Women's Half Marathon: Jenks edges Connolly in a 1:16:13 photo finish

• Lucy Jenks, 1:16:13 (5:49/mi): Won the women's race at the SF Marathon Half after leading wire-to-wire through most of the course — but it wasn't clean. She fell to 3rd around the midpoint, clawed back to 2nd, and reclaimed the top spot to hold on at the line.
• Grace Connolly, 1:16:13 (5:49/mi): Same clock time as Jenks, but the timing chip said otherwise — Connolly crosses 2nd, owner of the fastest women's split on miles 6–8, and the one who led through the middle miles before Jenks retook her.
• Nina Usubyan, 1:20:23 (6:08/mi): Improved on her 3rd-place finish here in 2025 (1:21:09) to land 4th this year — 46 seconds faster, and with the 3rd-fastest women's closing split from mile 12 to the finish.
• Sophia Carcamo, 20, 1:19:47 (6:05/mi): The youngest podium finisher briefly led the women's race in the first half before settling into 3rd — the fastest women's split on the opening half belongs to her.

Lucy Jenks and Grace Connolly turned the San Francisco Half Marathon into a two-woman race that went down to the wire in the breezy, 59°F conditions along the bay. Both finished in 1:16:13 at 5:49/mi — but Jenks, the 24-year-old San Franciscan, took the win by the slimmest of margins. Her route to the tape was anything but straightforward: she held the women's lead early, was displaced to 3rd around the midpoint, fought back to 2nd, and then reclaimed first when it mattered most. Her fastest women's split on the miles 2–4 stretch showed she had the early punch to match her finishing resolve.

Connolly, 25, ran a tactically different race — patient through the first half, surging to lead the women's field through the middle miles, and posting the fastest women's split from miles 6–8. She held that lead into the late stages before Jenks came back. The gap between them at the finish was a matter of milliseconds, not seconds.

Sophia Carcamo, just 20 years old out of Clayton, was the aggressor early — she briefly seized the women's lead in the opening miles and posted the fastest women's split over the first half of the course. She couldn't hold the pace of the top two, but 3rd in 1:19:47 is a legitimate result. Behind her, Erin Phelps (5th, 1:20:59) was the second-fastest woman on the miles 6–8 stretch — the same segment where Connolly was flying — while Nina Usubyan (4th, 1:20:23) closed the hardest of anyone near the front, running the 3rd-fastest women's split from mile 12 to the finish and bettering her own time from 2025 by 46 seconds.

Further back, Audrey Spaly (8th, 1:25:19) and Farah Allen (9th, 1:25:19) share the same displayed time but not the same place — Spaly edges Allen by a chip-timing sliver. In a field of 1,760 women, the depth was real: 20th place (Marie Sbrocca, 1:30:25) still averaged 6:54/mi through the hills and the wind.