06.58 to 4:04.91. Recent BYU grad Carlee Hansen went from 4:06.18 to 4:04.92, Taryn Parks of the Golden Peaks Track Club also PRed (4:05.92 to 4:05.14), as did Wisconsin’s Kylie Finger (4:08.58 to 4:05.78) and Jessica Kain (4:09.03 to 4:06.21), who both made significant jumps. Kain had a particularly strong showing in the final, where she finished sixth in 4:11.10. And Finger was a 4:18 1500m runner at the beginning of the outdoor season.
Because there were only two rounds of the 800m, the field went from 22 runners down to nine in the prelims, and there were a number of surprising casualties, including Michaela Rose, who missed advancing by 0.13 seconds, McKenna Keegan, who is otherwise having a strong season, and Valery Tobias. Though others toyed with the idea, only Wiley ended up doing the 800m/1500m double.
I loved seeing New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani make an appearance at the meet, and it sounds like this Threads post from Melissa Jefferson-Wooden helped make it happen. USATF made sure that Jefferson-Wooden got to spend some time with Mamdami before she dominated the 200m the following day. Mamdami’s office also gave away 500 free tickets to the meet, and 7,000 people applied. (So I assume cost is part of what’s keeping people away from these events. It’s clearly difficult to fill all the seats at a track meet in the U.S. right now, no matter how great the athletes are.)
There are the glamour events in track & field, and then there’s the race walk, which barely gets any attention. (And yes, I contribute to that.) I looked for a broadcast of the race on Friday night, and if there was one, I missed it. But I watched Lauren Harris’ splits as she walked a half marathon in 1:38:35 and won the race by more than nine minutes. I appreciate that this event has gone from 20K to 13.1, because now it’s easier for runners to compare their running times and be impressed. (Race walk results)
At the Para National Championships, held concurrently, Lipscomb graduate Liza Corso won the T13 1500m in 4:28.61, and Kaitlin Bounds won the T20 1500m in 4:46.75. Hoda Ismail won the T54 5,000m in 12:35.45, Hannah Dederick won the T54 1500m (3:35.47) and 800m (1:52.47), Linden Williamson won the T34 800m (1:57.07), and Yen Hoang won the T53 800m (2:01.69). (Results)
I appreciated this video of Atalanta NYC’s Emily Richards being congratulated by the high school athletes she coaches after she competed in the 800m prelims.
Juliette Whittaker, who won three NCAA titles for Stanford and was a 2024 Olympic 800m finalist, signed with Brooks and announced she’s joining the Seattle-based Brooks Beasts. She’s still being coached by J.J. Clark for now, but she’ll be making the switch in the fall.
Makayla Paige, the 2025 NCAA indoor 800m champion for UNC, and Chloe Foerster, a 1:59.91/4:05.75 runner for UW, have both signed with Nike. Along with Gracie Morris, they are joining the Flagstaff branch of the Swoosh TC. Morris, who has produced many stellar results in the past year, has struggled this month. At USAs, she missed making the 1500m final by 0.12 seconds. And BYU’s Carlee Hansen is joining the Provo hub. Both Whittaker and Paige had NIL deals with On, and Foerster’s was with Brooks, so all of them made a switch.
Other News, Links, and Results
Defending champion Hawi Feysa of Ethiopia will return to the Chicago Marathon this fall, and she’ll be up against Kenya’s Sharon Lokedi, among others. It will be interesting to see how Lokedi fares running her first flat marathon. Emma Grace Hurley will make her marathon debut, and the other U.S. women in the field include Susanna Sullivan, Dakotah Popehn, Natosha Rogers, Molly Born, Gabi Rooker, and Elena Hayday, Sara Hall, and Des Linden.
Great Britain’s Clare Elms set two more 60-64 age-group world records on Wednesday at the Dave Clarke Mile, running a 5:17.25 mile and splitting 4:56.09 for 1500m en route.
Taylor Roe reported that she recently had surgery to repair a torn tendon in her foot.
After talking to her for this article, I was thrilled to see Anna Camp Bennett announced that she has signed with Asics. She was already pregnant when she found out that Adidas would not be extending her contract, and she was advised that there wasn’t much she could do about finding another sponsor until she was back to racing again. That didn’t sit well with her, so she kept looking for opportunities, and found a good one. She had her first child in May.
Melissa Riggins, who was a 4:24.98 miler for Georgetown, has signed with Atlanta Track Club Elite.
Audrey Werro won the 800m at the Swiss Championships in 1:57.21, and she also ran an impressive 50.80 personal best in the prelims of the 400m, but she opted to skip the final. (Results)
Australia’s Claudia Hollingsworth, 21, won the 800m at the TIPOS P-T-S Meeting in Slovakia, running 2:00.34. (Results)
Morgan Nokes won the Deseret News Half Marathon, which takes place at altitude but has a net elevation loss of 1,600 feet, in a speedy 1:09:56, and Grace Clements took second in 1:10:34. Allie Ostrander won the 10K, which has a net elevation loss of about 600 feet, in 30:50. (Results)
Kenya’s Everlyn Kemboi, whose 2023 NCAA 10,000m title was vacated for unpublicized reasons, won the Bix 7, running 35:30 and averaging 5:04/mile for seven miles. Kassie Parker, who took fifth in 36:46, was the top U.S. finisher. (Results)
Paige Wood won the Wharf to Wharf 6 miler, running 30:34 and averaging 5:05/mile. (Results)
Lauren Gregory won the Speedgoat 50K in 5:56:04. (Results)
Samantha Hastie won the Ryan Shay Mile in 4:30.4. (Results)
Anna Oeser won the NYRR Team Championship 5 Miler in 26:30, and Roberta Groner, 48, took second in an impressive 26:50. (Results)
Former Stanford teammates Lucy Jenks and Grace Connolly went 1-2 at the San Francisco Half Marathon, both running 1:16:13. (Results)
Podcast Highlights
Ciara Mageean’s appearance on The GAA Social podcast was powerful. She discussed the jarring transition from pursuing her goals as one of the world’s best runners to learning she had stage 4 colorectal cancer. She said that unfortunately her last six rounds of chemotherapy were not as effective as her first 12, so they’re going to have to change her chemo regimen. She discussed planning her wedding and things she wants to enjoy while she can. And she encouraged listeners to go to the doctor if they have any concerning symptoms, and to become organ donors. I think there’s a lot of messaging out there about all of the things we can do to be healthy, but Mageean’s story is one of many reminders that there is so much that is beyond our control.
Rachel Schilkowsky was great on the Road to the Trials podcast. She discussed working with Kellyn Taylor to get her Olympic Marathon Trials qualifier at the Vermont City Marathon, balancing motherhood and training with her engineering job, and finally figuring out marathon fueling.
I’ve heard from some people who want to know more about David Roche, now that he’s coaching a handful of the country’s top road races. The latest episode of C Tolle Run is a good place to start.
I appreciated hearing from Australia’s Claudia Hollingsworth on The [Female] Athlete Project podcast, though the episode was recorded months ago.
Additional Episodes: Erin McDonald on Runners of the Bay | Emma Grace Hurley on the Lactic Acid Podcast | Gracie Hyde on Pending Ratification | Cailie Hughes on I’ll Have Another | Mary Cain on Set the Pace | Former MIT standout Maryann Gong on Fueling Forward | MIT’s current director of track and field, Julie Heyde, on Sideline Ascent
For the first time in eight years, this year’s USATF Outdoor Championships didn’t serve as the qualifier for a global championship. But even without the higher stakes, the meet was still really fun to follow, and I’m glad so many athletes opted to show up anyway.
A big thanks to Gregorio Denny for spending the last four days at Icahn Stadium, capturing all the action, to Sarah Lorge Butler for editing this newsletter for the past 7+ years, and to Marcy Withington for her touching sponsorship of this week’s newsletter.
I hope you all have a great week.
Alison
I agree with your point about coverage of meets where they cut away too soon and only show the winner finishing as though the race is over. I feel this is done far too often. If you’re invested in the race, and some of the other athletes, it’s very frustrating not to see them finish. Sometimes you don’t even see the results on screen. They shouldn’t focus on the winner celebrating until the most of the runners have finished
I was disappointed that the broadcast cut the HM race walk because I think it was the one event they cut that evening! A cool story from that is that the 2nd place finisher is the coach of the winner.