She Was Smiling at Mile 14 — Hours Later, Rachel Apa, 24, Collapsed at the NYC Marathon and Never Crossed the Finish Line

Just over two miles from the finish line, a young athlete collapsed while her mother waited farther along the course, unaware that the daughter she had filmed smiling earlier would never reach her.

On November 1, 2026, Rachel Apa, 24, was running her first New York City Marathon, with her mother, Michelle Apa, cheering in person and her father, Steve Apa, following every mile from Pennsylvania.

Before the afternoon ended, a joyful video would become a treasured last glimpse of her life, her father's phone would hold increasingly painful messages, and her family would face a shocking medical explanation almost impossible to reconcile with the healthy daughter they knew.

Rachel Had So Much Ahead of Her

Rachel arrived at marathon weekend with months of preparation behind her and a life that was already moving quickly. She had recently relocated to Charleston, South Carolina, where she began an MBA at Charleston Southern University while continuing a full-time remote job, fitting her athletic ambitions around the demands of work and school.

She had grown up in Lewisberry Borough, Pennsylvania, and graduated from Red Land High School in 2020 before attending Bucknell University. There, she played Division I field hockey for four years, scoring 17 goals during her collegiate career and building the kind of athletic background that made taking on a marathon feel like an understandable next challenge.

Her accomplishments extended well beyond the field. In a celebratory LinkedIn post, Rachel shared that she had graduated with honors in May 2024, earning a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, and announced that she had joined TE Connectivity as a product manager in its Aerospace, Defense, and Marine segment.

She sounded eager to get started, grateful for the people who had helped her, and proud of everything she had managed as a student-athlete. "Thank you to everyone who has supported me along the way!" she wrote, signing off on an announcement full of plans for the future.

For Steve, that energy was simply his daughter being herself. Speaking to NBC News, he said, "She was always on the go, always go, and it doesn't matter if it's school or sports or whatever it is. She was go."

Even after college, Rachel continued exercising regularly, and she had spent months training for the 26.2-mile race. But the reason she chose this particular challenge reached back to someone who had encouraged her for a long time.

She Carried Her Grandfather's Memory to the Starting Line

Rachel entered the marathon as a charity runner for the Parkinson's Foundation, joining its Parkinson's Champions team in memory of her grandfather. He had died in 2022, and she had watched the disease gradually take away the movement he once enjoyed.

In her fundraising message on LinkedIn, she explained why choosing a cause with a personal connection mattered so much. "My grandfather was one of my role models growing up," she wrote. "He taught me to stay active, push my limits, and embrace challenges."

Running through New York offered her a way to put those lessons into practice while supporting research and better care. She hoped the money she raised would also help bring a cure closer, and she encouraged people to contribute whatever they could.

Her family planned to help her get there. Michelle and two of Rachel's friends would travel around the five boroughs to cheer her on, while Steve stayed home in Lewisberry with the marathon tracking app and his phone, ready to encourage her from a distance.

At Mile 9, Her Father Had Every Reason to Smile

Steve spoke with Rachel before the race, and she was excited to begin. Once she was on the course, their conversation continued in short messages, allowing him to share the experience even though he was following from another state.

At approximately 11:30 a.m., around the nine-mile mark, she sent him a familiar phrase: "Hey, go." The words belonged to a mantra they had shared for years, with a connection to Steve's own days playing football at Lehigh University.

Her next messages sounded wonderfully reassuring. "I feel amazing," Rachel wrote, crediting her pre-race carbohydrate loading, before adding, "I've never felt this good."

Steve's response combined encouragement with the caution of a father who wanted his daughter to enjoy her first marathon without asking too much of herself. "Great, don't overdo it," he replied. "First marathon. This is a learning run. Don't overdo it."

He also helped her find the people waiting along the route, telling her that Michelle would be on the left in two blocks. While he watched her progress on a screen, her mother had the chance to see her daughter coming toward her, and to capture a moment that would later become painfully precious.

Her Mother Lifted the Camera at Mile 14

By the time Rachel reached Mile 14 in Queens, she still looked delighted to be there. Michelle filmed her passing, and the race-day video, later shared with the media, showed Rachel smiling as she ran toward and then beyond her mother's camera.

She wore a matching mint-green sports bra and running shorts, with a red-topped race bib attached to the front of her shorts. White running shoes and socks completed her outfit, a simple band circled her left wrist, and her light brown hair was secured back from her face.

Rachel lifted her hand toward the camera for a wave as she passed. It was an ordinary, lovely exchange between a runner and the mother who had come to support her, preserved before either of them knew how the day would end.

Michelle then headed toward Central Park, where she and Rachel's friends would wait near Mile 25, close to the finish. Steve continued sending encouragement from home, but the messages returning to his phone soon sounded very different.

The Replies Became Harder to Read

As Rachel pushed farther along the course, the excitement in her messages gave way to pain. When she texted "Ugh," Steve tried to encourage her: "You beat the 18." But her next reply, "Ow, ow," prompted him to remind her to go easy.

Around Mile 20, she sent another "Ow, ow," according to her father's account to NBC News. Steve kept texting as she reached Miles 21 and 22, but the replies stopped coming.

At Mile 23, he sent "Final stretch," according to the Times. He also reminded her that completing her first marathon mattered far more than her pace: "All finish, not speed."

Around 1:30 p.m., Steve texted again as Rachel reached the vicinity of Mile 24, then noticed that her location on the tracking app had stopped moving. Ahead at Mile 25, Michelle and Rachel's friends were still waiting to cheer her toward the finish when they noticed the same worrying pause.

Michelle called Steve, who told her to go and find their daughter. He then sent Rachel another message, letting her know that her mother was walking toward her, but his phone remained silent.

There was no reply. As Michelle headed back along the course to look for Rachel, a spectator nearby was already rushing to her side.

A Stranger Called Her Name, Then Ran Toward Her

Near Mile 24 in Central Park, close to 85th Street, hospital social worker Michaela Nicholas spotted a runner in green. Rachel's name appeared on her bib, numbered 29977, giving Michaela a way to offer the personal encouragement spectators called out all along the route.

"Let's go, Rachel, you got this!" she shouted. Seconds later, Rachel collapsed.

Michaela ran over and could not find a pulse. Her fiancée called for a doctor, and three people took turns performing CPR, including two who identified themselves as physicians.

While they worked, Michaela held Rachel's hand and told her she was not alone. Her mother was still trying to reach her, her father was still miles away, and a woman who had only just learned her name stayed beside her.

New York Road Runners, the organization behind the marathon, said a bystander began CPR before its medical personnel took over and used a defibrillator. An ambulance subsequently arrived to take Rachel to the hospital, but the timing of the response became a source of anguish for Michaela.

Timestamped photographs and videos supplied to the Times placed the collapse at approximately 1:33 p.m. A red-shirted marathon medical team was present by 1:40 p.m., and the available images placed defibrillator use between 1:41 p.m. and 1:50 p.m.

Michaela said the wait for formal help felt far too long. "It was an unacceptable amount of time," she said.

The organizers did not immediately answer the newspaper's questions about when their personnel arrived or first used the device. The Fire Department said its ambulance reached the location at 1:41 p.m., with paramedics making contact with Rachel a few minutes later.

Michelle Reached the Course as the Ambulance Left

When Michelle arrived near the Mile 24 marker, she could not find her daughter and began calling out Rachel's name. Steve said an emergency worker told her that an ambulance had just taken Rachel away.

Michelle traveled in a second ambulance to Mount Sinai Hospital, where Rachel had arrived in critical condition, according to the New York Police Department. Back in Pennsylvania, Steve began driving to New York.

Doctors worked to save Rachel for more than six hours. Despite their efforts, she died that day.

The race that her family had expected to follow through to a finish-line celebration ended inside a hospital. Her parents then had to confront how someone so young, so accustomed to demanding exercise, could have become critically ill during an event she had trained for.

The explanation Steve later shared named a condition many people would never associate with a fit 24-year-old athlete.

Her Father Shared the Explanation That Doesn't Seem Possible

According to Steve, Rachel died from rhabdomyolysis, often shortened to "rhabdo," a serious condition in which damaged muscle tissue breaks down and releases substances into the bloodstream that can harm the body.

He also gave that explanation to ABC News on Tuesday, November 3. His disbelief was painfully plain. "It's unfathomable," he said. "Perfect health, perfect shape, 24 years old."

According to Cleveland Clinic, rhabdomyolysis can follow intense exertion, although it also has other causes. As muscle fibers break down, their contents enter the circulation and can damage the kidneys; the resulting disturbance can also place dangerous strain on the body.

Symptoms can include:

• Unusual muscle pain
• Muscle weakness
• Muscle swelling
• Dark urine
• Some people also experience nausea or reduced urination

However, it's unclear if Rachel experienced any of this, as her complete medical findings have not been disclosed.

The condition was relatively uncommon, with approximately 26,000 cases reported annually in the United States, a figure researchers believed could undercount the true total. Competitive athletes were among those affected, making physical fitness no guarantee against it.

Dr. Bradley Uren, an emergency medicine physician at University of Michigan Health, told the Times that he treated cases each year, often during summer. Prompt treatment could include intravenous fluids to help clear harmful substances, while severe kidney damage could require dialysis.

His assessment of Rachel's reported deterioration was that the most dangerous outcome appeared to have unfolded extremely quickly. The medical explanation gave her family a name for what happened, but it could hardly make the loss easier to understand.

Researchers Had Already Examined the Risk in Marathon Runners

The connection between marathon running and serious muscle breakdown had been studied long before Rachel's death. A research review by Priscilla M. Clarkson explained that strenuous exercise could damage skeletal muscle cells, with most cases resolving without lasting consequences.

More extensive damage, however, could release large quantities of muscle proteins, including myoglobin, into the blood. Under certain conditions, that protein could accumulate in the kidneys and contribute to acute kidney failure.

The review emphasized that acute kidney failure remained relatively infrequent among marathon runners. It described how contributing factors could overlap, including dehydration, heat stress, certain medications, infection, or an underlying condition, rather than identifying one explanation that applied to every runner.

A 2026 study in Nephron examined cases after New York City Marathons held between 2017 and 2023, using records from four hospitals. Researchers identified 24 runners with post-marathon rhabdomyolysis after the unusually hot 2022 race, compared with 15 across the other five marathons combined.

The cases correlated with the combined effects of temperature and humidity, and the researchers also noted the sharp increase in race-day heat compared with the preceding two weeks. All patients received intravenous fluids, and one required hemodialysis.

But these findings concerned earlier races and did not establish what triggered Rachel's condition. For the people who knew her, the focus remained on the young woman they had lost, and the communities she had been part of began finding words for their grief.

The Places She Had Called Home Began Mourning Her

Back in Pennsylvania, Rachel's former school district remembered a student whose achievements had continued well beyond graduation. In a statement shared by WGAL, West Shore School District said, "Through her many accomplishments as a student-athlete and in the years following graduation, Rachel made a lasting impact on Red Land and the District as a whole."

Bucknell also mourned the former player who had spent four years contributing to its field hockey program. "The Bucknell community mourns her loss and extends its heartfelt condolences to all who knew and loved her," the university said.

On Monday, November 2, New York Road Runners expressed sorrow over the death of a participant following the previous day's race. The organization said the last runner to die after a medical incident at the marathon had been in 2024.

Its condolences continued in a Tuesday statement: "Our thoughts and sincere sympathies are with her family, friends, and the entire running community." For those who had watched Rachel compete, studied beside her, or worked with her, the news meant trying to absorb an absence where they had expected years of further accomplishments.

The Parkinson's Foundation also paid tribute, recognizing the deeply personal reason Rachel had joined its team. "We admire Rachel's determination and are grateful that she was part of our team," it said, offering condolences to her family, loved ones, and fellow Parkinson's Champions.

Steve and Michelle returned home to Pennsylvania, where Rachel's two brothers were also trying to process what had happened. A family that had spent Sunday cheering her onward was left learning how to live without her.

She had entered the race to honor someone she loved. Now the people who loved Rachel were carrying her memory, too.