THE COACH'S MOVE: HOW NATHAN MARTIN RAN THE RACE HE'S BEEN TEACHING FOR YEARS
At mile 21 of the 2026 Los Angeles Marathon, Nathan Martin made a decision.
He surged. Nobody followed.
In that moment, a 36-year-old substitute teacher and high school cross-country coach from Jackson, Michigan recognized the opening he had been patient enough to wait for through nearly ninety minutes of racing across one of the most unforgiving urban courses in American distance running. When he looked ahead and saw the lead pace car, and the Kenyan runner who had controlled the race from Dodger Stadium all the way through Beverly Hills, he did not panic. He calculated.
"An opportunity opened up around 5 miles out," Martin told reporters after the race. "I surged a bit and no one went with me and at that point I'm like, it's time to fight and give what I have."
The Conditions Made It Harder for Everyone
Before getting to the tactics, understand what kind of day this was.
The heat was significant enough that LA Marathon organizers took the extraordinary step of offering every runner an early exit at mile 18. Participants were told that if conditions got too tough, they could take a turn onto Santa Monica Boulevard and still receive a finisher's medal without completing the full 26.2 miles. Signs, cones, and barricades were in place to help direct runners toward that option.
Martin knew what he was walking into. "I knew conditions were going to be pretty rough," he said, "so I wanted to be smart and just be able to fight with the leaders and really give myself an opportunity to be able to race the last 6 miles."
That is a pacing strategy, not a survival plan. He came to Los Angeles to race the back half.
The Hunt
Kenya's Michael Kimani Kamau led the men's field for a vast majority of the 26.2-mile course. From Dodger Stadium through Chinatown, past the Hollywood Walk of Fame, down through Sunset Strip and Beverly Hills, Kamau was in front. By all accounts he was running a controlled, confident race.
Martin was behind him, managing the heat and managing himself.
"It's one of those things where it's just up and down," Martin said. "Some moments you feel amazing and other moments you're like, oh my goodness, I still have 15 miles to go."
But at mile 21 he moved. And when nobody covered it, the race changed.
What followed was a quiet, grinding chase across the final miles of the course. Martin began to close the gap as the race made its way into Century City toward the finish line on Santa Monica Boulevard. He started noticing Kamau and the lead pace car ahead of him and thought he still had a shot.
He did not panic. He did not sprint wildly. He calculated each segment.
"At a mile and a half to go, I could see the leader," Martin said. "With 800 meters to go, I was thinking, I'm catching him."
At 100 meters out, the race was still in doubt.
"Right around 100 to go, I'm like, oh my goodness, I might be able to catch this guy," Martin said. "I surged as hard as I could and was able to kind of pull it off."
He crossed the line in 2:11:16.50. The closest finish in LA Marathon history. Kamau, who finished with effectively the same official time, collapsed at the finish line and was treated by medical personnel.
The Lesson He Teaches Every Day
Martin is the head cross-country coach and events coordinator at Jackson High School in Michigan. His athletic director, Chris Hoover, said the school was thrilled Martin won, but not surprised by how he won. "He is a top-tier person, not just an elite world-class athlete, he's also an elite human being. He coaches our kids the same way."
Martin himself regularly tells his athletes not to tie their success to a result but to the effort they put in.
On Sunday in Los Angeles, the effort produced a result. 0.01 seconds worth of it.
There is something to sit with in that. A coach who spends his seasons telling teenagers that process matters, that you race your own race, that you stay patient and make your move when the opportunity is real, went out and ran 26.2 miles in brutal heat in front of a national audience and did exactly what he preaches.
Why This Win Is Bigger Than One Race
Martin's victory extends a streak that would have been unthinkable a decade ago. His win marks the second consecutive year an American man has taken the LA Marathon title, capping a three-decade drought for U.S. runners in the event. Martin joins 2025 winner Matthew Richtman in what is beginning to look like a genuine resurgence for American distance running — a streak rooted in a 40-year history of the Los Angeles Marathon that saw U.S. men shut out of the top spot for three consecutive decades.
He is also the fastest U.S.-born Black marathoner in history, with a personal best of 2:10:45 from 2023.
Martin's historic finish will likely earn him a spot on the U.S. Olympic marathon team for the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles. The same course. The same city. A different kind of race.
Final Thought
Every major outlet covered the Nathan Martin story this week. Most of them got it right on the surface. He is humble. He is inspiring. He almost did not catch the guy.
What they mostly missed is the tactical intelligence underneath the emotion. Martin did not stumble into a historic finish. He managed energy across a hot course, made a calculated move at mile 21 when the field refused to respond, and then executed a disciplined closing chase that only became visible to the naked eye in the final mile and a half.
He ran it the way he teaches it.
That is the part worth remembering.