Jingping Nie’s 2025 was a marathon

If you had told Jingping Nie just a few years ago that she’d be running marathons and leading research on improving sport performance with wearable technology, she wouldn’t have believed you.

In the middle of her doctoral studies at Columbia University, she wasn’t too concerned about her physical wellness. But after an annual checkup in 2022, her physician encouraged her to develop a regular exercise habit, so she gave running a try.

Her initial slow and short efforts became faster and longer — and more enjoyable. She had caught the running bug. “I gradually realized, ‘OK, I can do 5K, I can do 10K,’” said Nie, who joined the UNC School of Data Science and Society as an assistant professor this past summer.

She quickly ramped up to half marathons just months later and ran her first marathon in 2023. Nie’s running shoes have taken her to places she’d never imagined, including the finish lines at the Boston, Chicago and New York City marathons this year alone.

“It’s very funny,” said Nie, who’s now run six marathons. “I never thought I’d do this.”

Beyond becoming physically fit, Nie said she has better focus and mental stamina thanks to running. That helps with conducting research, writing papers and working with students as a member of the Carolina Health Informatics program and director of the Networked Intelligence and Cyber-Embedded Systems Lab.

Nie ran the New York City Marathon alongside colleague Tarek Zikry, an assistant professor in the UNC School of Data Science and Society. (Submitted photo)

Running in her research

Nie’s work has evolved to reflect her favorite hobby. She’s published research on post-exercise speech patterns’ potential to offer performance and health insights and how smartphones could improve accuracy of treadmill running metrics.

In becoming a runner, Nie noticed “more people are data-driven in sports than I thought.”

Her willingness to connect her running to her research came when she suffered her first running setback, an abductor injury. Nie became dedicated to learning the theory of running, including training plans and form. She even became certified as a distance-running coach.

For amateur runners like herself, she sees the potential for already popular smartwatches and phones to continue to evolve, offering runners optimized guidance and feedback on form, pacing and recovery. Nie thinks this technology isn’t too far removed from the starting line.

“I don’t think it’s personalized enough,” she said. “During a race, people want to push for their limit. It doesn’t give them personalized feedback about how they should do it in terms of marrying their heart rate with biomarkers and other input to adjust this target.”

She sees the potential for smartwatches to become more responsive in-race to help runners account for the unexpected.

Nie’s personal experiences back that up. In each of her three marathons this year, she encountered a unique challenge either during the race or in the buildup.

This spring, she was searching for a job while preparing for the Boston Marathon and only running 20-30 miles per week, considerably fewer than normal. In October’s Chicago Marathon, the weather was warmer than she expected, and her watch produced faulty data because of tall buildings.

And in November’s New York City Marathon, just three weeks after Chicago, Nie experienced car sickness in her Uber on the way to the race.

“Especially for the marathon, there may be a lot of unexpected things that happen,” she said.

Yet, Nie still ran Boston in 3:25:41, Chicago in 3:19:42 and New York City in 3:34:12.

In choosing Carolina, Nie was attracted to the University’s vast and diverse range of expertise in sport science, medicine and biomechanics and the potential for collaboration. She has family nearby as well.

“Also the trails,” she said. “I’m a runner.”