Six years ago, when Joe Klecker was named to the inaugural class of the On Athletics Club (OAC) in Boulder, Colorado, his goals were all about racing fast on the track. But based on his physiology, his tenacity, and even his genes, coach Dathan Ritzenhein already knew Klecker was destined to become a marathoner—and probably a very good one. When the team now known as OAC Global formed in the summer of 2020, it featured eight postcollegiate runners chasing Olympic berths from 1,500 to 10,000 meters.
The OAC sent several runners (including Klecker) to the Tokyo Olympics and brought home medals from Paris. But track success was only the first step of what Ritzenhein envisioned. In the years since, he and coach Laura Thweatt have built an elite marathon program, too.
Kenyan great Hellen Obiri, four-time Major Marathon winner and current women’s New York City Marathon course record holder, put OAC on the marathon map after joining in 2022. The progression of Klecker (with a marathon PR of 2:05:56 from Boston), along with newer teammates Ryan Ford (2:05:46 marathon PR) and Patrick Kiprop (59:14 half marathon PR), has helped to solidify the team’s presence on the roads. As all four prepare for the NYC Marathon, we went behind the curtain at the OAC Global Training Facility in Boulder to learn what has fueled their success.
When On recruited Obiri to Boulder in 2022, the two-time Olympic silver medalist at 5,000 meters was about to move up to the marathon. That meant shifting from pure track speed and relatively low mileage (80 miles per week) to 120- to 125-mile weeks and grinding sessions like 25K tempo runs. With no other marathoners on the team, she did portions of her long runs with 10,000-meter runner Alicia Monson and some longer tempo efforts and fartleks with Klecker.
Obiri became one of the best marathoners in the world, winning New York and Boston twice and an Olympic bronze medal in Paris; Monson broke the American 5,000- and 10,000-meter records in 2023, and Klecker got a taste of what marathon training was all about, which gave him proper perspective as he was about to begin his first marathon build. When you’re racing on the track, a long run is kind of a chill day because all of your hard work is on the track. But when you’d see her go out and do her long runs, she was just hammering from the start, and so I knew I really had to wrap my head around this new way of training for the roads.” As Klecker got closer to his marathon debut last fall, the OAC signed Ford as his primary training partner.
They developed a synergy, but weren’t entirely aligned in their schedules because Ford was building up to the Chicago Marathon and Klecker was preparing for New York a month later. But they did sync up for all of their training (including harder workouts) as they prepared for Boston, and that paid off with better racing execution and significant time drops. The team recently added an even faster teammate in Kiprop, a 25-year-old Kenyan and former University of Arkansas star, after big wins at the Lilac Bloomsday 12K and Peachtree Road Race 10K.
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