2026 Chicago Marathon Elite Field: Emma Grace Hurley

Emma Grace Hurley has never raced farther than 25 kilometers, yet plenty of people expect her to be the first American woman across the line at the Chicago Marathon on Sunday, Oct. 11. The 28-year-old makes her debut at the distance just three weeks after running 1:06:23 for fifth at the World Half Marathon Championships in Copenhagen, the best finish by an American woman in the history of that race and a time that put her third on the U.S. all-time list. She has said she thinks her fitness is around 2:20, a mark only four American women have ever beaten.

Emma Grace Hurley by the Numbers

Personal Bests

• Marathon: none yet (debut Oct. 11, 2026)
• 25K: 1:22:51 (Grand Rapids, May 9, 2026)
• Half-marathon: 1:06:23 (Copenhagen, Sept. 20, 2026)
• 10 miles: 50:42 (Washington, D.C., April 12, 2026)
• 10K (road): 31:00 (Tokyo, May 3, 2025)
• 8K (road): 24:29 (Chicago, March 22, 2026)
• 5K (road): 15:01 (Indianapolis, May 2, 2026)

Records

• American 8K record: 24:29 at the Shamrock Shuffle (2026). Still current; it took seven seconds off Deena Kastor’s 24:36 from 2005.
• U.S. all-time list: her 1:06:23 ranks third among American women in the half-marathon.
• World Half Marathon Championships: her fifth place is the highest finish by an American woman. The previous best was 10th, by Milena Glusac in 2000.

National Titles

• USATF 10 Mile Championships: first (2026)
• USATF 25K Championships: first (2026)

Championships

• World Road Running Championships, half-marathon (Copenhagen, 2026): fifth, and team silver with the U.S. women
• World Cross Country Championships (Belgrade, 2024): member of the U.S. team

Other U.S. Championship Podiums

• Second: USATF 15K (2023), USA Cross Country Championships (2024), USA Half Marathon Championships (2025), USATF 5K (2026)
• Third: USATF 10K (2023), USATF 5K (2024)

From Furman to a Sales Job and Back

Hurley grew up in Roswell, Georgia, north of Atlanta, and ran for Fellowship Christian School before going on to Furman University in South Carolina. Her best results there came in the steeplechase, where she ran 10:06, and her highest finish at the NCAA cross country championships was 51st. The pandemic took away her final outdoor season in 2020, and she graduated with a 5,000m best of 15:57 and no offer from a shoe company.

She moved back home and drifted through jobs she did not much like, eventually landing in software sales, while coaching at a local high school. Working with those teenagers is what got her thinking about racing again, she told LetsRun last month, and in October 2021 she joined the Atlanta Track Club’s elite group on a trial basis under coaches Amy and Andrew Begley. By January 2022 she had her first bonus contract with the club.

She won Atlanta’s Thanksgiving Day 5K in November 2021 in a club record of 16:13, was fifth at the USATF 10K Championships in 2022, and in 2023 she finished second to Emily Sisson at the USATF 15K Championships in Jacksonville. When the Atlanta Track Club let the Begleys go at the end of 2023, Hurley packed up and followed them to Indianapolis, moving on Dec. 29 and giving up the club’s financial support to do it. She had no sponsor when she arrived, and spent three or four weeks waiting before an ASICS deal came through in early 2024.

That first year in Indianapolis brought second place at the USA Cross Country Championships, a trip to the World Cross Country Championships in Belgrade, and the overall USATF Running Circuit title for 2024. She finished the year by winning the Indianapolis Monumental Half Marathon in 1:08:26 on her debut at the distance. The sales job has since ended in layoffs, and running is now her full-time work.

The Best Year of Her Career

At the USA Half Marathon Championships in Atlanta on March 1, the first big race of her 2026 season, Hurley and several others were sent the wrong way at the 12-mile mark and she finished 12th, out of the places that would have put her on the team for Copenhagen. World Athletics later agreed to a one-time exception that let the U.S. send seven women, and she was one of them.

Three weeks after Atlanta she came to Chicago for the Shamrock Shuffle and ran 24:29 for 8K, beating Karissa Schweizer by 26 seconds and taking down a 21-year-old American record that belonged to Kastor. Her first national title followed on April 12 at the Cherry Blossom 10 Mile in Washington, where she ran 50:42 and finished third overall behind Asayech Ayichew of Ethiopia and Joy Cheptoyek of Uganda. “I’ve never won a USATF race before,” she told Race Results Weekly afterward. A month later she added the USATF 25K title in Grand Rapids by 43 seconds, holding a steady 5:20 per mile, and she was second at the U.S. 5K Championships in Indianapolis in between, a second behind Schweizer.

After fourth place at the Falmouth Road Race in August, she went to Copenhagen on Sept. 20 expecting to finish somewhere between eighth and 10th. She went through the first 5K in 15:23, quicker than the pace of her previous best, and stayed in the hunt for a medal until about 20K before the leaders pulled away from her. Her 1:06:23 was a personal best by more than a minute, and with Weini Kelati sixth and Jess McClain seventh, the U.S. women won team silver behind Kenya, the country’s first women’s team medal at the event, on the day Agnes Ngetich won the title in a world record.

Getting Ready for 26.2

Hurley has been preparing for Chicago since June, and the hot Indiana summer made the early weeks of the build hard going. In one session of four two-mile repeats she was aiming for 10:10 and ran the second one in 10:30. “I am not used to not nailing workouts,” she told LetsRun, and Andrew Begley’s answer was to have her train by effort for a while rather than by the numbers on her watch. Falmouth, she said, was what convinced her she was in better shape than she feared.

Her mileage has gone up in steps over the years, from about 65 to 70 miles a week in Atlanta to a steady 75 to 80 in Indianapolis. During this marathon build she has had three or four weeks over 100 miles, with a peak of 115. She told the Chicago Sun-Times this week that the preparation has reached well past running, into how she sleeps, how much she walks and which plans with friends she says yes to, and that she still goes into Sunday with a lot to learn. “There’s a bit of ‘I don’t know what I don’t know yet,'” she said.

What to Expect From Her in Chicago

“I am confident that my fitness is right around the 2:20 mark,” Hurley told LetsRun, before adding: “That’ll probably be the effort that I’m shooting for. But again, it’s not about the time.” The four American women who have gone under 2:20 are Sisson, whose 2:18:29 American record was set on this course in 2022, Keira D’Amato, Betsy Saina and Kastor, so a debut close to that mark would make her one of the fastest American marathoners in history.

Sara Hall has the fastest best of any American in the elite field, 2:20:32, ahead of Susanna Sullivan (2:21:56), who was fourth at last year’s World Championships, Des Linden (2:22:38) and Natosha Rogers (2:23:28), last year’s top American here. The top American woman earns $15,000. At the front, Brigid Kosgei and defending champion Hawi Feysa are the favorites in a women’s race with 12 runners who have broken 2:20.

The weather looks kinder than it did earlier in the week, with the National Weather Service forecasting about 60 F at the 7:30 a.m. start. Hurley’s plan is to stay comfortable early and save her effort for the miles she has never raced. “The goal is to try to be relaxed and just enjoy the first half,” she told the Sun-Times. Her parents, extended family and boyfriend will be in Chicago to watch, and the race is only about three hours’ drive from her training base in Indianapolis.

She has been aiming at the 2028 Olympic Marathon Trials for years, and Sunday is her first real look at the event she will need to run there. Our live coverage follows the race from the start.