Fiona O’Keeffe broke the U.S. Olympic women’s marathon trials record in her debut at the distance on a warm Saturday to secure her spot at the Paris Games.
O’Keeffe finished in a time of 2 hours 22 minutes 10 seconds, breaking Shalane Flanagan’s 2012 American Marathon trial mark of 2 hours 25 minutes 38 seconds in Houston. Emily Sisson, the American marathon record holder, finished second and Dakotah Lindwurm moved into third place to become Team USA for Paris.
On the men’s side, training partners and close friends Conner Mantz and Clayton Young finished 1-2 to qualify for Paris. They celebrated with the crowd as they made their way to the finish line. Mantz finished in a time of 2 hours, 9 minutes, 5 seconds when Young gave way near the end and finished one second behind.
Leonard Korir used a late surge to finish third, but he will now wait until May to see if a third Olympic spot opens up in the US men’s marathon. He finished in 2 hours 9 minutes 57 seconds, just outside the time (2 hours 8 minutes 10 seconds) he needed to guarantee a spot at the Paris Games.
It was around 15.5 degrees Celsius at the start of the race, with temperatures rising into the 70s. In November, officials moved the race time to 10 a.m. due to weather conditions.
O’Keeffe savored the moment after her surprising finish.
“I didn’t expect this performance,” O’Keeffe said in a post-race interview. “I had to pinch myself with eight miles to go and say, ‘Keep calm. Don’t panic. ”
For Sisson, it was redemption after dropping out late in the race at the marathon trials in Atlanta in February 2020. Lindwurm, a one-time goaltender on her high school ice hockey team in Minnesota, went to Florida in December to get used to the weather.
Molly Seidel, who won Olympic bronze at the Olympic Games Tokyo Gamesdid not start due to a knee injury.
Mantz and Young were teammates at BYU and are trained by two-time Olympic marathoner Ed Eyestone. Mantz and Young worked together throughout the race and began pulling away with about three miles to go. Young even turned his hat around – before later putting it on the ground – to get started.
Young, who underwent knee surgery a year ago, energized the crowd by raising his arms to generate more applause on the homestretch.
It was their stage and they enjoyed the moment – together.
Two-time defending American marathon trials champion Galen Rupp finished in 16th place. At the age of 47, Abdi Abdirahman attempted to make his sixth Olympic team, but dropped out during the race.
The course along the streets of Orlando started with a two and a half mile loop before branching out into three eight mile loops on the fairly flat course.