F40-44 at CIM 2022: Piampiano Runs Away With It

• Sarah Piampiano wins in 2:41:20 (6:09/mi), more than 2:29 clear of runner-up Amber Morrison's 2:43:49.
• Melissa Perlman posts the strongest finish in the top five, climbing from 205th among women at the 5K mark all the way to 142nd by the line — the most relentless forward march in the group.
• Kara Roper and Luciana Bartholomew separated by just 21 seconds (2:46:21 vs. 2:46:42) for 3rd and 4th, with Roper logging the 60th-fastest 40K-to-finish split among women to hold her off.
• 479 women finished in the F40-44 group, with the top 20 all breaking 3:03 on a cool, damp Sacramento morning.

Sarah Piampiano was in a class of her own on Sunday. Running 6:09 per mile across 26.2 miles in light rain and 56°F temperatures, the 42-year-old from Louisville, CO, opened with a gender place in the 40s — already well inside the top 50 women — and held that territory through the halfway point before the field gradually caught and passed her in the back half. By the finish she had drifted to 77th among all women, but none of that mattered in the F40-44 standings: her 2:41:20 was untouchable, a margin of nearly two and a half minutes over anyone else in the age group.

Amber Morrison of Bellingham, WA, ran the opposite kind of race — patient and progressive. She was 122nd among women at the gun and worked her way steadily forward all day, cracking the top 100 women by the 35K mark and finishing 96th in 2:43:49. Her 58th-fastest women's split from 35K to 40K was the engine of that closing push. Kara Roper (2:46:21) and Luciana Bartholomew (2:46:42) fought a close battle for 3rd and 4th; Roper ran the 60th-fastest women's split over the final 2.2K to secure the bronze, while Bartholomew — who had been as high as 104th among women early on — faded slightly through the second half to settle 21 seconds back.

Melissa Perlman rounded out the top five in 2:49:23, capping a day-long charge from 205th among women at 5K all the way to 142nd at the finish — the most dramatic upward trajectory in the top ten. Kelly Travis (2:49:43) and Franziska Vansickle (2:52:12) followed in 6th and 7th, while Erika Pastrana, at 44 the oldest athlete in the top ten, crossed in 2:53:22 for 8th. The sub-3:00 barrier fell for 18 of the top 20 finishers in the age group, a testament to both the quality of the field and CIM's reputation as a fast December course.