Motherhood Has Tested, Strengthened And Inspired Four Of The Top Seven Entrants In The Women's Race

By David Woods for DyeStat

ORLANDO, Fla. – William Ross Wallace was years ahead of his time as a marathon prophet. His poem, “The Hand That Rocks The Cradle Is The Hand That Rules The World,” was published in 1865.

Change “hand” to “feet,” and Wallace was on to something.

“Moms shouldn’t be messed with,” as Keira D’Amato put it.

How to watch: Live at 10 a.m. on Peacock. Tape-delayed NBC coverage starts at noon (also streaming on NBCSports.com app and NBC Sports app).

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Moms might indeed rule during the U.S. Olympic marathon trials Saturday. D’Amato is one of four mothers among the seven fastest entries, all of them 34 or older:

>> 2:19:12 D’Amato, 39.

>> 2:21:40 Betsy Saina, 35.

>> 2:22:10 Sara Hall, 40.

>> 2:24:37 Aliphine Tuliamuk, 34.

D’Amato has an especially unusual trajectory. After competing for American University – with a best NCAA finish of ninth at 5,000 meters in 2006 – the Virginia native effectively retired from the sport after foot surgery in 2009. She was away from running for seven years and sold real estate.

In March 2017, seven months after her second child was born, she ran her first marathon in 3:14:54. You could not say a star was born.  Not yet.

Then, D’Amato’s star kept rising.

At Friday’s pre-race news conference, she acknowledged making an Olympic team is something she has dreamed about since elementary school.

“Then I quit for a while. And I gave up on my dream,” she said. “I didn’t have the confidence or thought it would be something that would be within my reach.”

With backing of her husband, an Air Force lieutenant, and two children, she had “the strength and unconditional love to risk big.”

In recent years, she said, she started dreaming, and risking, again.

In January 2022, at Houston, D’Amato broke Deena Kastor’s marathon American record with a time of 2:19:12. The record was subsequently broken by Emily Sisson, who in turn had her half-marathon record broken by D’Amato.

D’Amato finished eighth in the 2022 World Championships at Eugene, Ore., behind Hall (fifth) and Emma Bates (seventh), and she was 17th in the 2023 worlds at Budapest, Hungary.

“I do believe that being a mother has made me a better runner, and being a runner has made me a better mother,” D’Amato said. “I think it kind of puts everything in perspective of why I’m out there running.

“But I think it has taken a lot of women who’ve come before us to set the stage. And I think we’re still moving forward, and we still have a way to go as women. But I’m proud to be one of those women showing what moms can do.”

Andrea Pomaranski is doing that, too.

She took an even longer break from running, nine years. In 2001, as a college freshman at Miami of Ohio, she set an American Under-20 record in the steeplechase. Twenty-two years later, she set an American over-40 record in the 50-kilometer run.

Pomaranski, 41, is a mother of three who lives in Wolverine Lake, Mich. Last year, also at Houston, she ran a 2:31:06 marathon, a record for a former Indiana high school runner. As with D’Amato, running became an outlet.

“I would come back refreshed,” Pomaranski said. “I would have more patience. Above anything else, that’s what I want to share for new moms.”

Saina was fifth in the 10,000 meters at the 2016 Rio Olympics representing Kenya and became a U.S. citizen in 2021. She gave birth to a son in December 2021.

If the sport had been more accommodating earlier, she suggested, she might have had more children.

Tuliamuk, another native Kenyan and winner of the 2020 marathon trials, credited Kara Goucher, Alysia Montano and Allyson Felix for creating an environment more friendly to running moms.

“Corporations came alongside and said they were excited to support moms,” Tuliamuk said. “The last three years, we have so many pro athletes in their prime who decided to be moms. We can now see being a mom is a strength, not a weakness that we used to think.

“And I’m really glad I live in this time.”

Hall and husband Ryan adopted four sisters from Ethiopia in 2015. This will be Sara Hall’s eighth Olympic Trials. She ran at the 2020 and 2016 marathon trials, dropping out of both races.

Her husband set the men’s trials record of 2:09:02 in 2008.

Contact David Woods at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter: @DavidWoods007