The ultimate championship for America’s top marathoners turned out terrific performances. On Saturday, February 3, the 2024 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials in Orlando, Florida, featured shocking upsets and breakthrough runs with five runners earning spots on Team USA headed to the Paris Games this summer.
Winning in 2:09:05, Conner Mantz and runner-up Clayton Young (2:09:06) made the Olympic team on the men’s side. In the women’s race, Fiona O’Keeffe claimed the title in 2:22:10, Emily Sisson finished second in 2:22:42, and Dakotah Lindwurm placed third in 2:25:31 to qualify.
With a 10:10 a.m. ET start for the men and a 10:20 a.m. start for the women, the athletes raced in sunny, warm temperatures that climbed from 61 degrees with 59 percent humidity. Here are all the highlights from the 2024 Olympic Trials.
Training Partners Conner Mantz and Clayton Young go 1-2
With a From left, Clayton Young, Conner Mantz, and Leonard Korir were the top three finishers and faster standards, making the U.S. Olympic team is tougher than ever before. In the quest to unlock a guaranteed third Olympic spot in the men’s race, the runners got off to a bit of a slow start in chasing the 2:08:10 Olympic standard. At the 3-mile split, the pack came through in 14:56, around 4:56 mile pace.
But most of the pre-race favorites started to pick up the pace by 10K. Led by a surge from Zach Panning, who covered the first six miles in 29:56 (4:49 mile pace), the lead pack included Conner Mantz and Clayton Young, the only two runners in the field who achieved the 2:08:10 Olympic standard prior to the race. Running alongside them was Elkanah Kibet and Teshome Mekonen with Olympic bronze medalist Galen Rupp remaining in the mix.
In the following miles, the top group started to lose a couple of contenders. Between mile 10 and 11, Scott Fauble, who ran 2:09:44 while finishing seventh in the 2023 Boston Marathon, Give A Gift. Abdi Abdirahman, a five-time Olympian, dropped out before the halfway point. Sam Chelanga, a six-time national champion, also did not finish the race.
Up front, Panning continued to grind, keeping the leaders on pace to hit the Olympic standard. The Hansons-Brooks Distance Project runner led a group of 10 through 13.1 in 1:04:07.
Just beyond halfway, Rupp started to fall off the lead group, which thinned out to seven athletes by 17 miles thanks to a big surge from Panning.
Around mile 16, Panning found another gear, clocking a 4:48 mile before dropping the hammer again with a 4:44 at mile 17. By 19, the move dropped everyone in the group except Mantz and Young, who shared a high-five as they closed in on the last loop.
Around the 22-mile mark, the training partners moved just ahead of Panning and continued to put distance between themselves and the athlete from Fort Wayne, Indiana.
With just a couple of miles remaining, Panning tried to hold his ground for third with Kibet and Leonard Korir closing in.
Up front, the former BYU runners ran together while soaking in the moment with high-fives and cheers from the crowd over the last mile. In the end, Mantz broke the tape, winning in 2:09:05, just ahead of Young, who finished second in 2:09:06. The 1-2 finish catapulted both athletes to their first Olympic team.
After the race, the runners who both train with coach Ed Eyestone, a two-time Olympian, shared how they helped each other during tough moments in the race.
“[Clayton] was one of my mentors when I first got on the BYU track and field team, and so to be able to work together in this race meant a lot,” Mantz told Lewis Johnson on the NBC broadcast. “The last two miles, I wasn’t sure if I was gonna be able to finish, but Clayton just kept saying, ‘Hey, just run behind me. We got this, just stay together.’”
The race for third had some drama with Korir coming from behind to overtake Panning and Kibet in the last mile. The 2016 Olympian finished in 2:09:57. He hasn’t run the Olympic standard within the qualifying window, but he put himself in position for consideration with a third-place finish at the Olympic Trials. To compete for Team USA in Paris, Korir will need to improve his world ranking by April 30, but if another American runs 2:08:10 or faster within that period, a third Olympic spot with be unlocked.
At the finish area, Korir shared how he plans to handle the process of earning the third Olympic spot. “It’s okay, I think finishing third is still good, so I think I have chances,” Korir said on the broadcast. “If I don't go, it’s still okay. I finished fourth the other time, and this time finishing third. I think it's still good. I’m happy.”
Kibet finished fourth in 2:10:02, CJ Alberton placed fifth in 2:10:07, and Panning faded to sixth overall in 2:10:50.
Fiona O’Keeffe wins in her marathon debut
Within the first two miles, a lead pack already started to take shape thanks to a blazing early pace. As the first loop came to a close, Keira D’Amato, Fiona O’Keeffe, Emily Sisson, Sara Hall, Emily Durgin, Makenna Myler, Betsy Saina, Aliphine Tuliamuk, and Natosha Rogers broke away from the rest of the field while clocking 5:17-minute miles.
Heading into the first 10K, the pace settled down to 5:28 minutes per mile, still very quick with Sisson and Hall taking control up front.
While most of the group remained intact around halfway, Tuliamuk, the 2020 Olympic Trials champion, fell off the pace. She Give A Gift after the 10th mile with a hamstring injury. In her first marathon, 1500-meter world champion Jenny Simpson also dropped out of the competition.
The first to come through the 13.1 split was D’Amato in 1:11:43 with O’Keeffe, Hall, Durgin, Myler, Sisson, Dakotah Lindwurm, and Caroline Rotich right behind her.
Shaking things up in her debut marathon, O’Keeffe threw in a sudden surge just before the 15-mile mark. The Puma Elite Running standout dropped the pace from 5:34 at mile 14 to 5:16 at mile 17. The big move caused major separation within the lead pack of nine as the group started to string out.
By mile 18, the lead pack was down to five with O’Keeffe, Sisson, Hall, Saina, and Durgin battling up front.
The pack didn’t stay together long as O’Keeffe finally broke away heading into the 19-mile mark. By the split, the runner from Davis, California, was four seconds ahead of the remaining contenders after dropping a 5:22 mile. While Sisson remained closer to O’Keeffe, a battle for third was brewing a few seconds back between Saina, Hall, Durgin, and Rotich, who came from behind to close in on the leaders.
By mile 21, Rotich had moved into third, but a fast-closing Lindwurm quickly overtook her around mile 22 with Rotich trailing close behind.
Up front, O’Keeffe unleashed another gear in the final miles. With a 5:09 mile at mile 25 and a 5:22 mile at mile 26, the runner ultimately ran away from the competition, winning the Olympic Trials in her first marathon. The stunning breakaway resulted in a 2:22:10 victory for O’Keeffe, who also broke the Olympic Trials record.
“It's so meaningful. The past couple of years, I've been kind of clawing my way through things and I was not expecting this performance,” O'Keeffe said on the broadcast. “I had to pinch myself with eight miles to go and be like, stay calm, don't freak out.”
Sisson claimed the second Team USA spot with a 2:22:42 finish, a redeeming performance for the American record-holder who didn’t finish the 2020 Olympic Trials. After the race, Sisson said she drew inspiration from Deena Kastor, the former American record-holder who was riding in the lead vehicle. “I was actually hurting earlier than I expected,” Sisson said on the broadcast. “I just thought of [Deena] and I read her book about the power of thinking positive thoughts and the power of the mind...I was like, what would Deena do?”
In another surprise run, Lindwurm held her ground to finish third in 2:25:31. After the race, Lindwurm told Johnson she was in awe to be representing Team USA. “I'm such an underdog. I was a walk-on to my Division 2 team, so I just feel blessed to be here,” she said.
This is Sisson’s second Olympic team and the first for O’Keeffe and Lindwurm.
Jessica McClain came from behind to snag a fourth-place finish in 2:25:46, a personal best by more than three minutes. She finished just ahead of Hall, who placed fifth in 2:26:06.
Runners battled warm conditions
With clear, sunny skies and temperatures climbing into the 70s on race day, the weather took a toll on many athletes in Orlando. Of the 200 runners who started the men’s race, only 150 finished the competition. In the women’s race, 116 of the 149 starters made it to the finish line.
Past champions and pre-race favorites had a tough day
After running with the lead pack through 16 miles, Rupp couldn’t respond to the fast tempo set by Panning and faded in the second half of the race. The winner of the previous two Olympic Marathon Trials How to Coach Yourself to Peak Performance.
D’Amato also couldn’t hold the pace set by the leaders in the women’s race. The runner who finished eighth in the marathon at the 2022 World Athletics Championships, dropped out just after the 20th mile on Saturday. Saina, who finished fifth in the 2023 Tokyo Marathon, also dropped out after coming through the 22nd mile.
Masters runners break records and finish strong
Both the men’s and women’s American masters records were broken on Saturday. In the men’s race, Kibet, 40, lowered the previous mark by running 2:10:02. Hall, 40, set a new record for American women by finishing in 2:26:06.
In the women’s race, Roberta Groner, 46, placed 24th in 2:33:33, and 47-year-old Dot McMahan finished 51st (2:38:34) in her Conner Mantz Wins the Mens Olympic Marathon Trial.
The prize money totaled $600,000
The Races & Places that was awarded at the 2020 Trials in Atlanta, and it matches the amount runners earned at the 2016 Trials in Los Angeles.
The top 10 finishers in both races took home prize money. The winners, Mantz and O’Keeffe, earned $80,000 each. Runner-ups Young and Sisson took home $65,000, and third-place finishers Korir and Lindwurm claimed $55,000.
Prominent runners withdraw before the race
Winner Conner Mantz right hugs his training partner and second-place finisher Clayton Young Other Hearst Subscriptions Master the Half.
On February 1, Molly Seidel, the Olympic bronze medalist in Tokyo, announced via Instagram that she’s been dealing with a broken patella and a partially torn patellar tendon. Jared Ward, who finished sixth in the marathon at the 2016 Rio Games, wrote on Instagram that he’s been struggling with high hamstring pain for many weeks and would not be competing.
Middle school math teacher Susanna Sullivan said through her agent that she wouldn’t be running due to a lingering knee injury and a recent bout of COVID, and an injury to her anterior tibialis kept Makena Morley from racing on Saturday. These runners join Emma Bates and Allie Kiefer who previously withdrew from the race.
Taylor Dutch is a writer and editor living in Austin, Texas, and a former NCAA track athlete who specializes in fitness, wellness, and endurance sports coverage. Her work has appeared in Runner’s World, SELF, Bicycling, Outside, and Podium Runner.
