The Jenny Simpson cardiac arrest that struck the three-time Olympian during a community mile run in Raleigh, North Carolina, on Tuesday, 16 June 2026, has ended her competitive running career.
Simpson, 39, the only American woman to win a world 1500m title and a bronze medallist at the 2016 Rio Olympics, has confirmed she will never compete again, as reported by CBS News.
She remembers nothing of the day.
What happened during the Jenny Simpson cardiac arrest
Simpson was pacing a group of girls when she collapsed. Ivy Pointer, a paediatric intensive care unit physician, was on site with her husband Joey Pointer, and the couple carry a defibrillator because their child has a congenital heart condition.
The Pointers used the device. Ivy Pointer, on what she saw:
“When I looked over from afar, I knew that something was very, very wrong. So I told Joey to grab an AED and ran over and got there. I just remember thinking like, ‘This can’t happen right now. Like we have a lot happening soon and that this is not going to happen right now. You are going to fight. You’re going to hold on. You have to wake up.’ And I just kept saying her name and kind of screaming her name, honestly.”
Why the Jenny Simpson cardiac arrest was survivable
Bystanders performed CPR until first responders arrived. Simpson suffered a second cardiac arrest and was transferred to Duke University Medical Center, where she spent days on life support while her husband, Jason, flew to her side.
Simpson, on who happened to be standing near her:
“It means to me that there was a God present in all of this, my family doesn’t have a history of heart conditions. I don’t know that a lot of the time in my life I’m around people that know how to intervene when there is a heart condition. And it’s like I got plucked out of my home and put into this family.”
What the ARVC diagnosis means for her career
The diagnosis was arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy, a rare congenital condition in which the heart repairs damage with tissue that does not conduct electricity properly in the right ventricle. Running did not cause it, but revealed it. A defibrillator and pacemaker have since been implanted.
Simpson, who calls her cardiologist her ‘favourite person in the world’, on waking in hospital:
“I’ve spent so much of my life and my career bringing people joy, and to wake up and see that the room was full of heaviness and sorrow, that was really hard.”
What happens next for Jenny Simpson
Simpson, on the run itself:
“To think that the way I showed up as a person and as a woman with my last mile was in community, taking young girls around the track, I’m really proud of that. That’s what I’m grateful for. That’s what I want to remember.”
Simpson will continue as chief running officer at Fleet Feet, the retailer led by Joey Pointer, while recovering at home in Colorado.
On Instagram she said there is “a lot to learn” about her recovery, but that she is “not afraid of what comes next.”
