Blue Devil of the Month: Lauren Hoffman
Track & Field All-America • Graduate Student • Haymarket, VA
GoDuke The Magazine
During her first few seasons on the Duke track team, Lauren Hoffman stared down her goal virtually every day. Whenever she walked by the record board in the team’s locker room, her eyes were drawn to the mark for the 400 meter hurdles while her mind affirmed her desire to one day see her own name listed in that slot.
It took some time, but Hoffman finally reached her objective during her fourth year when she clocked a time of 57.54 seconds in a meet at Virginia, topping former teammate India Lowe’s standard of 57.58.
A few weeks later, Hoffman lowered the record to 56.98 during a silver-medal run at the 2021 ACC Championships — with a finish that was crucial to the Blue Devils claiming their first conference team title in program history.
What does one do for an encore to that? First, the evolutionary anthropology degree holder made the decision to return to Duke for a fifth year as a graduate student, taking advantage of the year of eligibility she missed in 2020 due to covid. Then she had to come up with a new set of age-appropriate goals befitting an experienced performer who would be a veteran leader for the 2022 Blue Devils.
“We make a goal ladder at the beginning of the year with our coaches, putting big goals at the top, then the little goals to help us meet those big goals, and then the things you want to do every day,” Hoffman noted this May, on the eve of her final collegiate postseason. “My big goals this year were to lead the 4x4 (relay team) to the NCAA finals and to be top three at the NCAAs for the 400 hurdles. Then for the time I wanted to hit, my goal was to run sub-56 (seconds). I was able to do that in the second meet so I had to figure out what I wanted to run after that, which is a good problem to have. But top three nationally was the big thing for my individual race, and to be ACC champ on the home track would be special.”
When the 2022 season — and her Duke career — came to an end June 11 at the NCAA Championships in Oregon, Hoffman could look back with pride at having met just about every challenge she set for herself.
Although her 4x400 relay unit could not crack the finals against one of the fastest fields ever, Hoffman checked off every other box in delivering the best season for a hurdler in the history of the program.
From the records standpoint, Hoffman began the year with her name on the board in the locker room at 56.98 from the ACCs. She knocked it down to 56.53 in the season-opening meet at High Point, became the first Blue Devil to go under 56 seconds in the second meet when she ran 55.98 at the Texas Relays, then bested it for a third time at NCAA Regionals with a time of 55.91. That means she lowered the record by more than a full second over the course of the year, and ran a full two seconds faster this season than she did for her 10th place finish at the 2021 NCAA nationals (57.91).
Hoffman lowered the record for a fourth time at the NCAA meet with a mark of 55.47 seconds, posting the third best mark among the three semifinal heats. That placed her in the final, where she took third place to earn the NCAA bronze medal and first-team All-America honors.
Hoffman also set new stadium marks in the 400 hurdles three times this year, twice at Vert Stadium in High Point along with Morris Williams Stadium at Duke. And she set a meet record at the Duke Invitational.
From the ACC standpoint, Hoffman capped her conference career by winning the gold medal with a time of 56 seconds flat on her home track as Duke hosted the outdoor meet. She had earned the bronze in 2019 and the silver in 2021. Her conference title was the first ever for a Duke female hurdler.
She also had an excellent year as one of the stalwarts in Duke’s signature event, the 4x400 meter relay. Duke has qualified for NCAA nationals in the 4x400 six times in the last seven years and reached the finals for the first time in 2021, when Hoffman was part of the unit that broke the school record in both the regionals and nationals on the way to a seventh-place NCAA finish. This year her 4x400 unit won the ACC title at both the indoor and outdoor championships. The win at the indoor meet, in the last event of the day, enabled the Blue Devils to tie for the team title, while the race at the outdoor meet shattered the stadium record and helped Duke to a second-place team finish.
Hoffman ran the anchor leg at the ACC indoor meet and posted one of her best performances to bring the Blue Devils home in first place.
“It all came down to us,” she recalled. “I didn’t think we’d be behind when I got the baton but it just happened to be like that and honestly it was exciting. It was nice not having the pressure of having a target on my back. I got to go chase someone and get after it. At that point it’s not really about the time — I was just trying to run tactically and smooth.
“All we had to do was win so I just stayed on her shoulder as long as I could. In my head I’m thinking, ‘I gotta win, I gotta win.’ Coming off the last curve I was able to use that motivation and see the team title on the line and just pass her. That was really, really exciting. Everybody did their job on that relay, which was really cool.”
Reflecting on her five-year Duke journey, Hoffman views the impact of covid at the midpoint of her career as something of a turning point that helped her realize how much she enjoyed training and competing.
Deciding to return for a fifth year was difficult but ultimately worth it.
“A lot of people in track don’t peak with their speed and strength until their mid 20s or late 20s so I want to see where it goes,” she said. “I’m really glad that I did it. Looking at this year, this wouldn’t have happened if I was a senior. It wouldn’t have happened last year. I needed that extra year to develop and keep progressing, so I’m really glad I took it.”
After such a strong finish at Duke, Hoffman has no plans to stop competing now. She qualified for the USA outdoor national championships (June 23-26) and had one of the top eight times in the 400 hurdles field going in. She has also been considering applying for dual citizenship with The Philippines to compete internationally under that flag, as her mother Laura is a native Filipino who immigrated to the United States at the age of 5.
“I feel like I’m not done yet,” she said, mentioning the Olympics as a long-held dream. “This progression is really smooth where I’m dropping times, so I want to see where I can take it. I’m young and I’m never going to have this opportunity again in my life, so I’m going to go after it.”
Dedicated to sharing the stories of Duke student-athletes, present and past, GoDuke the Magazine is published by LEARFIELD with editorial offices at 3100 Tower Blvd., Suite 404, Durham, NC 27707.