Fast Women: Records for Monson, Tuohy
Alicia Monson sets an American indoor 3,000m record and in the same race, Katelyn Tuohy breaks the collegiate record.
Issue 223, presented by Seed Retreat
Alicia Monson leads a parade of records at the Millrose Games
Thanks to improving technology, particularly in shoes, records have been falling at a record pace in recent years. It provides me with no shortage of headlines. But it’s also clear that times don’t mean quite the same as they used to. The sport has had to recalibrate what’s world class and what’s possible.
Point this out, and you risk being accused of taking away from athletes’ accomplishments. Setting a record is still an incredible feat that requires the right combination of fitness, health, and conditions on the day. But a 4:20 mile in 2023 isn’t the same as a 4:20 mile in 1990. (Especially if we’re talking indoors, because whew, they raced on some terrible indoor tracks back then. But also anti-doping measures in 1990 weren’t what they are today. So it’s complicated.)
At Saturday’s Millrose Games in New York City, Alicia Monson set an American 3,000m record of 8:25.05, shaving 0.65 seconds off the previous record, held by Karissa Schweizer. (Video highlights here.) And considering the context, I do think Monson’s run was superior to the record she surpassed.
When Schweizer established the previous record in 2020, she had modern shoe technology and Boston University’s speedy track on her side, Kate Grace pacing through 2K, and Shelby Houlihan to battle with. In Saturday’s race, Monson had a fast track and fast shoes, but she led most of the way. Dani Aragon did a good job of pacing, but she made it only 1100 meters. It’s tough finding a rabbit who can last long running 33.67 seconds per lap.
Monson had a fast field chasing her. That included Elise Cranny, who ran right behind Monson through about 2200m, but the pace ultimately proved to be too hot for her.
Katelyn Tuohy knew better than to start off with Monson and Cranny. The second pack had Anna Camp Bennett as a pacer through the mile, and they hung back a bit early on. But late in the race, the two packs began to merge. Around the 2300m mark, as Whittni Morgan and Tuohy began to catch Monson and a fading Cranny, it almost looked like Morgan or Tuohy had a shot at the win. But Monson had another gear, and she used it to pull away and win by more than five seconds.
Morgan finished second in a huge PR of 8:30.13. Between this result and her 4:23 mile last month, I’m excited to see what else she can do this year. She’ll compete at the USATF Indoor Championships later this week.
Tuohy finished third in 8:35.20 and took 6.4 seconds off the collegiate record. That record was also held by Schweizer, who set it at Millrose in 2018. Success as a collegian in the Millrose 3K is becoming a stepping stone to future pro success. Tuohy said on the NBC broadcast that she was inspired by Monson, who pulled off a surprise win in the 2019 Millrose 3K, when she was still in college.
Elly Henes, who overlapped with Tuohy at NC State, put together a strong run to take fourth in 8:36.48, faster than her outdoor PR. And Cranny hung on to take fifth in 8:37.17. I didn’t see any post-race interviews with Cranny, but when she lines up for a domestic race, she usually does so ready to win. So without any additional context, this seems like it was an off day for her. And Laura Galvan, in sixth, set a Mexican record of 8:40.45. (All Millrose results)
Ajee’ Wilson, Laura Muir also win in NYC
Three weekends in a row, someone has tried to run away from Ajee’ Wilson, and three weekends in a row, it has not worked. When Wilson entered the Millrose Games 600m, it looked like she’d have a great showdown with Athing Mu. But five days before the race, Mu announced that she had withdrawn from the meet. She did not say why, just that she was focusing on being at her best for the world championships this summer.
But even without Mu in the race, Wilson had an intriguing opponent in the form of Shamier Little, who ran 1:24.65 in the 600m last month. On Saturday, Little took the race out hard, going through 200m in 25.57, but she faded on the last lap (running 31.91 seconds). Wilson calmly caught and passed her with 100m to go, winning with room to spare, 1:24.85 to 1:26.16. (Finish video)
The last time Great Britain’s Laura Muir raced in New York City, she pulled off a record-breaking win at the Fifth Avenue Mile. And on Saturday, she won another iconic New York City race, taking the Wanamaker Mile title at the Millrose Games. Muir followed pacer Charlene Lipsey through halfway in 2:08, before slowing over the next quarter mile. It looked like Muir might be in trouble when Josette Andrews and Lucia Stafford went by her with two laps to go, but Muir said later that she intentionally backed off the hot pace, in an attempt to save something for the finish.
It worked. With one lap to go, Muir moved back to the lead and she held off Andrews to win, 4:20.15 to 4:20.88. Muir’s two-meet U.S. tour is now complete, and up next, she’ll race in Birmingham, England, where she’s planning to go after the indoor 1,000m world record of 2:30.94 at the Müller Indoor Grand Prix on February 25.
Andrews has been through a lot of change recently—new name, new team, new sponsor, new location—but it appears to be paying off. She had a rough outdoor season in 2022 after dealing with an injury, but this was an excellent season opener for her. She finished just 0.07 seconds off the personal best she ran in finishing second at Millrose a year ago.
Great Britain’s Katie Snowden finished third in a big personal best of 4:21.19. Canada’s Stafford continued her strong season, running 4:22.72 for fourth and breaking her week-old PR. Helen Schlachtenhaufen, fifth in 4:23.94, took almost five seconds off her indoor mile PR. And Sinta Vissa of the On Athletics Club finished sixth in an Italian record of 4:24.54.
In the shorter distances, Abby Steiner won the 300m in an American record of 35.54. Aleia Hobbs remained unbeaten this season, winning the 60m in 7.04 seconds. And Shawnti Jackson finished fifth in the 60m, running 7.16 seconds and breaking her own high school record. Devynne Charlton of the Bahamas won the 60m hurdles in 7.91 seconds, Katie (Nageotte) Moon won the pole vault (4.81m/15 feet, 9.25 inches), and Chase Ealey won the shot put with a world-leading mark of 20.03m (65 feet, 8.75 inches).
Thanks to Seed Retreat for supporting Fast Women this week!
Since Seed Retreat opened registration for their first retreat last Monday, more than half of the available spots have filled. So if you’re considering taking part in their August 10–13 retreat in Flagstaff, Arizona, don’t wait too long to sign up.
Seed Retreat days will be filled with exploration, community, and reflection. Each day will be slightly different but will include a running adventure, sports psychology, group coaching, opportunities for mindfulness, delicious meals, and free time.
The retreat will be led by Julia Hanlon (who initially made a name for herself in the running world with her Running On Om podcast) and Erica Landerson. And the retreat team includes sport psychology coach Emily Saul, running coach Natalie Mitchell, photographer and videographer Laura Green, and professional runner Jessa Hanson. Molly Seidel is planning to make a guest appearance for a fireside chat.
There are a limited number of need-based scholarships available, and the deadline for applying for a scholarship is 1:00 p.m. ET on February 19. The application form is here. You can read many more details about the retreat on Seed Retreat’s website.
Dani Jones, Natosha Rogers, Emily Mackay, and Michaela Rose score big wins in Boston
I spent 14 hours at the Boston University indoor track on Friday, for the Valentine Invitational. I am thankful that BU’s bouncy track attracts so many top runners to the area, but I have no idea how track & field coaches and athletes endure these meets week after week. Hopefully most of the events they attend are a bit shorter.
Hanging out at an overcrowded indoor facility all day lends itself to some interesting people watching. I saw a good number of elated runners, but there was also so much disappointment. It was a reminder that this is a tough sport, and it takes so much more than a fast track and fast shoes to be successful. There were the runners who got DQed for false starts and didn’t get a chance to test themselves. There was at least one tearful phone call home, from an athlete who was afraid her season was over. And then there was Claudia Saunders, who was running in a good position in the mile when she suddenly got bumped out of the pack, rolled across the track, and her race was over.
There was the athlete whose teammate screaming encouragement at her seemed to be the final straw, and she dropped out of the race right there. Sometimes it was hard to tell if the tears I saw were ones of joy, frustration, pain, sadness, or some combination of those things. More than once, I wanted to tell a stranger that it was all going to be okay. And I was thrilled to notice age-group record setter and Olympian Michelle Rohl, who was the subject of this good Runner’s World piece last week, competing in the 3,000m. It was so fun to see the 57-year-old mixing it up with collegians, but Friday didn’t seem to be her day, either, as she dropped out after 2,000m.
It was Dani Jones’ day in the 1,000m, though. Jones followed teammate/pacer Cory McGee and Heather MacLean through 700m. McGee dropped out at that point, and Jones took over the lead. With 100m to go, MacLean tried to go by Jones, but Jones held her off and won, 2:34.64 to 2:35.03. Jones’ performance moved her to second on the U.S. all-time list, behind only Jen Toomey’s 2004 American record of 2:34.19.
Natosha Rogers also had a big day. Coming off of a month of altitude training in Iten, Kenya, with her new Puma Elite teammates, Rogers won the 5,000m in 14:52.21, breaking 15:00 for the first time. She led a Puma Elite sweep with Great Britain’s Sarah Inglis second (14:59.65) and Fiona O’Keeffe third (15:01.34). Emily Infeld took fourth in 15:04.74 but was hoping for more. “Some races you feel like 💩🔥🗑,” she wrote on Instagram. Infeld also said she’s in the midst of a heavy training block as she prepares to race the TEN on March 4. BYU’s Aubrey Frentheway was the top collegian in the race, running 15:32.82. And Brianna Robles of Adams State won the second heat in an NCAA DII record of 15:47.88. Neely Spence Gracey set the previous record, 16:01.09, in 2011.
I enjoyed getting to see LSU’s Michaela Rose race in person. Two weeks ago, I said I wondered if she might be one of the NCAA’s breakout stars of the season, and I think it’s safe to say she is. Rose went out hard in the 800m and no one could catch her. (Race video here.) Her winning time of 2:00.18 moved her to second on the NCAA all-time list indoors, until Roisin Willis ran 1:59.95 later the same day.
Emily Mackay, a first-year pro for New Balance Boston, had her second fantastic race in two weeks, winning the 3,000m in 8:40.75, a personal best by 13 seconds. Val Constien made her first trip to BU and was rewarded with an 11-second PR of 8:41.77. (Race video) Many eyes were on Florida’s Parker Valby in this event, but it was Alabama’s Hilda Olemomoi who finished as the top collegian, taking third in 8:45.50. (Olemomoi’s former coaches, Will and Samantha Palmer, recently moved from Alabama to Florida, and now they coach Valby.) Running her first open race of the indoor season, Valby took sixth in a PR of 8:49.71.
UA Mission Run Baltimore Distance’s Susan Ejore won the first heat of the mile, which is usually the fastest, in 4:31.80. But because that heat went out slower, heat two ended up being the faster one. The University of Guelph’s Cameron Ormond used a 31.02 second final lap to win in a big personal best of 4:30.17, and Virginia Tech’s Lindsey Butler, last year’s NCAA 800m champion indoors, finished second in 4:31.41. I hadn’t heard Ormond’s name before, but I’m paying attention now. (All Valentine Invitational results)
Other News and Links
Rhode Island high school senior Sophia Gorriaran ran the 800m at BU’s Valentine Invitational on Friday, finishing second in 2:01.16 behind one of the top runners in the NCAA. Then she hopped in the family’s minivan and rode to New York City, where she live streamed her college announcement (it’s Harvard) later in the day. Fast Women editor Sarah Lorge Butler wrote a good article for Runner’s World about Gorriaran’s decision-making process and her running career thus far. The following day, running against pros, Gorriaran finished fifth in the Millrose Games 600m, running 1:27.51. While Harvard has had its share of superstars over the years, it’s still somewhat uncommon for the best track & field athletes in the country to choose the Ivy League, which does not offer athletic scholarships. It will be interesting to see if she is able to, and chooses to, offset some of that with NIL deals.
Kellyn Taylor wrote an honest post about the challenges of getting a workout in as a new mom.
Doris Brown Heritage won five consecutive International Cross Country Championships (now called the World Cross Country Championships) starting in 1967, and now she has donated the gold medal that she won that first year to the Museum of World Athletics.
In this article, former University of New Mexico runner Charlotte Prouse discussed taking time away from the sport to deal with an eating disorder and returning stronger. (I wasn’t thrilled to see a photo I took at the top of the article, used without permission.)
Tina Muir doesn’t want others to struggle with Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport (RED-S) the way she did, so she has created a series of videos to help educate people.
Florida State graduate Lauren Ryan announced that she has signed with Under Armour and joined their Baltimore Distance squad. And New Mexico graduate Adva Cohen has also signed with Under Armour, but she’ll be joining Dark Sky Distance.
Jeff Hollobaugh wrote a piece for Track & Field News about hammer thrower Janee Kassanavoid, who became the first Native American to medal at the World Championships last summer. She says she has increasingly embraced her Indigenous heritage partially because it makes her feel closer to her father, who died of cancer when she was 8.
Additional Results
Ethiopia’s Gudaf Tsegay ran 4:16.16, the second-fastest indoor mile ever, at Wednesday’s Copernicus Cup in Torun, Poland. You can watch her run the last straightaway of the race here. And Great Britain’s Keely Hodgkinson had a good duel with Benin’s Noelie Yarigo in the 800m, which Hodgkinson won, 1:57.87 to 1:58:48. Yarigo’s time was a national record. (Results | 800m video highlights)
Stanford first year Roisin Willis made a statement in the 800m at the Windy City Invitational, winning in 1:59.95. Her teammate, Juliette Whittaker, finished a close second in 2:00.32. The duo moved to second and fourth on the NCAA all-time list indoors. Hansons-Brooks’ Amy Davis-Green won the 5,000m in 15:39.11. (Results)
I was impressed by New Mexico’s Amelia Mazza-Downie running 15:18.54 for 5,000m at the University of Washington’s Husky Classic on Friday night. She outkicked Utah’s Emily Venters, who also ran a great race and finished in 15:20.37. Those are the only two performances in the top 15 of the NCAA list not run at BU. And Mazza-Downie should be at an advantage come NCAAs because the meet is being held on her home track, at altitude, and the majority of the athletes in the NCAA live and train at sea level most of the year. Oklahoma State’s Taylor Roe won an interesting 3,000m at the same meet. Arkansas’ Lauren Gregory had a solid lead with a lap to go, but her ambitious early pace caught up to her and Roe won in 8:56.94, with Utah’s Simone Plourde (8:57.12) and Colorado’s Ella Baran (8:58.51) taking second and third. Washington’s Kayley DeLay, running unattached, finished fourth (8:58.93) and Gregory was fifth (9:00.05). (Results)
Huntington University’s Addy Wiley ran the fastest indoor 800m in NAIA history on Friday, with a 2:02.33 on Grand Valley State’s 300m track. (Results)
Oregon’s Jorinde van Klinken set a collegiate record in the indoor shot put with a mark of 19.57m (64 feet, 2.5 inches). She bettered Raven Saunders’ previous mark by 0.25 inches.
Oregon high school junior Mia Brahe-Pedersen broke Bianca Knight’s high school indoor 200m record at the Don Kirby Invitational in Albuquerque. Brahe-Pedersen ran 22.89 seconds, shaving 0.08 seconds off of Knight’s time, run in 2007.
Ethiopia’s Dera Dia won the Dubai Marathon in 2:21:11. (Results)
HOKA NAZ Elite’s Lauren Paquette won the Kook Run 10K in 31:53, finishing 19 seconds ahead of runner-up Katie Izzo. (Results)
Great Britain’s Joasia Zakrzewski set a 48-hour world record in Taipei, covering 411.207K (255.668 miles). That’s 11:16 per mile for two days straight!
Podcast Highlights
I enjoyed Deena Kastor’s conversation with Mary Ngugi, who is making a difference for women and girls in Kenya while still in the prime of her running career. Ngugi’s segment begins at the 29:00 mark of this episode of Marathon Talk.
In a recent issue of her newsletter (which you can subscribe to here), Colleen Quigley said that she had signed up for her first triathlon, and she planned to continue racing on the track through 2024. And last week, she was on the Ali on the Run Show, discussing all of that in more detail. That first triathlon took place on Saturday, and Quigley won it. (Also, if you care about Quigley’s experience with an IUD, apparently enough people were curious that she wrote a separate update about that.)
From the little she had shared, Nell Rojas seemed to have a good trip to Iten, Kenya, to train recently. But on her intro Road to the Trials episode, she said that she got very sick due to a parasite while she was there, which really set her training back, rather than boosting it.
I enjoyed hearing from content creator Tiara Williams, who has carved out a cool role for herself in the sport in recent years, on the Lactic Acid podcast. I particularly enjoyed hearing her talk about how wonderful the Armory’s HBCU meet is.
Additional Episodes: Chelsea Clinton on the Ali on the Run Show | Kara Goucher on Some Work, All Play | Katie Izzo on Lactic Acid | Vicki Hunter on I’ll Have Another | Shawanna White on Run Farther & Faster | Sara Mae Berman on Women’s Running Stories
Upcoming
This is a big week in running, as the USATF Indoor Championships begin on Thursday in Albuquerque. I don’t love it when championships are held at altitude, because it puts the sea level-based athletes at a disadvantage. But if I’m looking for positives, it might lead to some more unexpected results.
The meet will be live streamed on USATF.tv, subscription required, until Saturday at 4:00 p.m. ET, when the meet will be on NBC (and hopefully Peacock, too?). The entries might be final by the time you see this, and this page has the schedule and should have a link to the live results soon.
And the World Cross Country Championships will take place this weekend in Australia. If I’m doing the math correctly, the races will take place between 11:30 p.m. ET Friday and 3:00 a.m. Saturday, which could be a bit rough to watch live. I’ll share information about how to watch on Twitter later this week, once I find it. The entry lists can be downloaded here, and the results will be here. I haven’t seen an update since this tweet, but some of the Ethiopian and Kenyan athletes who were planning to compete have reportedly had their visas denied. Allie Buchalski has replaced an injured Emily Durgin on the U.S. roster. And in the U20 race, Abbey Nechanicky didn’t take her spot, so it was filled by Allie Zealand.
Thanks again to Seed Retreat for sponsoring Fast Women for the past two weeks, and if you’re with a company that’s interested in sponsoring this newsletter in 2023, please reach out. (Replying to this message works.) Thanks, also, to everyone who has supported Fast Women on Patreon and via Venmo.
Have a great week!
Alison