EUGENE, Ore. — The University of Iowa closed the 2026 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships with matching national top-five finishes in the 4×400 relay, as both the Hawkeye men and women raced to fifth place at Hayward Field.
The performances gave Iowa first-team All-America honors on both sides and showed the program’s growing strength in one of track and field’s marquee events.
The Iowa men’s 4×400 team of David Akhalu, Zidane Brown, Tyrese Miller and Landon Fontenot finished fifth Friday night in 3:00.65, a season-best time and the second-fastest mark in school history.
The Hawkeyes entered the meet as the No. 19 seed, then stormed past expectations by outplacing that seed by 14 spots. Their fifth-place finish scored four team points and helped Iowa finish the meet with 10 total points.
It was the 10th time in school history, and the second straight season, that Iowa’s men’s 4×400 relay earned first-team All-America honors.
Iowa Director of Track and Field Joey Woody called it an “amazing finish” to the season, noting that the relay produced a top-five national finish while running the No. 2 time all-time at Iowa.
Akhalu opened the race with a 45.94 split out of lane one. Brown followed with a strong 44.79 lap, Miller delivered Iowa’s fastest leg at 44.64, and Fontenot anchored in 45.30 to secure the All-America finish.
Woody said the relay’s hunger came in part from disappointment earlier in the year, after the group did not qualify for the NCAA Indoor Championships. That setback, he said, helped fuel the Hawkeyes through the outdoor postseason, where they ran their three fastest times of the season over the final stretch.
The next night, Iowa’s women’s 4×400 relay answered with a historic race of its own.
The Hawkeye team of Alivia Williams, Damaris Mutunga, Princess Uche and Chioma Nwachukwu finished fifth Saturday night in 3:25.10, crushing Iowa’s school record by nearly two seconds. The previous record, 3:26.90, had been set in 2025.
The women had already run 3:27.21 in Thursday’s qualifying round, which at the time stood as the second-fastest mark in program history. By Saturday night, they had taken another major step forward, shaving more than two seconds off that semifinal time and putting Iowa into the national top five.
The performance marked Iowa’s second straight top-eight finish in the women’s 4×400 relay at the NCAA Outdoor Championships. After earning first-team All-America honors in the event for the first time in program history in 2025, the Hawkeyes made it back-to-back first-team finishes in 2026.
Williams led off in 52.92, keeping Iowa near the front of the race. Mutunga then delivered a blazing 49.84 split, the fastest leg for the Hawkeyes. Uche followed in 51.54 while battling through traffic, and Nwachukwu closed in 50.82, pushing Iowa as high as third before finishing fifth in a loaded national final.
Woody said he was proud not only of the four runners in the final, but also of the alternates and other athletes who helped build the relay throughout the season.
“These women ran amazingly well tonight,” Woody said. “Every leg fought the entire race and competed so well.”
The national meet also included an NCAA Championships debut for Iowa sophomore Bryce Ruland, who finished 21st in the men’s discus. Ruland’s best throw came on his second attempt at 57.22 meters.
But the headline for Iowa was the pair of fifth-place relay finishes — one by the men with the second-fastest time in school history, and one by the women with a new school record.
For a Hawkeye program built on sprint strength, relay depth and late-season momentum, the NCAA Championships ended with both 4×400 squads standing among the best in the nation.