There is a certain degree of naivete that every runner brings to the starting line of their very first marathon.
And it sure served Fiona O’Keeffe well Saturday morning.
O’Keeffe turned in a stunning and blistering performance at the U.S. Olympic marathon trials in Orlando, crossing the finish line in 2:22:10 to not only win her marathon debut but break the event record. She finished nearly 32 seconds ahead of runner-up Emily Sisson, effectively pulverizing a deep and talented field of American distance runners and booking her ticket to the 2024 Paris Olympics this summer.
She also became the first woman to win the U.S. Olympic marathon trials in her first race at the distance.
‘The past couple years, I’ve been kind of clawing my way through things,’ O’Keeffe told NBC after her win. ‘I was not expecting this performance. I had to pinch myself with eight miles to go and say ‘stay calm, don’t freak out.”
Sisson, who entered Saturday’s race as one of the favorites, joined O’Keeffe in qualifying for the Paris Games on Saturday, as did little-known Dakotah Lindwurm, who started out as a walk-on athlete at her DIvision II school in South Dakota.
On the men’s side, training partners and former BYU teammates Conner Mantz and Clayton Young secured the two guaranteed U.S. spots in Paris. While they ran shoulder-to-shoulder down the home stretch, it was Mantz who crossed the finish line first in a time of 2:09:05, with Young just one second behind him.
The 2024 Paris Olympic start July 26, with the men’s and women’s marathons slated for Aug. 10 and Aug. 11, respectively.
Who is Fiona O’Keeffe?
O’Keeffe, 25, didn’t arrive in Orlando on Saturday as one of the favorites, but she wasn’t a complete unknown either.
O’Keeffe grew up in Davis, California and won the 5,000-meter race at the 2016 U.S. junior nationals. She was a six-time all-American at Stanford before turning pro in 2021, and she’s been in the mix on the track at various points during her brief pro career. O’Keeffe finished sixth in the 5,000 meters at the 2022 outdoor track and field national championships.
After missing part of last year with an ankle injury, O’Keeffe set her sights on the marathon − and perhaps a shot at qualifying for the Paris Olympics.
For the first half of Saturday’s race, she was at or near the front of a 10-woman lead pack, looking comfortable alongside some of the more recognizable faces in the race, Keira D’Amato and Sara Hall. Then, at Mile 19, O’Keeffe started turning the proverbial screws, putting a little bit of distance between herself and the rest of the field.
By Mile 24, she had opened up a whopping 40-second lead over Sisson, effectively putting the race away with two-plus miles to go and the temperature in Orlando creeping closer to 70 degrees.
‘I just tried to stay focused on the running, go back to the feeling of workouts that I’ve done,’ O’Keeffe said.
Her performance drew immediate praise from NBC analyst and former marathoner Kara Goucher, who said on the television broadcast: ‘The future has arrived.’
BYU teammates go 1-2 in men’s race
Nearly three quarters of the way through the men’s race Mantz and Young exchanged a quick high five as they passed a water station. It was a sign of agreement that it was time to lock down their Olympic spots.
Mantz and Young entered Saturday’s race as the only two men who had met the Olympic standard, so it wasn’t entirely surprising to see the former BYU teammates cross the finish line well ahead of the rest of the field.
A hard-charging Leonard Korir finished third in 2:09:57 but will have to wait and see if he is able to compete at the 2024 Games; The U.S. only has two guaranteed spots in the men’s race but could add a third in the coming months if an American man besides Mantz or Young finishes a major marathon in 2:08:10 or faster.
Mantz, 27, and Young, 30, both competed collegiately at BYU and have emerged in recent years as Team USA’s top contenders in the marathon, an event in which the U.S. men have won just two Olympic medals since 1980. Mantz entered Saturday with the fastest personal best of anyone in the field, a 2:07:47 in a sixth-place finish at the Chicago Marathon last fall. Young finished seventh in that race with a time of 2:08.
Mantz told NBC that he considers Young to be both a mentor and close friend.
‘We train together, we worked out together, we run together almost every day,’ he said on the television broadcast after his win.
‘The last two miles, I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to finish. But Clayton just kept saying ‘hey, just run behind me, we’ve got this, just stay together.’ It meant a lot (and allowed me) to say, ‘OK, I can run with Clayton.’ ‘
While Mantz and Young were always near the front of the pack, it was Grand Valley State product Zach Panning, who led for roughly 17 of the 26.2 miles and set the pace for the majority of the race. He finished sixth.
Tough day for some big names in Olympic marathon trials
Galen Rupp, who won the 2020 Olympic marathon trials and placed eighth in Tokyo, started strong but fell off the lead pack around Mile 17. He ultimately came in 16th and will miss out on the chance to win a second Olympic marathon medal; He took bronze in 2016.
Abdi Abdirahman, a five-time Olympian who is 47 years old, and 2021 Olympian Jake Riley were among the notable names who did not finish the men’s race, while 2021 Olympic qualifier Aliphine Tuliamuk was among those who recorded a DNF on the women’s side.
Molly Seidel, who was the only American to win a marthon medal at the Tokyo Games, had been scheduled to compete Saturday but announced 48 hours beforehand that she was withdrawing because of a knee injury.
Contact Tom Schad at tschad@usatoday.com or on social media @Tom_Schad.