Emma Grace Hurley Runs the Fastest Marathon Debut by an American Woman

Emma Grace Hurley ran the fastest marathon debut by an American woman on Sunday, finishing seventh at the Chicago Marathon in 2:20:47. Fiona O’Keeffe had held the mark since February 2024, when she won the Olympic Trials in Orlando in 2:22:10 in her first marathon, and Hurley, who had never raced farther than 25K before this weekend, took 1:23 off it.

Kara Goucher’s 2:25:53, run for third at the New York City Marathon in November 2008, was the American debut best until Jordan Hasay clocked 2:23:00 at Boston in 2017, and O’Keeffe lowered it again in Orlando. American women have now cut more than five minutes off the mark in 18 years, and Hurley’s share is the biggest single improvement since Hasay’s.

Hasay came to Chicago later that year for her second marathon and ran 2:20:57, so Hurley’s first try on the same course came out 10 seconds quicker. Her time was also the fastest marathon by any American woman since the Paris Olympics, just two seconds inside the 2:20:49 Jess McClain ran for fifth at Boston in April, as NBC Sports noted. Of the Americans in Sunday’s women’s field, only Sara Hall came in with a faster personal best, the 2:20:32 she ran at the Marathon Project in December 2020.

“I am confident that my fitness is right around the 2:20 mark,” Hurley told LetsRun last month, and for the first half she ran like it. After a 16:24 opening 5K she held each of the next four between 16:28 and 16:39, reached halfway in 1:09:50, on schedule for 2:19:40, and passed 25K in 1:22:40. That was 11 seconds quicker than she ran in Grand Rapids in May to win the U.S. 25K title.

Beyond 25K she was into distance she had never raced, and her next two 5Ks took 16:43 and 17:02. Australia’s Isobel Batt-Doyle, who had been behind her at 30K, went by before the finish and took sixth by nine seconds. Hurley steadied over the last 7.2K, covering it in 24:22, and came home with a second half of 1:10:57. Our live coverage has the full splits from the morning.

In March she ran 24:29 at the Shamrock Shuffle, also in Chicago, to break Deena Kastor’s 21-year-old American 8K record. She went on to win U.S. titles at 10 miles and 25K, and three weeks ago she ran 1:06:23 for fifth in the half-marathon at the World Road Running Championships in Copenhagen, the best finish by an American woman at a world half-marathon championship. When she graduated from Furman University in 2020 she had no shoe contract, and she went to work in software sales. She returned to serious training in 2021 under Amy and Andrew Begley, and followed the coaching pair from Atlanta to Indianapolis at the end of 2023.

Hurley led the next American, Dakotah Popehn, by more than two minutes at 30K, and the top American woman in Chicago earns $15,000. The bigger target for her has long been the 2028 Olympic Marathon Trials in St. Louis on March 25, 2028. Before then, USA Track & Field will hold its 2027 national marathon championships inside this same race on Oct. 10, 2027, and the two winners there earn the Trials “A” standard.