Kaua'i Marathon F25-29: Nelson Runs Down the Field for the Win

• Alexandra Nelson won the F25-29 age group in 4:16:56 (9:48/mi), climbing from 23rd to 14th among women in the opening miles and holding that position all the way to the finish.
• Lacy Morice posted the 13th-fastest women's split from 24.15 miles to the finish, surging from 69th to 28th among women across the race to claim 3rd in the age group.
• Lesya Lackey and Claire Devine finished 14th and 15th separated by just 0.14 seconds — both clocking 5:10:55 — one of the tightest near-misses of the day.
• The F25-29 field spanned a 56-minute gap from Nelson's 4:16:56 to the last individually listed finisher at 6:02:58, across 23 finishers.

Alexandra Nelson, 29, from Honolulu, made her move early. By the time the field reached 6.55 miles she had already risen from 23rd to 14th among women — helped by the 13th-fastest women's split on that opening stretch — and she simply didn't let go. She held that exact position through every subsequent checkpoint, crossing in 4:16:56 at a 9:48/mi clip to take the age group by more than eight minutes over runner-up Maria Machado.

Machado, also 29 and making the trip from Arlington, VA, ran a different kind of race — moving steadily up through 17th among women at the halfway point before fading slightly to 22nd by the finish. She held on for 2nd in the age group at 4:25:30. Behind her, Lacy Morice of Northridge, CA put together the most dramatic trajectory of the day: she was 69th among women at the first checkpoint and climbed all the way to 28th by the finish, fueled by that strong closing split, to land 3rd in 4:32:45.

The battle for 4th and 5th played out between Mia Richards and Nadia Jackson, separated by just over two minutes at the line (4:38:21 vs. 4:40:54). Both were strong closers — Richards posted the 24th-fastest women's split on the final stretch, while Jackson had the 23rd-fastest split in the 22.25-to-24.15-mile segment. Then came the race's most dramatic finish: Lesya Lackey and Claire Devine, both listed at 5:10:55 but separated by a mere 0.14 seconds, filled 14th and 15th in the age group — a gap that 26.2 miles of racing in Kaua'i's warm, humid air made feel impossibly small.