AS ROOKIE PRO season’s go, Addy Wiley’s was an all-over-the-place roller coaster, but it ended in the right place for the 20-year-old who’s charging finish to her 2024 began to redeem all the potential her high school and brief college career suggested.
The high point was her 1000 AR of 2:31.49 in Szczecin, Poland, on the last day of August. Her season was all about running through the tape. That became important to her after an ill-timed bout of food poising and a hamstring injury 3 weeks before the Trials derailed Olympic dreams.
The Trials “was very disappointing because I had done so much work, my fitness was the best it’s ever been and I knew I had a chance not just to make the team in one event but two,” says Wiley, who was eliminated in the 800 semis before finishing 11th in the 1500 in Eugene. “Coming out of the Trials I was ready to prove that that was still a true statement.
“Trusting my fitness and knowing I still had a lot left in the season, I was still really motivated, especially after how disappointing the Trials were. It gave me a lot of extra motivation for the last couple of races. The fitness was there.”
Assuredly, Wiley had shown fitness of the highest order as a prep and then NAIA collegian at Huntington University. Her 4:26.16 for 1600 as a North (Huntington, Indiana) senior, a 4:27.71 mile equivalent, to this day is the fastest 4-lap time by a prep. A year ago at the Brussels DL — in the late summer following her frosh, and only, season at Huntington — she raced 3:59.17 for 1500, well under Jenny Simpson’s 3:59.90 CR.
Now it was time to chase open-level records.
“The AR in the 1000 was something I had my mind on for a while,” Wiley says. “With the Trials being this year it’s something I thought would come second to competing at the Olympics. When the Olympics didn’t happen, everything in my mind was focused on knowing I could get that record.
“I had a couple of other records in my mind earlier in the year when I was super-fit that I felt like I could go after, but this one fit so well into the schedule. I had a call with my agent, he said there was a 1K opportunity in Poland and he said, ‘You can go after that record,’ and I said I definitely will. We were ready for it.”
That was part of an inspiring close to the season that included a…
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