A DyeStat Look Back At The Most Jaw-Dropping Achievements Of 2025

By Doug Binder, DyeStat Editor With Contributions By David Woods (Pro), Keenan Gray (College) And Oliver Hinson (HS)

Photos by Becky Holbrook and Logan Hannigan-Downs

The idea seemed simple enough. Let's come up with the 25 most electrifying moments of the 2025 track and field/cross country seasons and cover all three of the levels that we cover. 

I asked David Woods to make a top 10 list for the pros, Keenan Gray for the best of college and Oliver Hinson for the best of high school. Then I made some executive decisions about how to order the final list. Of course, that part wasn't easy the further down the list you go, and 25 items wasn't enough to squeeze all of the great things into. 

Track and field remains a space where heightened anticipation, the thrill of watching historic feats unfold before your eyes, and the visceral reaction of 'Wow!' can create lifetime memories. 

Here are our Top 25 for 2025:

1. Super Cooper. Sixteen-year-old phenom Cooper Lutkenhaus shook the track and field world on Sunday, Aug. 3 at the USATF Outdoor Championships when he surged down the home stretch to take second place in the 800 meters final with an unreal time of 1:42.27, beating world indoor champion Josh Hoey and American record holder Bryce Hoppel. Fewer people will remember than a resurgent Donavan Brazier won with a triumphant 1:42.16 PB than that Lutkenhaus’ time was over three seconds faster than his previous personal best and four seconds faster than Michael Granville’s high school record, which had stood for 29 years before the sophomore from Justin Northwest TX dipped under it four times during the season. Soon after, he turned pro and signed with Nike. A true track and field fairy tale. 

2. Sydney: Who needs hurdles? It took nearly 40 years, but someone finally made a run at Marita Koch’s world record of 47.60 for 400 meters. Who else but Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone? She thoroughly beat global stars Marileidy Paulino of he Dominican Republic and Salwa Eid Naser of Bahrain. To contextualize her American record of 47.78 at the World Championships in Tokyo, it scores1,329 points on World Athletics tables. Her Tokyo time exceeds her world record of 50.37 for 400 hurdles (1,322) and Florence Griffth Joyner’s 10.49 for 100 meters (1,314). 

3. Mondo. Again. World records are infrequent in track and field . . . unless Mondo Duplantis is on the pole vault runway. His fourth world record of the year – 20 feet, 8 inches (6.30m) – came in the biggest meet of the year, the Tokyo worlds. By age 25, the Louisiana-born Swede had broken the record 14 times. He is, to put it in Swedish, största genom tiderna (the greatest of all-time).

4. Beatrice Chebet 5K WR. It wasn’t enough that the 25-year-old Kenyan has a double-double: 5k/10K gold medals at both Paris and Tokyo. At the Prefontaine Classic, she became the first woman to go under 14 minutes for 5,000 meters, clocking 13:58.06. Historic.

5. Crouser’s One And Done. This was athletics’ version of  Willis Reed coming off the bench for the New York Knicks or Kirk Gibson’s pinch-hit home run for the Dodgers. Ryan Crouser, sidelined by injury all season, started and finished outdoors by winning gold in the shot put at worlds. His second-round 72-1.75 (21.99m) would have been enough, and he extended that to 73-3.50 (22.34m) in the fifth. As Duplantis did, he completed a sweep of five global golds from 2021-25. He not only endured the grueling all-day qualification (morning) and final (night), he wasn't sure if his elbow would hold together. 

6. Jefferson’s Declaration. Melissa Jefferson-Wooden’s breakout year was highlighted by a World Championships record of 10.61 in the 100 meters, equaling the No. 4 time ever. It was the fastest by an American since FloJo’s WR of 10.49 in 1988. She also won the 200 meters and was part of the winning 4x100. Three golds. Nobody could touch her. 

7. Ingebrigtsen's Indoor Mile. Considering he lacked top fitness in the outdoor season, it’s easy to forget what Jakob Ingebrigsten did indoors. His 3:45.14 mile crushed the 5-day-old world record of 3:46.63 set by Yared Nuguse. Notably, Ingebrigsten’s 1,330 was the highest score in any men’s track event all year.

8. Another Hocker Shocker. Cole Hocker’s world gold at 5,000 was, if anything, more unexpected than his victory over 1,500 at the Paris Olympics. He became the first U.S.-born runner to win global gold in the 5,000 since Bob Schul at the 1964 Olympics, and only the fifth runner ever to win global golds at 1,500 and 5,000. (The others: Nurmi, El Guerrouj, Lagat, Ingebrigtsen.) It was a redemptive moment for Hocker, who was disqualified in semifinals of the 1,500 for “jostling.” The 24-year-old arrived in Tokyo ranked 26th on the 2025 world list. He was 12th with a lap to go and won in 12:58.30. His finish was extraordinary: 52.62 for last 400 meters, 25.50 for last 200, 12.51 for last 100.

9. Lemngole Breaks Barrier Over Barriers. The two times Doris Lemngole won an NCAA title in the women’s steeplechase, both performances were collegiate records. To win her second title, the Alabama star not only became the first women in NCAA history to run under 9 minutes, but her time of 8:58.15 ranks also No. 11 all-time on the world list. Lemngole also added a second NCAA cross country title in November. 

10. See Jane Run. What a year it was for Jane Hedengren, who produced so many moments in 2025 that it’s near impossible to pick the very best one. The Timpview UT senior, who now competes for BYU (and is already rewriting the NCAA record books), broke nine high school records in 2025, but her last one may have been her best one. Just two weeks after running a 4:23.50 mile at the HOKA Festival of Miles in St. Louis and a 9:17.75 2-mile at the Brooks PR Invitational, Hedengren stepped up to the line one last time and ran 8:40.03 for 3,000 meters at Nike Outdoor Nationals, winning by an incredible 41 seconds.

11. Alekna Owns Ramona. Might as well name the throwing ring in Ramona, Oklahoma after him. The two times Mykolas Alekna has broken the world record in the men’s discus, both have come in ThrowTown, USA. He not only broke his previous record of 243-11 (74.35m) once in 245-8 (74.89m) but did it twice with his best mark in 247-10 (75.56m).

12. Savannah Surpasses Sydney. It’s pretty telling what Savannah Sutherland’s potential in the 400-meter hurdles could be in the years to come after lowering Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone’s NCAA record of 52.75 to 52.46 to claim her second NCAA title. But how Canadian representing Michigan did it – winning by more than two seconds – was one of the most dominating performances of the NCAA Championships.

13. Anthony Blazes 9.75. In a year where The Bowerman was up for grabs on the men’s side, Arkansas sprinter Jordan Anthony’s near-wind-legal run of 9.75 (+2.1) in the 100 at the NCAA West Regional won him collegiate track and field’s highest honor. If running 9.75 only earns Anthony a 99-speed rating in NCAA Football 26, you can only imagine what he has to run to earn a 100. 

14. Natalie Dumas' Historic Triple At NBNO. Eastern Regional NJ junior Natalie Dumas came alive at the end of the outdoor season, putting her name on the map with three wins at New Balance Nationals Outdoor. Dumas ran 51.14 in the 400 meters, 55.99 in the 400-meter hurdles, and 2:00.11 in the 800 meters. All three of those marks put her in the top 10 all-time for those events.

15, Let Geordie do it. If you let Geordie Beamish in it, he might win it. And did he win world gold in the 3,000-meter steeplechase, overtaking heavily favored Soufiane El Bakkali. Adding to the improbability of it all, Beamish fell in the heats and had to scramble to reach the final. With 300 meters left in the final, Beamish was 11th, nearly two seconds behind leader Lamecha Girma. Beamish, a 28-year-old New Zealander and Northern Arizona graduate, ran the closing 100 in 13.70 and finished in 8:33.88 -- .07 ahead of El Bakkali. The Moroccan was thus denied a 2021-25 global sweep.

16. All Eyes On Faith. In June, Kenyan superstar Faith Kipyegon took center stage in Paris for a one-of-a-kind event, ushered by a fleet of pacers, as she tried to become the first woman to break the sub-four mile barrier. It was a memorable day for women's distance running, with a global audience tuning in to watch an all-time legend explore her limits. She came up short, yes, with 4:06.42, but the possibility of a woman breaking the barrier in our lifetime is real. 

17. Fisher's Record Spree. Grant Fisher ran to a time of 12:44.09 for 5,000 meters on Feb. 14 at Boston, breaking a world indoor record for the second time in seven days. He had set a 3,000 record of 7:22.91 at New York, beating Cole Hocker. Not since Ethiopia's Haile Gebrselassie, in 1997, had a runner owned world indoor records at 3,000 and 5,000 simultaneously. There is no evidence an American distance runner ever set two world records so close together. When world records were recognized in yards, Joie Ray ran to two world indoor records in 1923 -- 8:31.2 in the two-mile on Feb. 10 and 14:54.6 in the 5,000 meters on March 7.

18. Quincy Wilson Lowers His U18 WR. After tearing through high school competition in the spring, teen phenom Quincy Wilson threw down another shocking performance in July to remind everyone why he is the face of high school track and field. Wilson ran 44.10 in the 400 at the Ed Murphey Classic, lowering his own U18 world record by a tenth of a second. At the end of the year, that mark tied him for seventh in the world.

19. Whittaker's NCAA 400 Record. Before claiming gold in the women’s 4x400 relay in Tokyo, Isabella Whittaker of Arkansas turned heads in Virginia Beach when she broke the American indoor record in the 400 in 49.24 en route to winning her first and only NCAA title. Her time ranks second to Femke Bol (49.17) on the all-time indoor world list.

20, Only JJK did it Better. Anna Hall climbed to No. 2 on the all-time heptathlon list, scoring a meet record of 7,032 points in the annual gathering at Gotzis, Austria. (Sweden’s Carolina Kluft has also scored 7,032.) Jackie Joyner-Kersee has exceeded that score six times, topped by a world record of 7,291 in 1988. Hall, who won silver and bronze medals at the 2022 and 2023 worlds, took gold at Tokyo with 6,888.  

21. Strand Clocks 3:48.82. Ethan Strand’s run to Tokyo was sparked by his remarkable indoor campaign. He broke the collegiate indoor 3,000 record (7:30.15) at the BU Track two weeks after the conclusion of the 2024 cross country season. Then, he returned to Boston less than two months later and demolished Cooper Teare’s collegiate mile record by over two seconds in 3:48.32, No. 7 on the all-time world indoor list, and became the first collegian under 3:50.

22. Owen Powell Breaks HS Mile Record. Amidst a swarm of record-breaking performances across all levels this indoor season, Mercer Island WA senior Owen Powell delivered one of the best moments of the winter, breaking Hobbs Kessler’s indoor high school mile record with a time of 3:56.66. Crater OR teammates Josiah Tostenson and Tayvon Kitchen also broke four minutes in that race; Tostenson ran 3:57.47, also dipping under Kessler’s old record of 3:57.66, while Kitchen ran 3:59.61.

23. Epic Boys 100 Meters At NON. On a rainy night at Hayward Field in mid-June, three high school boys with sub-10 credentials lined up for the 100 meter final at Nike Outdoor Nationals. Tate Taylor, Brayden Williams and Maurice Gleaton had all put up dominating performances throughout the spring, but this was the first time all would meet in the same race. Taylor came out on top, running 10.10 in a cool, wet final, followed by Gleaton in 10.11 and Williams in 10.17. Taylor would later win the Gatorade National Player of the Year award for Track and Field.

24. Spencer/Dudek XC Seasons. Jackson Spencer of Herriman UT and Natasza Dudek of Ann Arbor Pioneer reigned supreme at the end of the high school cross country season. Spencer capped an undefeated season in which he broke course records at the Clovis Invitational and Utah state meet by becoming the first boy to sweep the Nike Cross Nationals and Brooks XC Championships since Lukas Verzbicas in 2010. Dudek also accomplished the double and joined her sister Zofia as a champion at San Diego's Balboa Park. (Brooks took over the San Diego race after it was discontinued by Foot Locker over the summer). 

25. All-Time Great State Meet. So many options for No. 25, but we're giving it to Quentin Nauman, who achieved one of the greatest state meet triples in the history of state meets. The junior from Epworth Western Dubuque won the 800 in 1:49.41. He won the 1,600 in 3:59.60. And won the 3,200 in 8:57.97. That was all before he broke the junior class national record in the mile at the HOKA Festival of Miles with 3:58.65. 

Honorable Mentions - 

- Noah Lyles won his fourth consecutive World Championships gold medal in the 200 meters, matching Usain Bolt 

- The Moll twins, Amanda and Hana, took over collegiate women's pole vaulting as freshmen at Washington, breaking the NCAA indoor and outdor records

- Katie Moon won her fourth global gold medal in the women's pole vault

- Nico Young broke the American record in the men's 5,000 meters and won a Diamond League event (Bislett Games) with 12:45.27

- Conner Mantz broke the American record in the men's marathon in Chicago

- Breakout year for Josh Hoey included a global indoor gold in the 800, a world record (600) and American records

- Valarie Allman continues dominance of women's discus

- Pamela Kosgei edges Lexy Halladay-Lowry in epic women's 5,000 at Bryan Clay, with NCAA Nos. 2 and 3 all-time performances