Kavanaugh Places Fifth Among Federal Judges in DC Road Race

Justice Brett Kavanaugh didn’t match his 24:20 running pace from two years ago in the annual three-mile Capital Challenge road race Wednesday, clocking in at 26:23, according to Real Time Race Tracking.

Asked how his race went, he told Bloomberg Law, “It was OK. I cramped up.” Acknowledging that it wasn’t his best time, he added. “I didn’t train as much. It turns out training makes a difference.”

Kavanaugh, a 2018 Trump appointee to the US Supreme Court, has run the annual Washington road race 13 times, starting in 2010 when he served on the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit. The race dates back to 1981.

Kavanaugh placed fifth among 13 federal judges. US Tax Court Judge Jeffrey Arbeit beat last year’s judicial winner Bradley Garcia of the DC Circuit, with a 17:48 time.

The race, sponsored by the American Council of Life Insurers, features teams of runners from all three branches of the federal government and the media. This year, due to a congressional recess, the only member of Congress to run was Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), who by default placed first in his category with a time of 32:29.

The only cabinet-level official to participate was US International Trade Commissioner and former Chairman Jason Kearns, with a time of 25:01. Other executive-branch runners came from the Justice Department, the Census Bureau, and the Executive Office of Legal Counsel. The team from the Labor Department’s Employee Benefit Security Administration sported the name “MEGA: [Make Erisa Great Again].”

Other Article III judges participating this year included the DC Circuit’s Florence Pan (25:39), Robert Wilkins (34:08), and Patricia Millett (36:58) as well as the DC District Court’s Trevor McFadden (27:17), Tanya Chutkan (27:21), Randolph Moss (28:10), and Loren AliKhan (33:33)

Kavanaugh was the only Supreme Court justice to run this year. Last year, that honor went to Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. She has run five times under team names including “Voir Die Hard,” “Run-D.D.C. (Walk This Way)”, when she was a district court judge, “The Jackson 5K” on the D.C. Circuit, and “Junior Justice League,” in her first outing as a justice.

The year 2024 was a good one for Supreme Court participation in the race, which raises funds for the education nonprofit Junior Achievement USA. That year, Kavanaugh was joined by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who had a time of 26:09. Both got beat by then Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar (22:23).