Going...Going...Gone! ⏱️
Lap 242: Sponsored by Beekeeper Coffee & Canadian Running Series
Sponsored by Beekeeper Coffee
Fuel your miles with BeeKeeper Coffee. For runners on-the-go, each sleek can blends smooth cold brew with just a touch of organic Oregon honey (sourced in TrackTown USA - Eugene!), giving you clean, sustained energy without the crash. From Vanilla, Mocha, Caramel, and Black to the new Horchata Latte—cinnamon and vanilla kissed with honey—BeeKeeper is the perfect pre-run boost or post-run reward. Sweet enough to savor, strong enough to power every stride. Get 25% off your orders at at BeekeeperCoffee.com using code CITIUS25 at checkout.
Compiled by David Melly & Paul Snyder
Conner Calls His Shot 🚀
The 2025 Chicago Marathon was last weekend, and it’s safe to say that Conner Mantz knocked it out of the park. But he wasn’t the only one.
About two minutes ahead of Mantz, Jacob Kiplimo won the men’s race in 2:02:23, setting a Ugandan national record and cracking the all-time top-10 in just his second career marathon. It goes to show how high expectations are for Kiplimo—who holds the half marathon world record at 56:42—that you likely felt a pang of disappointment when, after 22 or so miles under world record pace, the 2:01 barrier slipped away from him. But that’s the weight of expectation Kiplimo has to deal with, being the only human to have ever run under 57 minutes for 13.1. And he not only ran really fast; he handed reigning champ John Korir a bag of bricks so heavy with his winning move at 30km that this year’s Boston champ, a 2:02 guy in his own right, dropped out at mile 20.
On the women’s side, relative unknown Ethiopian Hawi Feysa became the sixth woman ever to run under 2:15, taking the win in 2:14:56. She outdueled Magdalena Shauri and fended off a late charge from Megertu Alemu to win her first World Marathon Major title in her fifth career marathon start. Alemu ended up second in 2:17:18 and is developing something of an “always the bridesmaid” reputation—she’s finished in the top five in London or Chicago six times but hasn’t won a Major yet. Three Americans rounded out the top ten, with both Natosha Rogers (sixth, 2:23:28) and Dakotah Popehn (seventh, 2:24:20) setting PBs in the process.
One slight bummer: the specter of Ruth Chepngetich loomed large over Chicago this year. The women’s elite field was clearly budgeted around her return appearance fee, and her suspension in July meant that there were no big names to replace her. Chepngetich’s situation was addressed early and directly on the broadcast, when coach-slash-commentator Ed Eyestone made an impassioned case for banning not just athletes, but the coaches and agents associated with them, following a positive drug test. Of course, that made things a little awkward two hours later when Kiplimo crossed the line… as he shares an agent, Federico Rosa, with Chepngetich.
But back to the man(tz) of the hour: Conner Mantz. After a tailwind- and adrenaline-aided first 5km of 14:23, the 28-year-old settled into a large pack, began clipping away at 2:04 pace, and stayed there most of the race. He moved up from ninth place at mile 20 to fourth at the finish, and posted impressively even splits of 62:19-62:24. More importantly, his 2:04:43 finish makes him the official American record holder and the first U.S. man to break 2:05 on a record eligible course. Gone are the “is it Ryan Hall or Khalid Khannouchi?” quibbles, because now only one man holds the title of fastest American marathoner.
Mantz didn’t let the fast pace up front tempt him out of a sensible tempo, sticking with his prescribed pacer and tucking into the pack when the course flipped into the headwind. Before the race, we predicted that a sub-2:05 and a podium finish would be roughly equivalent goals, and we were pretty much right: the only thing we didn’t guess was that NAZ Elite’s Alex Masai would have himself a day, sticking with Mantz stride for stride until the final mile when he kicked his way to a top-three finish, 3+ minute PB, and an epic 2:04:37 run.
Conner Mantz has had a season to remember from start to finish: an American record in the half in January, a fourth-place 2:05 run in Boston, victories at Beach to Beacon and Bolder Boulder, a national 20k title, and finally, his pièce de résistance in the Windy City. Any one of those performances could be career-defining for a lesser runner, but Mantz strung them together in one season with impressive consistency, proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that the BYU alum’s early jump to the roads was absolutely the right choice (as if anyone still questioned that).
The best part is, his 2025 season isn’t even over. After skipping out on a guaranteed Team USA spot at Worlds to focus on Chicago, Mantz isn’t about to pass up the next chance to represent his country. He’d barely caught his breath at the finish line before he started talking about World Cross Country and the qualifying event for it: the U.S. Cross Country Champs in Portland, Oregon, which is in just 54 days. That’s a tight turnaround… but if we’ve learned anything from this year, it’s that when Conner sets his mind to something, he’s going to get it done sooner or later.
Which brings us to our favorite part of Conner Mantz’s American record chase—the transparency and clarity with which he aimed for this huge target. In a sport where athletes love to be cagey and vague with their race schedules, their training secrets, and their true intentions, Mantz made no secret of his plans. When he was announced for Chicago in June, the mission was obvious. Conner Mantz talks about racing in the same way he runs: he’s aggressive, unsubtle, and unafraid. Who the heck records a 45-minute podcast before their race spelling out every detail of their training and race plan? The same guy who rarely misses a Strava entry and lets hours of workout videos make their way onto YouTube.
Like Babe Ruth pointing out to the bleachers at Wrigley Field, Mantz called his shot and delivered. That kind of old-school badassery is exactly what the sport needs—even if it does come in the form of a 5-foot-6 teetotalling marathoner, not a hard-partying slugger from the 1930s. Sure, it helps to have the talent and drive to back up all the talk, but there’s plenty of talented, driven people in track and field who don’t bother to share much with the fans at all.
So cheers to Conner Mantz: we can’t wait to hear what’s next!
Brittany Brown Carries ATHLOS To Relevance 👸
Hold up! The track season isn’t over just yet!
While all eyes are now turning to the roads and the grass, Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian and the ATHLOS NYC team spent a good amount of time and money last week giving track fans one more reason to look to the rubber. Complete with World and Olympic champions, pyrotechnics, celebrity appearances, and chunky Tiffany crowns, Icahn Stadium on New York’s Roosevelt Island hosted thousands of athletics (and/or Ciara) fans on a cool October evening and gave them a flashy show.
The day before, ATHLOS even ventured outside the Oval Office into Times Square for a unique, but ultimately kinda confusing, long jump exhibition headlined by World/Olympic champ Tara Davis-Woodhall. Messing around with the long jump’s format is nothing new, as the Diamond League has repeatedly changed around its finalist system and World Athletics keeps threatening to introduce a “takeoff zone” into the mix. But it was very unclear why ATHLOS felt the ideal presentation of the long jump consisted of two rounds of seven jumps total (four in Times Square and two or three inside the stadium the next day), with the top three jumpers advancing to the second round and only the top two getting a final jump. It was then made even more perplexing when Jazmin Sawyer’s first-round leap was measured as 6.76m, then invalidated, removing her from the final, only for her to ultimately get added back into the results and push Quanesha Burks down to fourth. Nothing brings in casual fans like taking one of the sport’s most straightforward events and making it convoluted as hell.
Another feature ATHLOS promised was the presence of some of the sport’s biggest stars. Gabby Thomas! Sha’Carri Richardson! Melissa Jefferson-Wooden! All there! Except—wait—they were all there to cheer, not compete. Scheduling a meet for October 10th is a tough ask for athletes who’ve wrapped up a long season with a World Championships nearly a month earlier, and those with the most lucrative endorsement deals won’t be swayed by the promise of a $60,000 prize. It’s nice that much of America’s sprinting royalty showed up and supported those who were competing, but putting your marquee names in the stands and not on the start line doesn’t help the perception that this is a meet prioritizing style over substance.
That’s not to say that ATHLOS NYC round 2 was a letdown, by any means. Five of the seven events were won by the reigning Olympic champion, proving that a little razzle-dazzle and a promptly-delivered paycheck can successfully secure high-quality participation. Marileidy Paulino, Masai Russell, and Keely Hodgkinson also got the big season-ending wins that eluded them in Tokyo, so the opportunity to end 2025 on a high note must have been something they appreciated as well. Hodgkinson was a particular highlight because we’ve seen her race so infrequently the past few months as she’s battled back from a hamstring injury. You’d never know it based on the Keely that showed up to Icahn, who confidently soloed an unrabbited 1:56.53 800m, gun-to-tape, and looked supremely controlled as she turned the tables on fellow Brit Georgia Hunter Bell after the latter’s silver medal in Tokyo.
After exercising more restraint than we’ve come to expect during the championship races, Gudaf Tsegay was back to her old tricks in the women’s mile, getting out ahead of the rabbit by 200 meters and opening up with a 60.5-second first 400m. Of course, that wasn’t enough to drop Faith Kipyegon—what is?—and Kipyegon used her rival as a de facto replacement pacer en route to a 4:17.78 win, with U.S. champ Nikki Hiltz way back in third at 4:32.51.
But even with all these big names getting crowned by Serena Williams trackside, the belle of the ball wasn’t an Olympic or World champ. It was fan-favorite Brittany Brown, the two-time Diamond League champ and two-time global medalist who showed once again that she doesn’t mess around when it comes to getting her bag. Last year, Brown upset expectations by taking second in the 100m and dethroning recently-crowned Olympic champ Gabby Thomas in the 200m, and this year she did one better: winning both events, only one hour apart and walking away with a nice $120,000 payday.
Despite the cool weather, Brown posted an impressive 10.99/21.89 double, the latter of which is a lifetime best for an athlete that’s been winning medals in the event since 2019. Like Hodgkinson, Brown had a slow start to the year after undergoing a medical procedure for complications related to endometriosis, and like Hodgkinson, she wasn’t just showing up for an intro and a wave: she came to WORK.
Ultimately, Brittany Brown was really the savior of this year’s ATHLOS event. She may not have the most Instagram followers or the craziest victory dance, but her performance lent the meet something it badly needed: credibility. Arguing on Twitter about Gold Label status doesn’t matter nearly as much as the results themselves. Running a top-five 200m performance in October and pulling off an ambitious double sends the message that this is a serious meet, taken seriously by athletes. And making Brown, one of the most likeable sprinters on the circuit, the face of the event helps balance out the gaudy neo-Gilded Age vibe that the meet’s big budget otherwise may conjure.
Will ATHLOS’s purported expansion from postseason one-off to full-blown league next year move it from novelty status to mainstay? Only time will tell. But one thing’s for sure—to give the event’s organizers the best chance of success, they better do everything they can to keep athletes like Brittany Brown coming back for more.
Sponsored by Canadian Running Series
Watch the 2025 TCS Toronto Waterfront Marathon on Sunday, Oct. 19th.We’re heading North this weekend. We’ll be streaming the broadcast on The CITIUS MAG YouTube channel. As part of CITIUS MAG’s partnership with the Canadian Running Series, Chris Chavez will the broadcast team alongside Geoff Wightman and Krista DuChene . We’ll also have some insights and videos from Eric Jenkins on the broadcast. Stream starts at 7 a.m. EDT on Sunday.
Behind The Scenes With Hawi Feysa 🗣️
This past weekend, CITIUS MAG’s Ethiopia correspondent Hannah Borenstein was technically off the clock as a journalist, but hard at work as an interpreter for eventual winner Hawi Feysa. Borenstein accompanied Feysa throughout her pre-race final preparations and was by her side as the Ethiopian star absorbed her breakthrough victory. Via these quiet, reflective moments with the 2025 Chicago Marathon champion, Borenstein gleaned more about Feysa’s mindset and approach to the sport than you’re likely to hear from any press conference.
Feysa’s result was the culmination of half a year of training to run precisely this fast.
[Feysa] had barely begun to process her victory when she asked me what time her compatriot, [Megertu] Alemu, ran. It was then, when we began looking at the Chicago Marathon app together, that she saw her time of 2:14:56. Suddenly, [an even bigger smile] appeared on her face. “When I looked up before finishing, like, I swear I saw 2:15:03, or 2:15:04,” she said, “I thought I just missed it.”
Her previous personal best was 2:17:00, which she ran in March at the Tokyo Marathon. Running under 2:15 was something Feysa and Alemu both talked about leading up to this race; however, it’s one thing for an athlete to say they’re going to do something, and another to actually do it.
…
It was not until after the press conference she saw her coach. He watched her on stage and when I waved him over he jogged to give her a big hug and congratulate her on such a major accomplishment. “Six months,” she later told me. “I had been preparing for and thinking about this race for six months, nothing else.” And you could tell, by the way she hugged her coach, it had been a long journey.
The sport’s stars still get star struck, and the marathon is a humbling distance, no matter how fast you are.
At 3:30 in the afternoon, Chicago Marathon champions, Feysa, Jacob Kiplimo, Susannah Scaroni, and Marcel Hug, went across the street to meet and take photographs with a group of people from Abbott, the health care company that sponsors the World Marathon Majors. As we crammed in an elevator, Feysa told me in Amharic, “I always see [Scaroni and Hug] on television; they’re always winning.”
As we walked down a few steps to meet the Abbott team, she noted that Kiplimo, who was leaning on the railing, was struggling to handle the impact. “He’s so sore,” she remarked empathetically. “I’m actually okay,” she said. It was the best she’d felt after a marathon. “But after my second marathon,” she added, “I looked like that.”
Winning a marathon is extremely simple, but extremely hard to do.
After many photos one woman came up to Feysa and asked, through me, “What do you think about when you race?” Her answer was brief. She thinks about her form, her pace, and tactics. It can be disappointing to sometimes hear that the focus is so narrow. Feysa is not thinking about the city of Chicago, how much she loves running, or her family back home. She then added, instructively, “When you are running, in racing and training, you cannot give your focus to other things.” It’s the preservation of the focus on the simple, but immensely hard task of running so doggedly for so long, that is a real psychological gift of many of the world’s best, even if it doesn’t exactly help them be more relatable to the masses.
Feysa takes recovery very seriously.
A long travel journey and a major time difference is hard to overcome in just a few days and Ethiopian runners value sleep as a prized mode of recovery. When they’re not running alongside Lake Michigan or eating in the dining hall, they’re most likely found to be snoozing between any and all obligations.
Feysa told me after winning she only slept two hours the night before the race but she had many hours stored in the two days prior.
[...After the race] she was excited to take a month off from training. During this time she takes rest and recovery seriously; she’ll spend a lot of time praying, listening to spiritual songs, and restoring all parts of herself.
Borenstein wrote more of her observations and more of what she discussed with Feysa in a full-length piece for CITIUS MAG—you can read it here.
More News From The Track And Field World 📰
– Say it with us, now. “Femke Bol: 800m runner.” The 2025 World champion at 400m hurdles announced her intent to move up in distance for at least the next few seasons.
– Emily Sisson showed the field a clean pair of heels as she won the Boston 10k for Women by over whopping a minute and a half—unsurprisingly, her 31:05 finishing time established a new course record.
– At the Bill Dellinger Invite—the first running of the meet since its fabled namesake’s passing—both the Oregon men and women posted near-perfect, 16-point scores. The Duck women (ranked No. 4) were led by Diana Cherotich and the Duck men (ranked No. 14) by Benjamin Balazs. (Air Force’s Ella Johnson and Weber State’s Peter Visser were your fifth-place finishers, who broke up the Duck party.)
— German Fernandez’s old Woodward Park 5k course record—14:24, set in 2007—is no more: Jackson Spencer of Herriman, Utah, ran 14:16 this past weekend at the Clovis Invitational. Spencer is headed to BYU next fall. (Of course, back in Fernandez’s day, the course was uphill both ways and everyone was racing in kangaroo skin slippers with the carpenters’ nail spikes hammered out to be CIF compliant.)
– A bit off the podium in Chicago, an Olympic gold medalist had himself a solid outing: Matt Centrowitz ran 2:22:40, a time good enough to drive unfounded speculation that Centro is going to keep hacking away at a 2028 Olympic Trials Marathon qualifier.
– The team from Koku Gakuin University won its second consecutive Izumo Ekiden, while the American Nerd Superteam known as “Ivy League Select” finished fourth, its best ever placing. Despite boasting the best track credentials of any runner in the event, Graham Blanks posted the fourth fastest time in his leg.
– YouTuber and possible harbinger of the decline of civilization “Mr. Beast” offered up a $100,000 prize to 100 male University of North Carolina students if they could beat Melissa Jefferson-Wooden in a footrace. Video of the stunt can be found here but to save you a click: none of the assembled students succeeded in running faster than the fastest woman on the planet, but plenty of them yelled “let’s go!” while making confident hand gestures on the starting line.
– Alleged Wikipedia editor-slash-ultramarathoner Camille Herron has filed a defamation suit against Canadian Running magazine over their coverage of her alleged Wikipedia editing.
Interested in reaching 20,000+ dedicated runners and track and field fans? Advertise with us here.
How could there be a “tailwind” in the first 5K when the route goes north, west, south, west, and then north again? Similarly, how could there be a “headwind” in the second half when the final two miles are also north?
Thank you again for all you do for Track and Field and Distance running
Keep up the great work BillTheriault PHAQUAWEE some day you need to ask me what that means. 714 260 8487