Fast Women: Track season isn't over yet
Diamond League competition resumes this week.
Issue 311, sponsored by SOAR Running
After a pause, the track season marches on
As we all recover from the excitement of the Olympic Games, the track world has been a lot quieter this past week. But there is still more exciting racing to come this season, and it will be interesting to see who has more left in them over the next month. Great Britain’s Laura Muir said last week that she has decided to end her season, as has Nikki Hiltz, who said in an Instagram story that they were taking some much-needed down time.
But among other things, there are still five Diamond League meets remaining, and those resume on Thursday in Lausanne. Originally event organizers put out a press release mentioning that Athing Mu would be running the 800m, but she is no longer on the start list. It should still be a great race, though, with Mary Moraa, Jemma Reekie, Georgia Bell, Natoya Goule-Toppin, Shafiqua Maloney, Nia Akins, and Allie Wilson all entered.
Ejgayehu Taye has the fastest personal best heading into the Lausanne 3,000m, but Diribe Welteji, who ran a 3:52 1500m at the Olympics and just missed out on a medal, should be dangerous. The field is solid all around, and it includes Elise Cranny. The meet will be on Peacock at 2:00 p.m. ET on Thursday.
News and Links
According to this article, Kenya’s Faith Kipyegon has forgiven Ethiopia’s Gudaf Tsegay after their skirmish during the Olympic 5,000m final.
I just became aware of Last Lap, a documentary about Doris Brown Heritage, which won an audience choice award at the Seattle Film Festival. It’s being screened only at film festivals and “exclusive events” at this point, but you can watch the trailer here. It appears that current pro Laurie Barton is in the film, and it looks like she plays young Doris. I’m glad to see Brown Heritage getting some additional recognition for her incredible career and the trail she blazed.
I enjoyed this four-post series from Amy Begley about some of the behind-the-scenes logistics of marathon fueling at the Olympic Games. A lot of championship races are held on criterium-style courses, but because this year’s route was one big loop, they needed more sets of hands to staff the fluid stations. Begley served as the U.S. women’s distance coach at the Games.
A pair of 2:16 marathoners, Ethiopia’s Tigist Ketema and Kenya’s Rosemary Wanjiru, headline the field for the Berlin Marathon, which will take place on September 29.
The entries for the World Athletics U20 Championships, which will take place August 27–31 in Lima, Peru, are now available. There are some truly elite competitors entered, including Ethiopia’s Medina Eisa, who has run 14:16.54 for 5,000m, Ethiopia’s Sembo Almayew, who is a 9:00.71 steeplechaser, and Australia’s Claudia Hollingsworth, who has run 1:58.40 in the 800m. Mary Moraa’s cousin, Sarah Moraa, will also run the 800m. Moraa finished high enough at the Kenyan Trials to make the Olympic team, but she didn’t have the Olympic standard.
When I saw Great Britain’s Rose Harvey post about finishing the Olympic marathon with a stress fracture in her femur, I didn’t expect that it would go viral. It’s unfortunately not that uncommon for athletes to line up for major championships with an injury, hoping for the best, only to find out they were more injured than they realized. (I don’t know how much Harvey knew on the starting line.) But the news took off last week. This BBC article adds some context. Harvey is getting married in a couple of weeks, and her hope is that she will be off of her crutches by then. It happens that like Fiona O’Keeffe, Harvey is coached by Alistair and Amy Cragg. Both athletes lined up hurt and obviously made different decisions from there. Hopefully they’ll both have smooth recoveries and be back at full strength before too long.
A lot of alternates don’t travel to the Olympic Games, so I was interested to see that the Ethiopians had Gotytom Gebreselase in Paris, ready to fill in if necessary. It just shows how different countries do things.
I appreciated this three-part recap of the Olympic marathon from Dakotah Lindwurm. And here’s the video of her partner, Montana Popehn, proposing afterwards. I love the enthusiasm and commentary from the onlooker with a French accent.
I loved the detail in this lengthy race recap from Australia’s Jessica Stenson, who finished 13th, one spot behind Lindwurm, in the Olympic marathon.
This article from Athletics Weekly has some interesting track & field stats from the Olympic Games. From it, I learned that Namibia’s Helalia Johannes became the first woman to complete five Olympic marathons when she finished 68th in Paris in 2:38:36.
If you’re interested in hearing more about Brittany Brown’s experience with endometriosis, she did a good Q&A with Refinery29. Brown won bronze in the 200m at the Paris Olympics.
This Guardian article about Elle St. Pierre doesn’t contain much new information, but I enjoyed the photos from Aisha McAdams that accompany it.
According to this article from Duke University’s student newspaper, The Chronicle, 37 members of the school’s cross country team signed a memo with a list of grievances directed towards the coaching staff. In March, program director Shawn Wilbourn announced that distance coach Angela Reckart would not be returning after the end of the outdoor track season, but she wound up leaving the program before the end of the season.
I love this video of Sha’Carri Richardson “racing” a four-year-old.
After having double Haglund’s surgery last year, sprinter Abby Steiner reports that she has just undergone another surgery.
Cindy Kuzma’s 2023 article for Runner’s World about top college running programs moving away from body composition testing just won an award from the American Society of Journalists and Authors.
Thanks to SOAR for sponsoring Fast Women this month
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Results
Fentaye Belayneh, 23, outkicked fellow Ethiopian Melknat Wudu, 19, to win the Falmouth Road Race, 36:10 to 36:11. The livestream of the race didn’t show anything between the start and the finish, but it looked like the lead pack broke up very late in the race. Emma Bates finished a close third (36:17), ahead of Emma Grace Hurley and Kenyans Everlyn Kemboi and Edna Kiplagat. All three were clocked in 36:25. (Results)
The summer of Kenya’s Dorcas Ewoi continues. Roughly two weeks after winning Sir Walter Miler, Ewoi picked up another win at the Falmouth Mile, running an event record of 4:23.11. Dani Jones (4:23.37) and Gabbi Jennings (4:23.99) finished close behind. Helen Schlachtenhaufen (4:26.76), Kate Mitchell (4:29.69), and Micaela DeGenero (4:29.95) also broke 4:30, with Mitchell and DeGenero doing so for the first time. (Race Replay | Results)
At the Motonet GP in Oulu, Finland, Lithuania’s Gabija Galvydyte, who just finished her collegiate career at Oklahoma State in June, won the 800m in 1:59.89. Finland’s Nina Chydenius won the 5,000m in 15:28.89, and Rachel McArthur finished third in a small PR of 15:40.60.
Helen Schlachtenhaufen won the 800m at the DMV Summer Invite, held at George Mason University, in 2:00.13. (Results)
Kenya’s Gladys Kwamboka won the Cal 10K in Cali, Colombia, running 32:19, and Steph Bruce finished fifth in 34:26. (Results)
It’s time consuming to comb through all of the results from the World Masters Athletics Championships, but among the things I have noticed so far: Sue McDonald won the 800m in a championship record of 2:25.42. Michelle Rohl won the 55–59 5,000m in 18:30.78, Kristine Clark won the 60–64 5,000m in a championship record of 19:28.50, and Jeannie Rice won the 75–79 5,000m in a championship record of 22:46.86, and then also won the 800m in 3:09.52. (All results)
I was looking forward to seeing how Allie Ostrander, Anna Gibson, Bailey Kowalczyk and others would do at the Tatra SkyMarathon 28K in Poland, but 11K in, the race was canceled due to heavy thunderstorms.
Podcast Highlights
Great Britain’s Amy-Eloise Neale was on the Fitter, Faster, & Happier podcast, where, among other things, she discussed her regrets about not fueling herself better for more of her running career. There is a lot in Neale’s experience that up-and-coming athletes can learn from.
On The Runna Podcast, Holly Archer’s story about how she got into running was both entertaining and terrible. She discussed some of the challenges of making ends meet as a “pro” track athlete in Great Britain.
I appreciated Carrie Tollefson’s brief recap of her experience working for the Olympic Broadcast Service during the Paris Olympic Games on C Tolle Run. I can’t imagine having to provide commentary for all of the events, both because of the amount of knowledge it requires and the long days.
I enjoyed hearing from Gordon Bakoulis, who was my co-worker at New York Road Runners long ago, on RunChats with @RonRunsNYC. Bakoulis is a five-time Olympic Marathon Trials qualifier, and she has also worked in the sport for decades. But probably the thing that most impresses me about her is her longevity in the sport, because she’s still able to crank out strong age-group performances.
Additional Episodes: Abby Nichols on I’ll Have Another | Masai Russell on Good Game with Sarah Spain | Emma Kertesz on Lactic Acid with Dom and Laura
This week’s newsletter is shorter partially because things have been relatively quiet and partially because I spent most of last week on vacation. The timing worked out well, but I’m looking forward to things picking up again this week.
Thanks to SOAR for sponsoring Fast Women this month and to everyone who helps keep this newsletter going via your support on Patreon and Venmo. I hope you all have a great week.
Alison