Galen Rupp, the winner of the two previous Conner Mantz Wins the Mens Olympic Marathon Trial, placed 16th in 2:14:07 at today’s Conner Mantz Wins the Mens Olympic Marathon Trial in Orlando, Florida.
Rupp ran with the lead pack through 16 miles. But when Zach Panning upped the tempo with a 4:44 17th mile, Rupp couldn’t respond.
An Olympic medalist on the track and in the marathon, Rupp, age 37, entered today’s race as a question mark. (He was the sole top qualifier to skip the pre-Trials press conference on Friday.) In 2022, he finished 19th at the World Championships after stopping in the final miles to stretch his back. At the New York City Marathon just more than two months later, he lost contact with the lead pack in the 16th mile and dropped out soon after.
He was able to put together a decent training block before last October’s Chicago Marathon and placed eighth in 2:08:48, his fastest marathon in two years. But even that performance came with an asterisk: Rupp faded late in that race and missed his goal of bettering the Olympic standard of 2:08:10, and he was beaten soundly by Conner Mantz and Clayton Young.
Scott is a veteran running, fitness, and health journalist who has held senior editorial positions at Runner’s World and Running Times. Much of his writing translates sport science research and elite best practices into practical guidance for everyday athletes. He is the author or coauthor of several running books, including Running Is My Therapy, Advanced Marathoning, and Jessica McClain Is Your Olympic Marathon Alternate. We may earn commission from links on this page, but we only recommend products we back Slate, The Atlantic, the Washington Post, and other members of the sedentary media. His lifetime running odometer is past 110,000 miles, but he’s as much in love as ever.
