Australian Olympian Izzi Batt-Doyle grieving loss of close friend ahead of Valencia marathon

Olympian Izzi Batt-Doyle had only just begun grieving the loss of a close friend when she became the third-fastest Australian woman to run a marathon.

Batt-Doyle ran a personal best 2:22.59 at Valencia on Sunday, falling short of only Benita Willis (2:22.36) and national record holder Sinead Diver (2:21.34) on the all-time list of Australians.

It was an exhilarating moment of the 29-year-old’s distance running career that also gave her automatic qualification for the world marathon championships in Tokyo next year.

But on a personal level, the South Australian was hurting, having just learned of the death of good mate.

“I don’t want to get too emotional, but the night before I left Adelaide, a really close friend of mine passed away,” Batt-Doyle told Inside Running Podcast.

“I found out on the plane to Perth and it was really hard being away from our community when everyone was dealing with the loss of Bailey.

“He was a runner, he ran his first marathon this year in August, raising money for bipolar disorder, which is something that he suffered from.

“And he was always one of the first people to message me when I had a good result and to get excited about my running.

“Really, the whole race I was just thinking about him and on the start line I was actually crying because I was just thinking how fortunate I was to be doing what I was doing and to be alive.”

Before the race, Batt-Doyle had Diver’s record in her sights, with every indication in her training showing that she was in 2:21 shape. But with blisters developing on her feet and basically no one around her to run with from the 28-kilometre mark onwards, the record soon became out of reach.

Asked where she drew motivation from at that point of the race, Batt-Doyle said she had no shortage of reserves with the memory of her friend.

“To be honest, there are a lot of factors for why you might finish a race, but just thinking about Bailey got me through and I know he would have been really proud of me regardless of my result,” she said.

“He’d be absolutely frothing if he saw the Strava file and saw that average pace.

“So yeah, it was for Bailey and that really got me through yesterday.

“We’re so fortunate to travel the world and run and you can get pretty obsessed about doing these massive things like qualifying for world champs and breaking Australian records, but at the end of the day, it’s just about having fun and enjoying life.

“I got through because of Bailey.”

Regardless of the extra motivation she had through grief, Batt-Doyle said she’s never one to put in half an effort in any race anyway.

“I’m just not someone that would ever like to pull out of a race unless I physically had to — and that probably showed in Budapest, like I probably should have just pulled out at that stage, running 2:37.50,” she said.

“But I just don’t want to pull out of a race. I think you should always try and salvage something from it.”

The Aussie star finished eighth in a stacked women’s field, just over six minutes short of Ethiopia’s Megertu Alemu.

In an Instagram post after the race, Batt-Doyle said: “This race was for my friend Bailey who we lost the day before I flew to Europe.

“I’ll forever be running with him in my heart.”

Batt-Doyle missed selection for the marathon at the Paris Olympics earlier this year, with Diver, Jess Stenson and Gen Gregson preferred, despite having run a faster qualifying time than Stenson.

She was instead picked to race in the 5000m on the track, but failed to qualify for the final.