Katelyn Tuohy, winner of individual NCAA titles in cross-country, indoor, and outdoor track for North Carolina State University, has announced she has turned professional and signed a sponsorship deal with Adidas.
According to her agent, Ray Flynn, Tuohy, 21, will remain in Raleigh to train under her college coach, Laurie Henes, and make periodic altitude trips to Flagstaff, Arizona, for training with Henes’s daughter Elly, who also runs for Adidas.
Tuohy, who is majoring in business, will graduate this month with her degree. Because she started her collegiate running career at NC State during the pandemic, she has athletic eligibility remaining. But she opted out of using it after leading her cross-country team to a third consecutive NCAA title on November 18.
Tuohy was the defending champion, but she was ill that day. She gutted out a fifth-place finish, and NC State bested Northern Arizona University by one point, 123–124, to win the national title.
Last year, after winning the NCAA crown on the grass, Tuohy announced a name-image-likeness (NIL) deal with Adidas, the first college runner to announce a substantial deal with a shoe company.
Her PRs include times of 15:03.12 for 5,000 meters, 8:35.20 for the indoor 3,000 meters, and 4:24.26 for the indoor mile, with the indoor times establishing still-standing collegiate records.
Tuohy won three consecutive Nike Cross Nationals titles while she was attending North Rockland High School in Thiells, New York, and she developed a massive social media following, even though she didn’t enjoy the attention or seek it out. At large invitational meets, teammates and coaches had to clear space for her to warm up, out of the view of other athletes and fans who wanted to take selfies and videos. Message board critics were quick to dismiss her as over the hill on the rare occasions she had an off race.
Still, she maintained her excellence and dominated high school and collegiate running for most of the past seven years.
Sarah Lorge Butler is a writer and editor living in Eugene, Oregon, and her stories about the sport, its trends, and fascinating individuals have appeared in Runner’s World since 2005. She is the author of two popular fitness books, Run Your Butt Off! and Walk Your Butt Off!
