DULUTH – Minnesota’s best running rivalry is between best friends: Annie Frisbie of Edina and Dakotah Popehn of Hopkins.
And at the moment, Frisbie has taken the lead. For a second year in a row, she beat Popehn for the Garry Bjorklund Half Marathon women’s title Saturday.
Frisbie, 28, edged ahead of Popehn, 30, with less than a half-mile to go in the 13.1-mile race to win in 1 hour, 9 minutes, 5 seconds and earn $3,000. Popehn, 30, finished in 1:09:13 and made $2,000.
First-time entrant Murphy Smith, 22, of Charlotte, N.C., a recent U.S. Naval Academy graduate, won the men’s race in 1:02:49 to make $3,000. A record 9,762 runners were entered in the 35th annual race, which was delayed a half-hour because of early-morning rain.
“I’m not competitive in many things, but I am in running. We are both very competitive,” said Frisbie, who grew up in River Falls, Wis., and earned a graphic design degree at Iowa State. “We’re both in good shape and we thought this would be close, and we knew we’d fight right to the end.”
Popehn is the better-known of the Minnesota Distance Elite teammates. She qualified for the 2024 Olympics in Paris and was the top American finisher in the marathon last August, placing 12th. And she won Grandma’s Marathon women’s titles in 2021 and ’22.
Now the past four head-to-head meetings have gone to Frisbie — twice in Duluth, the 2025 Boston Marathon on April 21 (Frisbie eighth in a personal-best 2:23:21, Popehn 16th in 2:26:09) and the NYC Mini 10K on June 7 (Frisbie 12th in 32:05, Popehn 24th in 33:15).
“We do almost every workout together and know each other so well, but when it comes to racing, we keep our cards pretty close to the vest,” said Popehn, who grew up in St. Francis as Dakotah Lindwurm and married Montana Popehn last Oct. 27. “We run better when we run together and often it comes right down to the end and it is all grit and guts.”