Jed Smith Ultra Classic 50K: Janice O'Grady Owns the F70+ Field

• Sole finisher and champion: Janice O'Grady, 76, completed the 50K in 7:57:34 at a 15:22/mi average pace.
• Consistent women's field placement: O'Grady held 14th among women for the majority of the race, slipping briefly to 15th before recovering her position.
• Standout split: She posted the 13th-fastest women's split from Lap 2 to Lap 3 — a bright moment in a long, grinding day.

Janice O'Grady came to Sacramento and did what needed doing: she ran 50 kilometers at age 76 and crossed the finish line. In the F70+ age group, she was the only one who showed up to try it, and that fact alone deserves acknowledgment before anything else.

The conditions were no gift — 51°F, light rain, 14 mph wind, and 91% humidity made for a raw February morning on the Sacramento course. O'Grady, representing Conifer, Colorado, settled into a 15:22/mi pace and kept herself positioned 14th among the women's field through most of the race. She dipped briefly to 15th in the middle laps before clawing back to 14th, where she held firm through the finish — a small but real demonstration of competitive awareness over a nearly eight-hour effort.

The highlight of her race came between Lap 2 and Lap 3, where she turned in the 13th-fastest women's split in the field on that segment. Deep into a 50K, when most runners are simply trying to manage the damage, O'Grady was still moving with enough purpose to rank among the faster women on that stretch. That's not a footnote — that's the race within the race.

Seven hours, fifty-seven minutes, and thirty-four seconds. At 76, in the rain, in a field of accomplished ultrarunners. Janice O'Grady is the F70+ champion of the 2025 Jed Smith Ultra Classic, and it wasn't close.