The Olympian's marathon momentum may have been stalled, albeit temporarily, but the expectant mum explains why she wouldn’t have it any other way.

Calli Hauger-Thackery knew that something wasn’t quite right. She was 19 miles into the Honolulu Marathon and on her way to victory last December, but started to feel less than perfect.

“I felt like really vomiting,” she recalls. “I was like: ‘What is going on?’ I’ve never been sick in a training session, never been sick in a race. I had one of my final drinks and it basically didn’t want to go down. It just came back up.

“I just had to fight for the finish. I wanted that win so badly and I was able to take myself to a different place and tell myself: ‘You can be as sick as you want to be when you're finished’. I later joked with [husband, coach and fellow athlete] Nick: ‘Imagine if it's morning sickness’, but we just rushed past it.”

Two weeks later, on Christmas Eve, came the confirmation that in fact she hadn’t been very far off the mark. Calli had been four weeks pregnant during the race. The news meant a rethink for the 33-year-old when she lined up for the Houston Marathon on January 11.

There was an acceptance that the ambition to run under 2:20 would have to be shelved, but that didn’t mean another win was off the table. The race would provide an exceptionally steep learning experience and no-one but Nick knew just what the eventual victor, in a time of 2:24:17, had been going through.

“For Houston I knew I'd be eight weeks pregnant and it was a different kind of tough,” says Hauger-Thackery. “It was just mentally and physically so hard, but you also have this shift of your mindset. You're like: ‘You're doing this for your little person as well. Now it's not just for you, it's your little family unit’. You have this mum strength already and I'm like: ‘You're doing this. We're getting the win today’.

“Obviously, if there had been any major red flags, I'd be like: ‘Absolutely not, it's not worth it’ but for the most part it was fine. I felt pretty strong. You're just working a lot harder than you normally are, because you are growing a human. And then you just have to cap [the pace]. ‘Forward momentum only. Don't worry about the pace any more. Just get to that finish’. And that's what I did. Luckily, I was able to pull it off. But it was so hard.

“It’s the recovery as well. That's when it really took its toll. Obviously, it's hard after a marathon anyway, but that was: ‘I'm absolutely exhausted. Will I ever feel normal again?’. I took a full week off, which is so rare for me, and then I just slowly got back into it. God, it was tough.”

The second trimester has gone so well, however, that the Flagstaff-based Hauger-Thackery has been back in racing action in recent weeks, first with a top 10 finish at the Gate River Run 15km in Florida and then coming 17th at the New York City Half Marathon last month.

“Right now, while I feel so good, I'm just going to take advantage of it day by day, week by week,” she says. “But I spoke to the doctors, and they were like: ‘Because you’ve run since you were 12 years old, it would be weird for you not to do this. It’s not going to be bad for you’.

“They were like: ‘Obviously, if you’ve never run a marathon, then don't do it. But you're fine to continue as normal’. And I've spoken to so many of my amazing athlete friends who've done it, and they're all basically like: ‘You will feel good until you don't’. I'm sure when that 30-week mark comes, then it's going to be different but until then I'm just going to continue to do what my body allows me to.

“My body feels great just being outside, doing what I always do every day. It's been so good for me and I do genuinely think it's great for the baby as well. There's a lot of research in that, if that's what your body's used to, just keep it the same, but obviously within reason.

“I feel way more normal being outdoors, doing what I love and getting to race a little bit more while I can. I think it's going to be really nice to tell my future kid ‘you've actually won two marathons and you've got quite a few finisher’s medals already’.”

The New York Half had originally been intended as a warm-up race for Hauger-Thackery’s second appearance at the Boston Marathon, where she had been hoping to build on her impressive sixth-place finish last year. At the time of speaking with AW, she wasn’t ruling out still taking part, although it was beginning to look less likely.

“I genuinely just don't know,” she says. “It’s going to be a huge ask. It's so different and it's the marathon again. I'm in my second trimester and feeling so good but, at the same time, I'm fully aware that it could all change in an instant. I would love to do it if my body allows it, just because it's an amazing weekend and it's a great race. I'm definitely not going to be ‘full send’ or anything, but it'd be really cool to be able to try and do that.”

Regardless of what transpires, it will still be a significant day for the family.

“My husband will be turning 30 that day, and he's also doing the race so it's a really nice little story for us,” she smiles. “I’d love to be lining up with him and him having a great day because he's so good on those kinds of courses – the hills don't scare him, either. We're both really excited but if I have to be on the side, watching him, that's absolutely fine.”

There is no danger of Hauger-Thackery getting her priorities mixed up. She and Nick will be documenting their experiences with a YouTube series called Podiums to Parenthood and although she fully expects to want to get back into action as soon as possible after becoming a mother in late summer, there is no pressure being attached to her return. “After pregnancy, I have no time limit and I’m going to give my body the grace it needs,” she says.

But her marathon journey will continue. After a first Olympic appearance in Paris, the LA Games in 2028 is a huge target and, let’s not forget, at the time of writing the former world record-holder Paula Radcliffe was the only British female to have run faster over the marathon than Hauger-Thackery, whose personal best of 2:21:24 came in Berlin in 2024.

“I obviously really want to do big things, especially in the marathon, and then the LA Olympics but I've got a good timeline so I'm excited, all being well,” says the European half marathon bronze medallist.

“This is a great year for it [becoming a mother]. There were things that got me excited [about racing this year], but I said to Nick: ‘It's not necessarily firing me up’ and because I had such a busy, big year last year, I feel like this is the right time to actually just slow down a bit, to then move forward and have a different purpose. I think a shift in purpose sometimes really gets the best out of you.”

It will also present an opportunity for Hauger-Thackery to take a step back and consider her body of work to date. Last year was indeed exceptionally packed, not just with road races but also an 11th place in the 10,000m on the track at the World Championships in Tokyo.

“It’s always on to the next thing and you don't fully smell the flowers and take in what you've accomplished,” says Hauger-Thackery. “At the press conference in Houston someone said to me ‘you had a career year last year’ and I appreciated that so much. I have done so much to get to that point and for them to actually recognise that and say that really means a lot.

“As athletes we’re our own worst critics and I just look at the things that I did wrong or thinking ‘what if I had done this?’ You're always wondering. But [that comment] just made me think: ‘No, you should be proud of what you've done’.

“I still feel fresh to the marathon. I'm still learning so much and there's a lot more to learn. I love mixing it up in these different marathons. I think you've got to. For the Olympics, it's not going to be an easy marathon, it's going to be a battle of attrition, and I'm glad I've done a few marathons now to show me that: ‘You are tough, you can do that’.

“And then this is a really nice new fresh chapter. It will just give me a whole new meaning. I've already felt the ‘mum strength’. It's crazy what it does.”

This feature appears in the April issue of AW magazine. Subscribe here