The Incandescent Rise of Sofia Camacho

For Runner’s World, David Alm profiles Sofia Camacho, a 25-year-old runner with a rocky, traumatic past who’s emerged as a trailblazer in both sports and the arts. Camacho won the New York City Marathon’s nonbinary division last year and set a new nonbinary course record by 14 minutes. Alongside this rise in the running world, Camacho has taken New York’s drag scene by storm as their bold persona Xana Whoria, who is “everything Camacho never allowed themselves to be as a child: powerful, angry, big.” Alm writes an inspiring story about a boundary-pushing figure who is excelling in their fields—and, in the process, creating space for others like them. (Subscription required.)

They have begun thinking about hormone replacement therapy to present as “more masculine,” they said, “the way I feel in my body.” But that’s on the back burner for now. First, Camacho wants to try and go pro, even if it means racing as a woman. It’s all in service of a grander mission: visibility. “It’ll never be just by being queer that I’m going to be a queer activist,” they said. “It’s going to be because I’m good at running. It’s going to be because I’m a more known drag performer. It’s going to be because I’m good at something else that kind of breaks through into the non-queer world.”