On Valentine's Day BYU track runner Riley Chamberlain broke the NCAA indoor mile record.
Tens of thousands of women’s collegiate track athletes have toed the line for the indoor mile since the NCAA began sponsoring the event in 1983. But none has run it faster than BYU’s Riley A. Chamberlain (’27) did on Feb. 14.
Racing against top collegiate and professional athletes at the 2026 Boston University Valentine Invitational, Chamberlain turned to her trademark closing kick to track down and surpass the leading collegian in the race just before the finis line. She finished at 4:20.61, taking nearly three seconds off the previous record.
Coming into the race, Chamberlain and Coach Diljeet Taylor weren’t talking records. Even so, based on Chamberlain’s workouts, they knew something around 4:20 was possible.
As the starting gun sounded and Chamberlain and her teammate Jane E. Hedengren (’29) settled into the run, the conditions didn’t feel especially promising.
Following professional runner Elle St. Pierre, University of Oregon star Wilma Nielsen opened a large gap between herself and the BYU runners. And although Chamberlain hit her target midpoint goal of 2:10, she was starting to hurt. That’s when she borrowed strength from her teammate. “Jane went around me, and I was like, “Okay, she’s going for it. I’ll just try to hang on with her for a bit.”
With 200 meters to go and sensing a little left in the tank, Chamberlain shiftedgears and sprinted through a blistering final lap to overcome the 20-plus-meter gap separating her from Nielsen. The rest is NCAA history.
As honored as Chamberlain feels to be the NCAA record holder, she acknowledges that records are inevitably broken.
“You have to enjoy the process and enjoy what you’re doing, because it doesn’t happen very often that the results come together perfectly,” she says. But “when it does come together,” she adds, “it’s really worth it.”
