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55 women
— Ran a U.S. Olympic Trials qualifying time at the California International Marathon (54 Americans + 1 Canadian) — especially impressive given the qualifying time was dropped to 2:37 for the last Olympic cycle. The race, which also served as the USATF Marathon Championships, was won by Molly Born in her first ever marathon and despite a fall in the final stretch.
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Three big stories to know this week in women's sports
1. From brand new SkiMo athlete to Olympic medal favorite in six months!
Anna Gibson is a world class trail runner. Earlier this year, she won the Broken Arrow ascent & national championships, and then took bronze in the uphill 6km at the World Trail & Mountain Running Championships.
So how did she end up qualifying for the Olympics in a totally different sport — winning gold in her first ever SkiMo World Cup and qualifying the U.S. for the 2026 Games?! 🇺🇸
What is SkiMo?
SkiMo (ski mountaineering) will be making its Olympic debut in February. It consists of skiers climbing uphill using skins on the bottom of their skiis and then skiing downhill. Popular casually with endurance athletes during the winter, it's developed into a racing sport of its own first in Europe and then globally.
In the Olympics, individual sprint athletes will race laps of climbing and downhill skiing. Teams of one man and one woman from each country will also race in the mixed relay, where they alternate laps.
How did Anna Gibson turn out to be so good at this?
This past weekend, at the final World Cup qualifying event, it was the U.S. v. Canada for the last team spot. Both countries typically place 6th or 7th in these events, and the only goal was to beat the other team.
Enter Anna Gibson.
Gibson grew up dreaming of being a downhill skier. Then, transitioned to Nordic skiing and won the junior national title, before moving into running and trail racing. Earlier this year, at Broken Arrow, Cam Smith (who took third in that trail race but has long been a SkiMo veteran) proposed that she try this ski mountaineering thing. She fit in a national team camp earlier this summer, in between being a pro trail runner.
And then this past weekend she made her World Cup debut with Smith. They not only beat Canada, the U.S. won its first ever World Cup gold.
Now, Gibson & Smith go into Milano as medal favorites. Tell us that's not every athlete's secret dream! 🎉 |
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(Photo: ISMF)
2. It's NCAA championship season ⚽ 🏐 🏀
As fall college sports wrap up, and the winter season starts, it's non-stop excitement!
BASKETBALL: UConn remains undefeated as the season heats up and the Big Ten has nine teams in the top 25
VOLLEYBALL: With just one upset in the first rounds of the NCAA tournament (Cal Poly over USC), 15 of the top 16 seeds are through to the Sweet Sixteen — starting tomorrow
SOCCER: And, in the final minutes of the finals, Florida State scored to defeat Stanford 1-0 for their fifth NCAA title
🏈 ALSO: The owner of the New York Jets is putting down $1 million towards funding a collegiate women's flag football league on the East Coast
💰 BUT ALSO ALSO: What is going on with college sports? We talked to Victoria Jackson last year about the dramatically and quickly changing landscape. But a house vote on regulations over name-image-likeness was canceled this week.
3. And the highest paid female athletes of 2025 are...
...mostly tennis players!
🎧 LISTEN: We talk about why tennis players pack the list on this week's Feist podcast episode |
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Tip of the week
While all forms of strength training have benefits, we're particularly fans of barbell training here at Feisty. Why? Because barbells are one of the most efficient weight training tools out there and can't be beat for progressive overload — ie. gradually increasing weight, reps, and training over time.
That's why we're launching a 12-week barbell training program built for women who want to feel powerful, confident, and see real progress in the gym. The program, which starts in January, will include weekly workouts with written instructions and video demos, monthly virtual group coaching sessions, guest experts on topics like nutrition and pelvic floor health, and a supportive community of other women lifting.
🏋️♀️ SIGN UP: For the Feisty Strong Barbell Club (with a special discount this week only)
The highlight reel
- Tess Johnson 🇺🇸 won the moguls World Cup season opener and her first-ever leaders jersey. But the moguls Olympic team is shaping up to be a battle for qualification, with five Americans in the top 10.
- ⛸️ Ahead of the Olympics, Alysa Liu 🇺🇸 won the Grand Prix final in figure skating — her second major title since her return from retirement last year.
- 🎿 Jessie Diggins won the 20km skiathlon (a combo of freestyle skiing and classic skiing) — her first World Cup skiathlon title of her career — and qualified for her fourth Olympics.
- Coming down to the second run, 🎿 Julia Scheib 🇦🇹 won the World Cup grand slalom in Mont-Tremblant.
- 🧗♀️ In the middle of a storm and with bloody fingers, Sasha DiGiulian became the first woman to free climb Yosemite's El Capitan's longest route: the Platinum Wall.
- 🏊♀️ 🚴♀️ 🏃♀️ Georgia Taylor-Brown completed the fastest half-Ironman in history, covering a 1.2-mile swim, 56-mile bike, and half-marathon run in 3:51:19.
- Rosie Wild, 🇬🇧 who is also the first woman to complete the British Army's paratrooper selection, won the extreme Patagonaman triathlon.
- Joyciline Jepkosgei 🇰🇪 ran a world leading time of 2:14:00 to win the Valencia Marathon.
- 🏃♀️ 60-year-old Michelle Rohl ran an age-group world record 10:41 3,000m. And Jane Hedengren broke the collegiate record for the 5,000m (14:44).
- 🏃♀️ The 50K World Championships, set for India this past weekend, were delayed until March due to poor air quality.
- ⚽ A group of players from the San Diego Wave won the World Sevens soccer tournament and took home $2 million.
- ⚽ FIFA hasn't yet been able to sell the TV rights for its new women's global club competition.
- Maya Brady, a shortstop and the niece of football player Tom Brady, was the #1 pick in the AUSL softball expansion draft.
- U.S. Soccer announced the Kang Women's Institute to back research on female soccer players. UC Berkeley also announced an initiative to close gather data on female athletes and help close that research gap.
- The WNBA announced a contract extension as they continue to negotiate with the Players Association. And the NWSL (stupidly?) rejected Trinity Rodman's contract deal. We catch up all things players contracts and money on The Feist podcast.
Your Feisty recommendations
And then, this week, for the cozy holiday season, we put together a special podcast episode with all of our classic women's sports book & movie recommendations. Listen to the whole episode for why we made our picks (and which things from the '90s left us a little 😬).
📺 A few classic movies + one recent pick we're mixed on:
📚 Great sports books to read while you're recovering from sports:
- Good for a Girl, Lauren Fleshman
- Better Faster Farther, Maggie Mertens
- The Longest Race, Kara Goucher
- Money, Power, Respect: How Women in Sports Are Shaping the Future of Feminism, Macaela MacKenzie
- Tough Broad, Caroline Paul
- Little Girls in Pretty Boxes, Joan Ryan
- In These Girls Hope Is a Muscle, Madeleine Blais
- We Loved to Run, Stephanie Reents
- Carrie Soto Is Back, Taylor Jenkins Reid
- The Favorites, Layne Fargo
- As Good as Gold, Kathryn Bertine
- Up to Speed, Christine Yu
- Endure, Alex Hutchinson
- For kids: Books by Olympians from Strong Girl Publishing
Let us know what recs you'd add! |
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