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This 20-year-old Mass. native just became the youngest male to finish all 6 marathon majors
James Redding’s journey to a record-setting run required a few emails, the right charities, and a little lottery luck.
Just a few years after taking up running alongside his mother, Lisa, to stay in shape as a hockey player at Brookline High School, the Boston College junior made history in Berlin on Sept. 21, becoming the youngest male to complete all six Abbott World Marathon Majors at 20 years, 143 days.
Redding finished marathons in Boston, Chicago, New York, Tokyo, London, and, finally, Berlin — all in the last 18 months — to earn his Six Star Medal in record time.
What began as a way to stay in shape at the age of 14 evolved from monthly 5Ks to 10Ks and a half-marathon in 2021.
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At the finish line of that half in Newburyport, Redding told his mother it was time for the two of them to tackle the Boston Marathon. She needed some convincing.
“She goes, ‘Hold on, pump the brakes here,’ ” he said. “I researched and heard about the charity [program]. I sent my mom a link to Dana-Farber, cancer charity for the Boston Marathon, and this is a special cause for us, because she was a patient there [battling Hodgkin’s lymphoma] when I was 2 or 3 years old, and they saved her life.
“So I sent that to her, and I said, ‘Hey, like, what about, what about this marathon? It gives it a little bit more meaning.’ ”
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Lisa Redding completed the Boston Marathon in 2022, when James was still too young to race. He wouldn’t get his chance until 2024, when his mother returned the favor with some inspiration.
“I get this reciprocal, kind of full-circle text from my mom, and it’s her sending me a link to a charity for the Boston Marathon,” James said. “And the charity that she sent me was the Brookline Education Foundation, which was, again, super close to home, because she’s been a teacher and administrator at Brookline High School for 20-plus years now, and my K-through-12 education came in Brookline.
“So I’m looking at this, and I’m like, ‘Here we go. How am I going to say no now?’ ”
Redding picked up his first star at home in Boston in 2024, which opened the door for him to start ticking off the rest.
He raised money for the Huntington’s Disease Society of America to race in Chicago that October, then reached the halfway point of his Six Star journey in New York a month later.
As an employee coaching youth hockey at the New Balance-owned Warrior Ice Arena in Brighton, Redding got into New York with a New Balance employee bib — the Boston-based footwear and apparel giant is a major sponsor of the New York City Marathon.
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He needed a little luck to kick off the international leg, entering the lottery for a bib for the 2025 Tokyo Marathon and being selected on the first try. The record bid looked dicey when the Berlin lottery didn’t go his way, but the race’s organizer, SCC Events, hooked him up.
“I’m sitting in class and I get an email saying, ‘Hey, you have a number for the Berlin Marathon,’ ” Redding said. “I’m like, ‘OK, this is funny, like, somebody’s sending me a scam e-mail.’ But after a good hour of digging and trying to confirm that this thing was real, it was.”
Redding reached out to Abbott World Marathon Majors to ask about the youngest Six Star finisher. It was too late for him to grab the outright record, but finishing the three majors abroad in 2025 would make him the youngest male to achieve the feat. His original goal was just to finish all six before he graduated from Boston College, but now, there was history to chase.
So he reached back out to New Balance — also a major sponsor of the London Marathon — for a little help getting his last bib.
“I get an email a little bit later saying, ‘Your employee number for the London Marathon is ready,’ ” Redding said. “And I’m like, ‘Oh my goodness. This is really happening.’ ”
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There was just the small matter of completing three more marathons: Tokyo in March, London in April, and, finally, Berlin on Sept. 21.
After finishing the six original World Marathon Majors — Sydney became the seventh in 2025 — Redding had made history.
It’s hard for him to pick a favorite from six very distinct experiences, but there’s little surprise what the choice is when he does.
“When I get asked this question, I go straight to Boston was my favorite race,” he said. “Every mile was better than I expected. Just the energy, and I think also the gratitude that I had toward everybody that had made it happen. There’s no other race that has been that personal to me.”
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