Colgate Women’s Games has inspired generations of students and athletes to pursue their educational goals. Rooted in a mission of education, mentorship and athletic excellence, the Games were founded in 1974 by the late legendary Brooklyn track and field coach Fred Thompson, with the support of Colgate-Palmolive, who continues to sponsor the Games. Open to girls and women around the country, participating athletes have the opportunity to win one of more than 100 educational scholarships awarded by Colgate-Palmolive each season in $2,000, $1,000, and $500 denominations, based on order of finish in the series’ finals. In 2026, Colgate Women's Games celebrated its milestone 50th Season.

Colgate Women’s Games alumnae have gone on to have remarkable careers as successful teachers, judges, lawyers, executives and more, with 26 athletes moving onto the Olympics, and countless others becoming junior olympians and national champions. Recognizing the powerful and transformative impact it had on their lives, many former participants return each year to be involved in the Games, including Lorna Forde and Nnenna Lynch, who were both on hand at the 50th Finals celebration at The Armory in New York City.

Forde had already competed in the Munich Olympics representing Barbados in 1972 when she ran in the first-ever Colgate Women’s Games. She returned to the Montreal Olympics in 1976, and continued to run in the Colgate Women’s Games for a total of eight seasons.

“It was the beginning of my life,” Forde says. The scholarship money she won from the Games  helped pay for her education at Long Island University, where she studied respiratory therapy.  She has practiced respiratory therapy for more than 30 years, and returns to the Games each year to serve as the respiratory therapist supervisor. “Colgate [Women’s Games] was the key to my success.”

Among the enduring mantras that Thompson instilled in Forde were to dream big and to know your worth, she says. “He would always say to me, ‘You’re short, but run tall.’ So I always ran tall,” Forde recalls. “I noticed that when I started believing in myself and dreaming, then I saw the results.” This focus on internal excellence is a hallmark of the Colgate Women’s Games experience.

Lynch, who participated in Colgate Women’s Games throughout the 1980s and went on to win both NCAA and Junior Olympic championships, took similar insights from the Games. “The overall lesson of running is that you forge ahead. It's one foot in front of the other, one step at a time,” says Lynch, who now chairs the board for New York Road Runners, a nonprofit that promotes running and community events in New York City.

Lynch also reflected on the value of Colgate Women’s Games as a unique arena reserved for girls and women that combines healthy competition with formative friendships. “As girls discover their athletic identity and learn to compete, and then enter adolescence, these are really pivotal stages of life,” Lynch says. “Being able to navigate all of those transitions in the supportive and encouraging environment of the Colgate Women’s Games is really unique.”

Lifelong takeaways like these continue to be passed down to the next generation. “I hope that future generations embrace the joy and beauty and all the life lessons that are packed into learning how to be an athlete,” Lynch says. “It’s such a unique setting in which to grow and test yourself.”

Forde agrees, noting that returning to celebrate the 50th anniversary season is deeply inspiring. “I saw a young girl who ran the 400, which was my race. I had to go up to her because she was phenomenal. She’s the future,” Forde says. “Freddie would be smiling,” she adds of the late Thompson, who died in 2019 at age 85.

Echoing the spirit instilled in her by Thompson and the Colgate Women’s Games, Forde insists: “You’ve got to keep dreaming. Don't let anyone deter you from your dreams.”

Season 51 of Colgate Women’s Games will return in winter 2026.