Jed Smith Ultra Classic 50K Women: Herring Leads Wire-to-Wire in the Fog

• Jessy Herring won in 3:41:53 (7:09/mi), holding 1st among the women from the opening checkpoint to the finish line — and posting the fastest women's split on the Out & Back→Lap 1 segment.
• Verity Breen, 59, ran the fastest women's split on the final Out & Back→Lap 1 leg to move from 3rd to 2nd, finishing in 4:14:34 — 32:41 behind Herring but a full 2:01 clear of 3rd.
• Mei Yang, 50, closed with the 2nd-fastest women's split on Lap 3→Lap 4 to climb from 5th to 3rd, crossing in 4:16:35 — just 2:12 behind Breen.
• Shana O'Shea returned to Jed Smith and sliced 25:49 off her 2025 finish of 4:52:57, landing 5th in 4:27:08.

Jessy Herring made this race look almost simple. The 30-year-old from Cool, CA grabbed the lead among the women immediately and never let it go, holding 1st at every single checkpoint through 31.1 miles of Sacramento fog. Her 7:09/mi average was a full minute per mile faster than any other finisher, and her Out & Back→Lap 1 split was the quickest of any woman on the course. In a field where positions shuffled throughout, Herring was the one fixed point.

Behind her, the podium was earned late and earned hard. Melissa Curley ran with the leaders all day — sitting 2nd from the first checkpoint through five of seven splits — but faded over the final stretch, ultimately finishing 4th in 4:18:47. That opened the door for Verity Breen, who at 59 delivered the fastest women's split on that closing Out & Back→Lap 1 segment to lock up 2nd in 4:14:34. Mei Yang, 50, made her move even earlier, climbing from 5th to 3rd with the 2nd-fastest women's Lap 3→Lap 4 split to finish in 4:16:35. A 59-year-old and a 50-year-old on the podium — the experience in this women's field was formidable.

The returning veterans told compelling stories further back. Aiza Golledge, who took 3rd here in 2025 in 4:48:23, came back in 2026 and finished 6th in 4:37:26 — faster, but in a stronger field. Elizabeth Omodt improved from 6th in 5:06:19 to 7th in 4:45:17. And Christine Chapon, 67, knocked 21:38 off her 2025 time, finishing 10th in 5:41:03. Thirteen women finished on a cold, foggy Sacramento morning — and more than a few of them came back sharper than they left.