Rachel Apa, 24, Died Two Miles From the Finish of the New York City Marathon as Investigators Seek a Cause

Rachel Apa, a 24-year-old former college field hockey player running her first New York City Marathon, collapsed near mile 24 on Sunday and died at a Manhattan hospital that night, about two miles short of the finish line. Her family says doctors told them the cause was rhabdomyolysis, a rare muscle condition, but the city’s medical examiner has not yet confirmed that.

A race that began with “I’ve never felt this good”

Apa, from Lewisberry, Pennsylvania, had trained for months, her father Steve told The New York Times. He described her as in “perfect health, perfect shape.” He stayed home and followed her on the race’s tracking app while exchanging texts with her. Her mother, Michelle, was in New York with friends.

Early messages were upbeat. Several miles in, Apa wrote that she felt amazing and had never felt so good, according to NBC News. Her mother filmed her smiling and waving at around mile 14. Later texts were shorter and more worrying, among them “ugh” and “ow.” Accounts differ on exactly where each message arrived, with outlets placing the “ow” texts anywhere from mile 18 to mile 21. Steve Apa said the messages stopped around that stretch, though the tracker showed her still moving until it halted at mile 24.

Bystanders, CPR and a six-hour fight

Police said officers assigned to the race saw a woman having a medical episode near the mile 24 marker at about 1:40 p.m. Reports say bystanders, including two people who identified themselves as doctors, began CPR before medical crews arrived with a defibrillator. The sources vary on the timing, with one placing the collapse at about 1:33 p.m. and another saying crews took roughly seven minutes to arrive.

Apa was taken to Mount Sinai in critical condition. Her father told the Times that doctors worked for more than six hours to save her, and that she was declared dead at about 9:40 p.m. Her mother, who had rushed to the scene and learned from an EMS worker that her daughter had already been taken away, followed in a separate ambulance.

What is known about the cause

Multiple outlets report that the family was told Apa died of rhabdomyolysis, in which damaged muscle cells release a substance into the bloodstream that can lead to kidney failure. The Mayo Clinic lists marathon runners among those who can be affected. Yahoo Sports, citing a spokesperson, reported that the Office of Chief Medical Examiner is investigating and has made no final determination, so the diagnosis remains the family’s account of what doctors said.

The condition is uncommon. The Cleveland Clinic estimates about 26,000 people in the U.S. develop it each year, with runners at higher risk. A 2022 study found dozens of runners had been treated for it at the New York City Marathon, though the Independent noted there appears to be no data on marathon deaths from rhabdomyolysis specifically. Cardiac events are the better-studied danger. An Emory School of Medicine study published in 2025 put the risk of cardiac death at roughly one in 500,000 runners, and found that the risk during long-distance races has halved since the early 2000s.

Who Rachel Apa was

Apa spent four years on the Bucknell University field hockey team, making 42 starts in 63 games and scoring 17 goals. She earned Academic All-Patriot League honors and graduated in 2024 with a business degree. (One report says she played through 2023.) She worked as a product manager at TE Connectivity and had started an MBA at Charleston Southern University. Bucknell called her a “key contributor” to the program and said its community “mourns her loss.”

She ran with the Parkinson’s Champions team in honor of her grandfather, who died in 2022 after living with the disease. “He taught me to stay active, push my limits, and embrace challenges,” she wrote on her fundraising page. She had set a $4,000 goal. The sources give different totals, from about $7,600 to more than $21,000, and the figure may have risen after news of her death spread. One source mistakenly called the relative her father, but the others consistently identify him as her grandfather.

New York Road Runners, which organizes the New York City Marathon, said it was “deeply saddened” and offered sympathy to her family, friends and the running community. More than 61,000 people took part this year in the world’s largest marathon. The Independent reported that the last death tied to the event was in 2024, when a man fell from his Brooklyn apartment window while trying to watch the runners. Other coverage describes the 2024 case differently, and the sources do not agree on when a participant last died after a medical emergency during the race.

For now, the facts are limited: a healthy young runner, a sudden decline in the final miles, and a medical examiner’s review still under way. Her father’s description of the loss as “unfathomable” is likely to hang over the next New York City Marathon conversation about how runners are monitored and educated about exertion-related risks.

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