Ramsden Sets Ivy League Indoor Mile Record; Will Race For New Zealand at the 2024 World Indoor Championships

Senior distance runner Maia Ramsden made history last Sunday at the 116th Millrose Games, one of the most prestigious Track and Field meets in the nation. Ramsden represented the Crimson as she competed against an esteemed field of professional runners in the women’s indoor mile. Ramsden posted a record-breaking time of 4:24.83, narrowly beating a ten-year-old Ivy League record held by Dartmouth runner Abbey D’Agostino. The title is yet another to add to the senior’s list of accolades as she also boasts record times in the 1500m, 5000m, and indoor mile.

“It was good,” Ramsden said. “When I first thought about it, I had kind of assumed that I had already broken the Ivy League [record]. The first thing everyone told me after the race was that I was half a second off of the collegiate record, so I was a little like ‘oh, I didn’t even know I was that close’. I don’t think I had anything left to give.”

With the record breaking race, Ramsden now holds the second-fastest time in the mile and 3000m, which she raced in just 8:46.84 earlier this season.

Her stellar performance, which is just one of many Ivy Records broken by her fellow Crimson teammates this season, came just one day after she, alongside freshman distance runner Sophia Gorriaran, senior sprinter Egbe Ndip-Agbor, and junior sprinter Victoria Bossong set a new record in the distance medley relay, posting a time of 10:52.07 at the Eagle Elite Invitational.

The relay’s time decisively set a new record, clearing the previous distance medley relay time by over 14 seconds.

“My team and I had run a relay the day before, and I wasn’t initially intending to go to this meet since it was mostly a professional meet,” Ramsden said. “But I was invited, and it was a big opportunity to pass up, because it’s an historic meet, and they’ve been running it since the early 1900s in New York. The mile is the hallmark event of the Millrose games, so I just couldn’t say no to that. I was really excited about it, so I kind of worked my coach to the ground and came up with a plan on how I could do the relay, since I didn’t want to give up either one, on Saturday in Boston, and then get to New York for the mile on Sunday.

She has been tapped to run for New Zealand at the 2024 World Athletics Indoor Championships. By Courtesy of Harvard Athletic Communications

Harvard Track and Field head coach, Jason Saretsky, also played a role in building up Ramsden’s confidence to race in the historic meet.

“A lot of it was just building up my confidence, and being like ‘You’re fast enough to go with these more experienced professional athletes and stay with them’,” Ramsden said. “I think a lot of his work and his role was reaffirming that my training was good enough, and he could confidently tell me that I was ready.”

The Harvard Track and Field team is gearing up for the Indoor Ivy League Heptagonals, which the Crimson will host at home this weekend, with events taking place on Saturday and Sunday. Last year, the women’s team ended the weekend victorious, notching an impressive 177 points. While the women’s team will look to defend its title, the men’s team will hope to redeem its narrow one-point-loss to Princeton.

“The thing about these championships is that obviously they are a big deal, and they’re what we work for the whole season, but at the end of the day, it’s still just one meet, and so I take the mentality that this is an opportunity to show what we’ve been working on all season, and is a much better mindset to go into it, rather than having these expectations of specific outcomes,” Ramsden said. “I think that everything is earned, nothing is taken for granted, so that’s what my team and I talk about before going into a championship meet.”

While her short-term goal is to prepare for a successful weekend at Heptagonals, Ramsden’s focus has also shifted to her newly earned honor of her country, New Zealand, at the 2024 World Athletics Indoor Championships.

The meet will be held in Glasgow, Scotland over the first weekend of March. The senior will be running the 1500m race, which is the first event of the afternoon session.

“One of the things that is easier to do in a professional meet because you don’t know everyone, is to not think about specific names or teams, and really just look at people as nameless bodies,” Ramsden said. “Your goal is to pass as many bodies as possible. But I think it’s kind of a similar thing, with Heps coming up, it’s pretty easy to get caught up in what the rankings are. At the end of the day, everyone on the start line has a chance, so just kind of letting go of what the predictions might be, or rankings and things like that, and just kind of giving it our best shot is definitely the goal going in.”

Harvard Track and Field will host its next competition this weekend, the 2024 Ivy League Indoor Heptagonal Championships, at the Gordon Indoor Track. The meet will be streamed live on ESPN +.
—Staff writer Nadia Fairfax can be reached at nadia.fairfax@thecrimson.com