Maia Ramsden

Maia Ramsden
	Ramsden at the 2024 NCAA Division I Indoor Track and Field Championships
Personal information
Nationality	New Zealand
Born	23 March 2002 (age 22); New York City, New York
Sport
Sport	Athletics
College team	Harvard Crimson
Coached by	Alex Gibby
Achievements and titles
Personal bests	1500 m: 4:02.20 NR (Paris 2024); Mile: 5:05.73 (Whanganui 2019); 3000 m: 10:53.33 (Timaru 2019); 5000 m: 15:29.06 (Lexington 2024); Indoors; 1500 m: 4:06.51 NR (Glasgow 2024); Mile: 4:24.83 (New York 2024); 3000 m: 8:46.84 (Boston 2023);

Maia Ramsden (born 23 March 2002) is a track and field and cross-country athlete from New Zealand.^[2]

Early and personal life

Ramsden was born in New York when her father, Mark Ramsden, who had a career in foreign affairs for the New Zealand Government, was assigned to the United Nations. From the age of three, she was raised in Wellington, New Zealand. She studied at International Schools in Suva, Fiji, Solomon Islands and Addis Ababa. Maia began studying History and Literature, with a focus on the Pacific at Harvard University, in 2020. Her mother is called Margot and she has siblings called Griffyn and Isla.^[3]^[4]^[5]^[1]

College career

Ramsden was U20 New Zealand national champion over 800m and 1500m distances in March 2020.^[6]

Competing indoors in Boston in February 2023, she also ran a new personal best time of 4:30.19 for the mile, which placed her second on the all-time New Zealand women’s mile lists behind only Kim Smith, who ran 4:24.14 in 2008.^[7]

Ramsden won the 1500m title at the 2023 NCAA Outdoors Championships, held in Austin, Texas in June 2023, in a then new personal best time of 4:08.60.^[8] In doing so, she became the second New Zealander to win a track title at an outdoor NCAA Championships, and the sixth overall all-time female New Zealander at the distance.^[9] She also became the first winner from Harvard in the event since 1986.^[10]

In October 2023 Ramsden signed an NIL deal with On.^[11]

In her senior year of cross country, Ramsden finished 10th overall at the 2023 NCAA Cross Country Championships.^[12]

In February 2024, Ramsden set a new personal mile best of 4:24.83 in the Wannamaker mile at the Millrose Games in New York.^[13] She qualified for the final of the women's 1500 metres race at the 2024 World Athletics Indoor Championships in Glasgow, with a national indoor record time of 4:06.51. She finished tenth in the final with a time of 4:06.88.^[14] At the 2024 NCAA Division I Indoor Track and Field Championships on 9 March 2024, Ramsden set a new meet record to win the mile in 4:25.13.^[15] On 18 May at the Los Angeles Grand Prix she broke the national 1500m record with 4:02.58.^[16]