F65-69 at Peachtree: Sweeney Runs Away With It

• Mary Sweeney won the F65-69 field in 48:07 — a 7:45/mi average that put more than two minutes of clear air between her and second place.
• Becky Whitton made the race's most dramatic climb, surging from near 1,000th among women at mile 1 all the way to 612th by mile 3 before settling into 2nd in 50:17.
• Courtney Copeland was the field's biggest late mover, charging from outside the top 2,000 among women at mile 1 to 822nd by the finish — her 451st-fastest women's split on the final mile-to-finish stretch powering a 4th-place result of 51:56.
• Gwen Spung ran the opposite race: a blazing first half (402nd-fastest women's split) that put her 5th among women early, then faded from 427th to 832nd among women by the line — still good enough for 5th in 52:01.

In the warm, humid Atlanta morning — 75°F and 68% humidity on the Fourth of July — Mary Sweeney made it look manageable. The 66-year-old Atlanta local ran a measured, controlled race, sitting around 326th among women after the first mile and drifting only gradually to 412th by the finish. That steady-state approach, at 7:45 per mile, was simply faster than anyone else in the F65-69 field could sustain across 6.2 miles.

Behind her, the race was anything but settled. Becky Whitton's opening mile placed her nearly 1,000th among women, but she reeled in hundreds of runners through miles 2 and 3 — her 508th-fastest women's split on that 2M→3M stretch part of a sustained push that landed her on the podium in 50:17. Sally Boyd, 68, took a different path: patient through the early miles, she made her big move between miles 4 and 5 (556th-fastest women's split on that segment), climbing from 1,085th to 781st among women to claim 3rd in 51:28.

The rest of the top ten was tightly packed but not close at the front. Susan Berlam, traveling from Pawcatuck, Connecticut, rounded out the top six at 52:41, while Deborah Wetterhall and Kathleen Knowlton crossed within two seconds of each other — 55:24 and 55:26 — for 7th and 8th. All told, 795 women completed the F65-69 race, a field that stretched from Sweeney's 48-minute effort all the way through the morning.