“It’s better that we’re friends because otherwise it would be very intense.”
Nobody but Roisin Willis and Juliette Whittaker know what it’s like to run so fast in high school — they’re literally the two fastest American high schoolers ever over 800 meters.
They also finish each other’s sentences.
Sitting on a couch in the third-floor lobby of their hotel in Cali, Colombia before the U20 World Championships, a few feet away from the hotel gym where a Dutch runner was going nuts on the treadmill (probably trying to impress them), Juliette mentioned how the two have a shared passion and dedication for track and field. “Knowing how hard each other works helps us to be so happy when the—”
— “other person succeeds,” Roisin joined in, the girls saying the last three words in unison.
They looked at each other and grinned.
Three days later, they finished with gold and bronze medals in the 800, and Roisin smashed the 2-minute barrier for the first time ever. They never took it too seriously though. They’d spent the week relaxing in their shared hotel room, watching Dance Moms on Hulu.
Their track careers are where Roisin’s and Juliette’s similarities end. Small town versus big city, Friday night football school versus private all-girls academy, a lifetime of running versus only a couple of years. But running has strengthened their bond — they just traveled to South America to race together, and at the end of September, they’ll start classes at Stanford together too.
The origin story
Roisin and Juliette met at the Virginia Showcase in January 2021. They raced in the 800 and then ran the 4×800 together the next day.
“We had DMed a little on Instagram but we had never seen each other in person,” Juliette said.
Since that meet, they’ve been nearly unbeatable. Each one has stacked up several national titles and Gatorade Player of the Year awards, and even one world championship.
“It’s better that we’re friends because otherwise it would be very intense,” Roisin said.
They grew up 1000 miles away from each other in two places that couldn’t be more different. Roisin is from a small logging town named Stevens Point, Wisconsin, which she described as redneck.
Juliette went to a preppy all-girls Catholic school called Mount de Sales Academy in Catonsville, Maryland. She wasn’t allowed to watch TV as a kid and would be at some museum all day if her mom was off work. She appreciates it now but it bored her to death as the youngest of four kids.
Her siblings went to Harvard, Yale and Penn. “I’m the odd one out,” Juliette said, as though Stanford is any different.
Roisin started running in USATF meets when she was 8. She was encouraged by her mother, who was an Irish Olympian in the 5k and 10k. “She didn’t force me at all. I had to enjoy it myself,” Roisin said. “When someone forces me to do something it never works.”
Juliette didn’t start running until her freshman year of high school — unless you count the Girls On The Run program at her elementary school. She doesn’t count it.
“Going into high school I had to choose between running and swimming, and I just wanted to go full-in on running,” she said. “I took a blind leap of faith and it worked out.” How many high schoolers have put in years and years of miles, running youth cross country and eventually cracking their high school varsity teams, relishing any opportunity to compete on a national stage? Juliette didn’t even follow track three years ago. She always thought she would go to the Olympics in swimming, not track.
If you ask her who Mo Farah is, for example, you might get a blank stare.
Fast times at Stanford U
The duo recently finished their preseason training camp in Oregon and start their fall classes at Stanford today. Though they’ve raced on the national stage countless times, it’s the first step of an unfamiliar endeavor: navigating life thousands of miles away from their families.
Freshman athletes aren’t allowed to room together at Stanford—“unfortunately,” they both complained. Maybe when they’re upperclassmen, though. “I think of the rest of the years we can choose,” Juliette said, and she and Roisin exchanged a glance and smiled.
When we talked, they didn’t even know who their roommates were yet. She thought for a moment about what it would be like to open her dorm room door and hear, “Oh my god, it’s Juliette Whittaker!” She laughed. “That would be so awkward.”
Stanford’s campus is big and sprawling. Both of them have some anxiety over the possibility that they live “ten minutes” (or more) away from each other. But they’re already ahead of the curve. Most people don’t go into their freshman year on a D1 team knowing that they’ll be racing alongside their best friend. “We’ll be there for each other,” Roisin said. “That’ll really help, having someone who understands me and knows the pressure going into it.”
For two girls who have trained alone their entire running careers, they seem excited to run on a team together. They’ve always been the stars, the center of attention. For the first time ever, they’ll be running daily with teammates who are just as fast as them. But they don’t seem scared.
“Most people might be worried to start training with someone who could possibly be better than them. That’s kind of a scary feeling if you’re not used to that, but we’re so close,” Juliette said. “Roisin helps me on my speed and I help her with her strength. It works out.”
When I asked them about their majors, they fidgeted in their seats. “We’re both going in undecided,” Roisin said, half-chuckling and eying her teammate. Stanford lets them try out all the good classes before they get locked into a major. They won’t have to declare until the end of sophomore year, Juliette explained, while Roisin signed relievedly.
Juliette mentioned sports communication or broadcasting — something that would keep her in the running world. She’s going to sample classes, see what she likes.
Roisin seemed less sure. “I’m interested in sports psychology. I definitely want to stay in the sport in some sense, but I don’t know how directly connected to it. Kind of on the outside.” She put emphasis on that last word: outside. “I don’t really see myself doing this forever.”
Roisin isn’t running cross country, which will give her time to adjust to school before she starts racing. “That’ll be good,” she said. “It’s just such a big change. I’m used to kind of a normal, quiet life.” (Most people wouldn’t call a high schooler racing at the Olympic Trials “normal,” but to each their own.)
And as they enter the NCAA, they’re excited for the potential free food that might come from an NIL deal. Juliette had a few ideas for sponsors, starting with Sour Patch Kids or any type of fruit snacks. But her main obsession is Pop Tarts. “I just love them. I do strawberry and brown sugar.” (Basic, in my opinion. S’mores is the best flavor.)
Roisin just bagged her first NIL deal a few weeks after U20 Worlds with an antigravity treadmill training system called LightSpeed Lift.
“But Gatorade’s my dream,” she said. If she got a Gatorade contract, she would probably stop running for good and just get sponsored full-time. “That would be the ultimate deal.”
Roisin is not what comes to mind when you think of a small town runner from Wisconsin. She screams “Gen-Z kid,” and her favorite word is “Yass.” She’s also mildly TikTok famous — one of her videos about track has half a million views. She pulled up her iPhone’s screen time to show that she’d spent 10 hours on the app in the past week. Snapchat was her second-most used. “I’m always on it,” she said. “I’ll Snapchat Juliette and she’ll always leave me on read.”
Juliette is an older soul. She would rather have a face-to-face conversation than use social media. She doesn’t even have TikTok because she says she has no self control. “Everyone I tell that I don’t have it, they’re like ‘oh you’re so smart, good for you—”
“But the feeling of blowing up on TikTok…” Roisin interrupted affectionately.
Roisin’s more than just a TikTok star. She’s a lifelong violin player — longer than she’s been racing, actually. She swears she’s not a band kid. “I’m probably more into running than violin right now.” She might listen to some of Juliette’s classical music on Spotify before a race (her personal favorite is a playlist called “Baby Got Bach”), but she’ll also be queueing up Key Glock songs.
They seemed relaxed sitting in the third floor hotel lobby in a pair of comfy chairs. It had been a long season, but it could have been even longer. The 18-year-olds would have both run at the senior USATF championships if they weren’t on the same weekend as the U20s. They have no doubts about contending on the world stage. Imagine that mentality after four years at Stanford.
And the best part is that they couldn’t even imagine doing it as rivals. They know that with running, they’re in this together. During their interview, they said the word “we” over 80 times.
“Being happy for each other is so much better than being jealous or competitive,” Roisin said. “It just makes the sport a lot easier and a lot more fun.”
