‘Officially amazing’
What does it take to set a world record? For James Redding ’27, it was a combination of hard work, the right relationships, and on two occasions, the luck of the draw.
This fall, Redding became the youngest male athlete to complete the original six world major marathons, running 26.2 miles in Boston, Chicago, New York, Tokyo, London, and Berlin in a span of less than two years. When he crossed the finish line in Germany in September, he was exactly 20 years, four months, and 20 days old, nearly three months younger than the previous record holder.
“I tried to treat it like just another marathon, just go out there and run my race,” he said. “Getting the world record at the end felt incredible—when they say you're ‘officially amazing,’ you really do feel officially amazing.”
Even without the record, which was certified at the finish line by a representative from Guinness World Records, Redding would have been on cloud nine. His goal—to complete the six major marathons by graduation—was one he set his freshman year, after running the Boston Marathon for charity. The crowds and energy were unlike anything he’d experienced in previous races, and he wanted more.
“I went home and started Googling all the other major marathons,” he recalled. “I’m someone who, if something’s unfinished, it’s got to get finished. I got one of them, now let’s get the rest.”
Starting small
Redding and his mom after their first half marathon.
For many, running is a solitary sport, but Redding took it up as a way to get healthy with his mom, a member of BC’s Class of 1994. The pair ran their first 5K in 2019 in Old Orchard Beach when Redding was still in high school, and decided to run one per month thereafter. When COVID put a stop to organized races, they found three-mile loops to “race” on their own, sometimes at the Chestnut Hill Reservoir just a mile from where Redding grew up.
“At that point, three miles was a lot for both of us,” said Redding, “but after a year we did a 10K, and we started studying how to run longer distances—the right shoes, nutrition, stretching, all that stuff—and I said, ‘hey, let’s go bigger, let’s run a half marathon.’”
They were barely across the finish line of the Newburyport Half Marathon in 2021 when Redding took it even further.
“‘I said ‘Mom, we’re doing a marathon,’ and she said ‘Whoa, pump the brakes,’” he recalled with a smile. “To this day she still says I forced her to do it.”
Most marathons require participants to be at least 18, so 17-year-old Redding poured all his energy into supporting his mom’s marathon journey. He helped her land a spot on the Boston Marathon charity team affiliated with the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, where she had once been a patient, drove her to training runs along the course, and cheered from the sidelines on Marathon Monday. Five months later, Redding ran the Maine Marathon in Portland, with his mom there to meet him at the finish.
Six-star dreams
When he first arrived at Boston College, Redding wasn’t in marathon shape anymore. A hockey player all through high school, he’d taken a break from running after his first marathon to focus on the sport and enjoy his senior year. But then he met Holden Williamson ’27, an aspiring marathoner, and suddenly he was back in training mode. The pair completed the Clearwater Marathon in Florida that winter, cheered on by a few of their BC friends, and when they returned, Redding received a text from his mom: the Brookline Education Foundation was looking for charity runners for the 2024 Boston Marathon. How could he say no?
After Boston, which he completed in just over four hours (with one of his fastest spits coming at BC’s Mile 21) Redding knew he wanted to be a Six Star Finisher—someone who completes all six of the original Abbott World Marathon Majors—by the time he graduated. To do so, he would need to navigate the complex and highly competitive entry process for five of the most popular marathons in the world, so he pulled out his laptop and got to work.
The Berlin Marathon and Six-Star medals.
For the Chicago Marathon, Redding landed a spot on a charity team raising funds for Huntington’s Disease, a rare and fatal neurodegenerative disorder. That October, he set a personal best on the mostly flat course, with a time of 3 hours and 43 minutes. Three weeks later, he ran the New York City Marathon wearing a bib he secured through his job as a hockey coach at New Balance’s Warrior Ice Arena in Brighton (New Balance is a major sponsor of the New York City Marathon). Back on the Heights, he kept up the momentum, entering the lottery for the 2025 Tokyo Marathon. Fewer than five percent of applicants received entry to Tokyo that year, but to his utter amazement, Redding was one of them.
With his mom and two aunts in tow, Redding flew to Japan for an extended spring break, visiting Tokyo and Kyoto, catching glimpses of Mt. Fuji from the window of a bullet train, and immersing himself in a new culture. The night before the marathon, his family dined at a Japanese Italian restaurant, where the waiter insisted that Redding enjoy his meatballs and spaghetti separately, as an appetizer and entree.
“It’s so insightful to see how other people live,” said Redding. “To me it was simple; I just wanted pasta and meatballs, but for them this is the custom, this is what they do. The whole trip was an amazing cultural experience.”
After returning home, Redding entered the lottery for the Berlin Marathon, was rejected, and then received a bib in a surprise second-round drawing. Realizing that a world record could be in the cards, he reached back out to the team at New Balance, which is also a major sponsor of the London Marathon, to see if they could help him gain entry to his sixth and final race. A few weeks later, he received an email that his employee number was ready, and Redding was fired up.
“I remember thinking, ‘We’re in. Now we just gotta run.’”
The final leg
On September 18, Redding flew to Berlin for the final stop on his six-star journey. The Friday before the race, he joined other six-star hopefuls under the Brandenburg Gate for a ceremony hosted by Abbott. Runners posed for photos with flags and swapped stories of the years of planning and training it had taken to get to this moment. Redding was the youngest person there, sometimes by a decade or more.
“For most of them, this was a 10-plus year thing, and kind of a life-changing milestone,” he said. “I met some people who had overcome drug addiction, or depression, who started running as an escape and a way to better their lives. Hearing those stories was incredibly inspiring.”
The 2025 Berlin Marathon was the hottest on record, with temperatures exceeding 80 degrees, but Redding battled his way to the finish line with a time of 4 hours and 43 minutes, where he received the coveted six-star medal and was presented with his world record. Greeting him shortly after the finish were classmates Elizabeth Kane ’27 and Williamson, who also ran Berlin.
Post-finish with new hardware.
Williamson, Redding, and Kane.
“Seeing him cross that finish line was a full-circle moment for both of us, and I’m grateful I could witness it,” said Williamson. “James is one of the kindest, most humble, and most determined people I know—I doubt this will be the last record he sets in the running world.”
Not surprisingly, despite racing more than 150 miles in a year and a half, Redding has no interest in slowing down. In November, he’ll run the New York City Marathon for a second time, and he’s watching with interest as Abbott begins adding more races to its Major series, including Sydney, Australia this year. If a nine-star medal is announced, he won’t be able to resist. “I’ll absolutely go for it,” he said.
Also on his bucket list: running a marathon with his original training partner, who has driven him to countless training runs and cheered him on from sidelines all over the world.
“My mom and I still haven’t run a marathon together—I’ve watched one of hers and she’s watched seven of mine,” he said. “Once she’s ready, I’ll start pushing for it.”