F25-29 at Cleveland Marathon: Massaro Storms Home for the Win

• Bella Massaro won the F25-29 age group in 3:15:44 (7:28/mi), climbing from 42nd to 15th among women across the race and posting the 6th-fastest women's split on the final 22.5M-to-finish stretch.
• Emily Hooke entered the top 15 among women early and held firm through the halfway mark before fading — she still claimed 3rd in F25-29 at 3:19:57, just 1:10 behind runner-up Alexis Firment.
• Rosa Rumora mirrored Massaro's late-race charge, moving from 45th to 26th among women and posting the 9th-fastest women's split on that same closing stretch to take 5th in 3:22:25.
• Places 7 and 8 — Valentine Lily and Katherine Guilbo — finished in 3:30:50 and 3:30:51, separated by a single second after 26.2 miles in 75°F heat.

Bella Massaro came to Cleveland from Denver and ran like someone who saved her best for last. She was 42nd among women at the first checkpoint, methodically working her way through the field — 39th, 35th, 26th, 21st — before cracking the top 15 by the finish. Her 7:28/mi average tells the story of a controlled, confident effort, and her 6th-fastest women's split over the final miles confirmed she was accelerating when others were hanging on in the humidity.

Alexis Firment ran a remarkably steady race, hovering between 18th and 19th among women for most of the afternoon before closing at 17th. Her 19th-fastest women's split on the Half-to-19.1M segment shows she was moving well through the middle miles, and the local Cleveland runner earned her 2nd-place finish in 3:18:47. Emily Hooke, meanwhile, was the early mover — 12th among women through the first two checkpoints — but the back half of the course took its toll, and she slid to 21st among women by the finish. Still, 3rd in the age group at 3:19:57 is a result worth celebrating.

The late-race story belonged to Massaro and Rumora both. Rosa Rumora tracked nearly the same trajectory as the winner — 45th among women at the gun, 26th at the tape — and her 9th-fastest women's split over those final miles gave her 5th place in 3:22:25. Rebekah Bolzman was steadier throughout, never straying far from the mid-20s among women, and her 4th-place 3:21:29 reflects a disciplined run from start to finish. With 160 women finishing in this age group on a warm, humid Cleveland afternoon, the top five all broke 3:23 — a genuinely competitive field top to bottom.