Nathan Martin a Michigan high school cross country coach has won the 2026 ASICS Los Angeles Marathon.
Nathan Martin, who splits his time between coaching young athletes and competing on the elite marathon circuit, narrowed a 26.2-mile lead to beat Kenya’s Michael Kamau by a mere fraction of a second Sunday.
A close race from the start saw Martin trailing Kamau from the start but he found a second wind in the final mile of the race. A burst of energy saw him catch up to Kamau just hundreds of yards from the finish line on Santa Monica Boulevard.
“I definitely thought it’d be awesome to win but I knew that wasn’t in my control, what was though was giving what I had in the day and seeing what that kind of produced,” he said. “When I saw an opportunity where winning looks like it’s a real shot, then I went for it.
With the finish line on the horizon, Martin began to relaize that he was catching up to Kamau in the last mile, he began to believe more and more that he could win the title.
“With 800 to go, I’m like, I have to give what I have here and push and see what happens. Right around 100 to go, I’m like, ‘Oh my goodness, I might be able to catch this guy.’ I surged as hard as I could and was able to kind of pull it off,” he said.
Both runners clocked an official time of 2:11:18 (with reports indicating Martin won by 0.01 seconds in 2:11:16.50). As Martin sprinted across the line to take the win, Kamau collapsed and required medical attention.
His colleague said Martin has a past of running trials and winning other marathons.
“You can’t drive across Jackson without seeing him training. He’s constantly training, he’s running everywhere he goes,” Hoover a friend said.
School officials where Martin works celebrated the win on social media.