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Olympian Jared Ward was the top American male finisher at two TCS New York City Marathons, finishing sixth in both 2018 and 2019, and also placed in the top 10 last year. He was 12th in his TCS New York City Marathon debut in 2017, a year after serving as a Grand Marshal for the race with his fellow U.S. Olympic Marathon team members.

In 2019, Ward set a personal best in the marathon of 2:09:25, finishing eighth at the Boston Marathon.

Ward competed at the Rio 2016 Olympics after taking the last spot on the team at the U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon. In Rio he placed sixth, moving up from 36th place at the halfway point to finish in a personal-best time of 2:11:30. Prior to that, after a second-place finish at the 2014 USATF Marathon Championships, Ward returned the following year to win his first national title in 2:12:55. He would add titles over 25K (1:14:56) and 20K (59:24) later in 2015.

Born in Layton, Utah, Ward attended Brigham Young University, where he was a six-time NCAA All-American. He has a masters degree in statistics and at times has worked at the university teaching statistics courses. His masters thesis examined the effects of marathon pacing on finish times—maintaining that running an even pace was optimal for achieving goal times—and his performance at the 2016 U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon backed up his research: Despite the heat, he split 1:06:31 for the first half of the race and 1:06:29 for the second half. In the Rio Olympic Marathon, he ran a 28-second negative split, opening in 1:05:59 and closing in 1:05:31.

Ward and his wife, Erica, have five children, with their third child, Julia, having been born on her father’s birthday in 2016.