Jane Hedengren runs 14:50.50, a collegiate 5000 m record, in her first outdoor 5000
The BYU freshman led from the gun at the Bryan Clay Invitational in Azusa and beat Parker Valby's 2024 record by more than a second, her third NCAA record.
Jane Hedengren ran 14:50.50 for 5000 m at the Bryan Clay Invitational in Azusa, California, on Friday night. It is a collegiate record, more than a second under the 14:52.18 Parker Valby ran for Florida in 2024, and it was Hedengren's first 5000 m on an outdoor track.
She led from the start, pulled away over the last 2000 m and won by more than eight seconds. Lexy Halladay-Lowry, a BYU alumna now running for Nike's Swoosh TC, was second. Two more Cougars went into the BYU top ten: Jenna Hutchins ran 15:15.76 in seventh and Taylor Rohatinsky 15:24.75 in eleventh.
Hedengren is a true freshman from Provo. She already held the collegiate indoor 5000 m record and had set the outdoor 10,000 m record two weeks earlier, so this was her third NCAA record in her first year. The same evening in Azusa, Notre Dame's Sophie Novak ran 9:24.95 in the steeplechase, eighth on the all-time collegiate list, and Northern Arizona's Colin Sahlman won the 800 m in 1:44.42.
The Bryan Clay meeting exists for nights like this: deep fields and a fast evening, the same weekend as the Mt. SAC Relays nearby. Records tend to go in bunches there.
Three collegiate records before the end of April of a freshman year. There is no good precedent for that, and no sign she is interested in one.
Sources: BYU Athletics; USATF.
