UPDATE (July 31, 8:00 a.m. ET) -- Sifan Hassan has announced that, after further consideration, she will not compete in the 1500m in Paris, which means her schedule will include the 5000m, 10,000m and marathon.

If Hassan does compete in those three events, she'll vie to match the unparalleled feat of Czechoslovakia’s Emil Zátopek. Zátopek is the only athlete, male or female, to win medals in the 5000m, 10,000m and marathon at a single Olympics, which he accomplished at the 1952 Helsinki Games.

In a press conference on Wednesday, Hassan noted that she has become a fan of Zátopek and studied his career closely. She also maintained that she's focused on completing her full slate of events.

“I don’t want to make myself crazy focusing on gold,” Hassan said. “The medals will come later.”

Sifan Hassan is about to run 41 miles in nine days.

The Dutch star is already among the all-time distance running greats, but what she might do next is simply next-level.

In Tokyo, Hassan’s epic performance made the track and field community collectively gasp. She completed an unprecedented Olympic medal treble, winning gold in the 5000m and 10,000m, while also securing a 1500m bronze.

Hassan is the only athlete to collect medals across two long-distance events and a middle-distance race in a single Olympics. Put together, her Tokyo triumphs produced a career-defining moment for the ages.

Hassan is turning it up a notch for Paris. The 31-year-old is entered in an astounding four events for the Paris Games: the women’s 1500m, 5000m, 10,000m ... and the marathon.

If she completes all of the above, Hassan will have run 41.4 miles, the most ever at a single Olympics. Ambition like this simply defies all convention. Hassan is taking that already-loaded Tokyo Olympic slate and adding 26.2 miles, a distance she hadn’t even debuted in until last spring.

Hassan ran her first professional marathon at last April’s London Marathon. At first, it was a disaster. Already slowed by a month of fasting during Ramadan, she fell back from the pace early on and even had to stop twice to stretch her aching leg. But Hassan stormed back, slowly gaining on a loaded group of leaders and sprinting to the finish to shockingly win her first marathon in 2:18.33.  

"It was really amazing,” Hassan said in London. “I never thought I would finish a marathon.”

She then steamrolled through the 2023 Chicago Marathon in 2:13.44, setting a new course record with a commanding victory.

At the Paris Olympics, Hassan will aim to finish another marathon, and to finish it after competing in multiple rounds of the 1500m, 5000m and 10,000m. Hassan now enters the Paris Olympics as the second-ranked women’s marathoner in the world, trailing just Ethiopian Tigst Assefa, the current world record holder. She’s a legit gold medal contender in the event.

As for the other races, Hassan likely trails two-time defending Olympic champion Faith Kipyegon of Kenya among 1500m favorites. However, Hassan is the last woman to take down Kipyegon in a 1500m — she did so in June 2021. There’s strong hope for a medal.

Kipyegon bested Hassan in the 5000m at 2023 Worlds and enters that race as a gold medal favorite, too, but Hassan’s history suggests she’s a surefire medal threat once again. The 10,000m tells a similar story: Hassan’s challengers in that event include Ethiopians Gudaf Tsegay, Letesenbet Gidey and Ejgayehu Taye, but Hassan is expected to contend fiercely.

Put together, Hassan may very well earn a medal in all four events. In that case, she would stand alone in history as the only athlete in the 127-year history of the modern Olympic Games to do so. No one has accomplished that feat across multiple Olympics, let alone a single summer.

Only Czechoslovakia’s Emil Zatopek in 1952 has earned a medal in the 5000m, 10,000m and marathon. Hassan has opportunity one-up him.

“We think that’s possible, to do 5K, 10K and marathon, but she loves the 1500m, and I don’t see her trying to give that up, either,” her coach Tim Rowberry said. “So it’s going to be a really big question, and we might … have to make a decision at the last moment.”

While she’s entered in all four events, Hassan could still withdraw on the eve of any race. Her extra heavy training this year has led to some subpar performances, such as a seventh-place finish in the 5000m at the Prefontaine Classic in May. Her status is worth keeping a sharp eye on.

Track fans find it easy to root for Hassan. She was born and raised in Ethiopia but left as a 15-year-old refugee, moving to the Netherlands. Hassan took up running while studying to be a nurse and soon skyrocketed up Dutch and international rankings. She made her Olympic debut in 2016, earned her first medal in 2021 and might now be on the verge of a once-unfathomable feat in 2024.