[email protected] From: Alison Wade <[email protected]> Sent: Monday, March 2, 2020 3:00 AM To: Camille Estes Subject: Fast Women | March 2, 2020 | Issue 61 View this email in your browser Fast Women, March 2, 2020, Issue 61 Presented by UCAN Aliphine Tuliamuk (left) and Molly Seidel, with Sally Kipyego trailing, on their way to making the 2020 U.S. Olympic marathon team. (Photo: @TaFPhoto) Aliphine Tuliamuk, Molly Seidel, and Sally Kipyego earn spots on the U.S. Olympic marathon team 1 On Saturday in Atlanta, Aliphine Tuliamuk, Molly Seidel, and Sally Kipyego ran their way onto the Olympic Team by going 1–2–3 in the U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials. I thought Sarah Lorge Butler put it perfectly in this article for Runner’s World, when she called the top three “completely unexpected and utterly logical at the same time.” I still think Seidel making the team is slightly illogical, but I’ll explain later. There were so many excellent marathoners in contention, it was inevitable that some excellent runners would be left off the team. But for Jordan Hasay, Sara Hall, Emily Sisson, Molly Huddle, Des Linden, and Kellyn Taylor to all be left off, that’s the surprise. How it went down The race went out slowly, relatively speaking, with most of the 444 starters right together through the first mile, which the leaders hit in 6:13. The biggest development in the first mile, as far as I know, is that Kaitlin Goodman went down and got trampled. She got back in the race, but her injuries ultimately took her out of the race shortly before halfway, and it’s frustrating that she never got to test her fitness on this stage. (Her eye looked even more dramatic a day later.) Up front, there was a large pack for much of the race. The first favorite to drop off the pace was Hasay, who was 3 seconds behind the leaders at mile 12, and 21 seconds back by mile 13. She was never in contention after that, but she stuck it out and finished 26th in 2:37:57. A pack of 14 runners, led by Thweatt, hit halfway in 1:14:38. Thweatt led most of the middle miles of the race, from about mile 8 to 19, and later told reporters, “I probably was a little too aggressive early in the race, but it’s the Olympic 2 Trials and I wanted to make it tough and I wanted to really try and go for it.” Lindsay Flanagan was off the back of the pack by mile 17. Julia Kohnen was the next to fall off, by mile 18. Kohnen, who had a seed time of 2:31:29, was the only non-sub-2:30 marathoner still in the lead pack at that point, aside from Molly Seidel who was making her marathon debut. At mile 19, there were still 12 great runners contending for three spots: Thweatt, Taylor, Seidel, Tuliamuk, Kipyego, Huddle, Sisson, Hall, Linden, Nell Rojas, Emma Bates, and Steph Bruce. Just when I was starting to imagine it coming down to a 12-way sprint finish, the race started to break open. By mile 20, Hall, Rojas, Huddle, Bruce, and Sisson had been gapped slighly, with Bates fighting to hang on. Bates later told Flotrack that as they were going up a hill into the wind, Seidel, Tuliamuk, and Kipyego began to push the pace. Seidel told Flotrack that the move wasn’t a conscious decision on her part, just a matter of her wanting to run the pace she wanted to run, and focusing on her own race. By mile 21 Tuliamuk, Seidel, and Kipyego had a 5- to 6-second lead over the next closest runner, and Tuliamuk and Seidel gapped Kipyego by running 5:16 for the 22nd mile. After that, their lead would only grow. With four miles to go, there were two major questions remaining: Who would win the race, and could anyone catch Kipyego to grab the third spot on the team? As they ran side by side, Tuliamuk and Seidel appeared to be working together to maintain their advantage, rather than trying to run each other into the ground, which they confirmed at the post-race press conference. Though they’re not teammates, they’re friends who sometimes train together in Flagstaff. 3 Just before 24 miles, Seidel looked like she was beginning to struggle ever so slightly, and she tucked in behind Tuliamuk. In the last 2K, Tuliamuk put eight seconds on Seidel, and won the race 2:27:23 to 2:27:31. Back in third, Kipyego looked vulnerable. She would say after the race, “Those last three miles, I was basically surviving, and that was hell.” Linden rallied a chase pack to go after her, but they were never quite able to get close enough. Kipyego finished third in 2:28:52, Linden fourth in 2:29:03, Thweatt fifth in 2:29:08, and Bruce sixth in 2:29:11. Each of them ran an excellent race, but unfortunately we can send only three to Tokyo/Sapporo. (Results) Thanks to UCAN for sponsoring this month’s newsletter "UCAN is a great addition to our household. I use UCAN before my runs and it helps fuel me while being easy on my stomach. 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Follow ups 4 Des Linden was clearly disappointed to not make the team, telling reporters, “I’m trying not to think about my emotions right because I know my emotions will pour out of my eyes.” But she also showed genuine enthusiasm for the runners who made the team and was able to look at the bigger picture, saying, “Honestly, it was just a ton of fun to race today. To be in that field, to watch the next stars come up and just the potential around me, was really incredible.” Next up: the Boston Marathon. Kellyn Taylor told reporters after the race that her calf “just kind of blew up” and that her whole right leg has been bothering her, but she tried to push it to the back of her mind. Now she’s off to Disney World to rest up for what she called “the new Road to Tokyo,” a.k.a. the Olympic Track & Field Trials. She expressed her excitement for her teammate Tuliamuk’s performance and said she hoped she could be a part of her Olympic buildup. Julia Kohnen ran a great race to take tenth in 2:30:43. She was the first finisher, other than Molly Seidel in her debut, to run a personal best on the hilly course with a wind so strong it was knocking down barricades. She also got engaged post-race. And if you’re wondering who she is, here’s a good Runner’s World article, or read this, if you’re over your limit on RW articles. And here’s a pre-race TV segment. Sarah Sellers had a great race, and set a personal best by one second, running 2:31:48 for 11th. She also closed better than almost anyone in the field. The only two people who ran from mile 23 to the finish faster than she did were Tuliamuk and Seidel. Jordan Hasay told Flotrack that she was proud to finish the race, and that she didn’t want to drop out because she withdrew the night before the 2018 Boston Marathon, and dropped out early in the 2019 Chicago Marathon. But she admitted that she’d been struggling with her hamstring all winter, and while that was fine on Saturday, she had developed a low back issue during race week. 5 She said, “My back is sore, I’m afraid that it’s [a bone injury].” Molly Huddle dropped out after mile 21, and told Runner’s World that she and her coach had a plan that if things were going very poorly, she would drop out and start recovering so she could get ready for track season. She’ll have a strong shot at a spot on the Olympic 10,000m team. Instagram updates: Laura Thweatt, Steph Bruce, Sara Hall, Emily Sisson, and Roberta Groner (who ran with the leaders through 12 miles and dropped out at 15). I have relied heavily on Flotrack’s post-race interview footage in my reporting, and you can access them all here, but they’re behind a paywall. The team After the race, Aliphine Tuliamuk and Sally Kipyego, who became U.S. citizens in 2016 and 2017, respectively, talked about making the team as a way to give back, after this country has given them so much. Kipyego said it was helpful to go into this race under the radar. The fact that she finished almost three minutes behind Sara Hall in her last marathon contributed.