Napa Valley Marathon F60-64: Witter Runs Away with It

• Heidi Witter (Auburn, CA, age 62) wins in 3:39:10 at an 8:22/mi clip — more than 12 minutes clear of the field.
• Becky Wells (Austin, TX) takes 2nd in 3:51:17, running 8:49/mi and climbing from 243rd among women to 205th over the final miles.
• Catherine Scher (Little River, CA) and Helen Kolodziejzyk (Calgary, AB) battle through the back half, finishing 3rd in 4:07:18 and 4th in 4:12:06 — separated by under five minutes after 26.2 miles.
• Nineteen women aged 60–64 toed the line on the Silverado Trail, with finishes ranging from 3:39 to 5:51.

Heidi Witter put the F60-64 field away early and kept it there. Running 8:22/mi from Calistoga to Napa, the 62-year-old from Auburn never relinquished the lead and finished more than 12 minutes ahead of her nearest competitor — a dominant performance on a cool, humid morning. Her gender ranking among the women's field did fluctuate through the middle miles (drifting as far back as 135th before recovering to 128th), but within her own cohort there was never any drama: this was her race from start to finish.

Becky Wells ran a smart, negative-split-flavored effort, steadily climbing from 243rd among women at the early checkpoints all the way to 205th by the finish line. Her 8:49/mi average earned her a clear 2nd place, and the gap she built over 3rd — more than 16 minutes — was never seriously threatened. Behind her, Catherine Scher and Helen Kolodziejzyk staged the day's most watchable subplot. Scher (9:26/mi) and Kolodziejzyk (9:37/mi) tracked each other through the vineyards, with both posting strong 20M-to-finish splits — Scher's the 197th-fastest among women on that closing stretch, Kolodziejzyk's the 256th — before Scher secured 3rd by a 4:48 margin.

Fifth place went to Dawn Anderson (Carol Stream, IL) in 4:19:02, though her race told a different story: she was among the stronger women early, ranking as high as 250th among women through 6.2 miles, but faded through the second half to finish 373rd in the women's field by the line. Dianne Eckert (Reno, NV, age 64) rounded out the top six in 4:29:45, with Kristan Maynard (4:34:39), Asya Zikranova (4:35:44), and Maya Young (4:37:15) arriving in a tight cluster for 7th through 9th. Takayo Fredericks and Mary Mclean — both age 60 — closed out the field in 5:47:54 and 5:51:48 respectively, finishing a marathon through wine country at any pace worth celebrating.