Napa Valley Marathon F35-39: Meyer Commands the Top, Chandler Storms Home

• Eleanor Meyer (Portola Valley, CA) won the F35-39 race in 2:51:34 (6:33/mi), finishing 2nd among all women across the line.
• Madelyn Chandler posted the 2nd-fastest women's split on the final 20M→Finish stretch, rocketing from 14th among women at the opening checkpoint all the way to 6th by the finish — the most dramatic move in the F35-39 field.
• Connie Teague ran the 4th-fastest women's split on the 6.2M→13.1M leg, surging from 7th to 4th among women by the half — then faded to 14th among women in the back half, finishing 4th in F35-39 in 2:59:24.
• 95 women finished in the F35-39 field, with the top five ranging from 2:51:34 to 3:05:29 — a spread of nearly 14 minutes across the podium and beyond.

Eleanor Meyer ran the Silverado Trail point-to-point in 2:51:34 at a steady 6:33/mi, sitting 2nd among all women through the opening miles and never relinquishing her F35-39 lead. Her strongest relative moment came on the 6.2M-to-half-marathon stretch, where she posted the 3rd-fastest women's split on that segment — a mid-race surge that put the race firmly in her hands. At 39, she took the win by two and a half minutes over her nearest F35-39 rival.

The race's best subplot belonged to Madelyn Chandler of Saint Helena, CA — practically a hometown race along these Napa Valley roads. She was 14th among women through the first checkpoint, 13th at the halfway mark, and 9th by mile 20. Then she unleashed the 2nd-fastest women's closing split of the entire field from mile 20 to the finish, vaulting to 6th among women and 2nd in F35-39 with a 2:54:07 (6:38/mi). That's a textbook negative-split closer.

Sarah Villasenor (Denver, CO) ran a composed, consistent race — holding 8th among women from the 6.2M checkpoint through mile 20 before settling 9th overall among women at the tape — good for 3rd in F35-39 in 2:57:11 (6:45/mi). Connie Teague (Lees Summit, MO) told a different story: she was the 4th-fastest woman on the middle segment and climbed as high as 4th among women by mile 20, but faded to 14th among women in the final stretch, finishing 4th in F35-39 at 2:59:24 — the only sub-3:00 finisher in the group not to hold her position. Krista Drechsler rounded out the top five in 3:05:29, with Thia Angelo (3:08:00), Julia Sachdev (3:11:41), and Mariel Atman (3:14:21) filling out a deep top eight across a 95-woman field.