Napa Valley 5K — F40-44: Denise Neves Runs Away from the Field

• Denise Neves won the F40-44 race in 25:38 (8:15/mi) — more than 2 minutes and 15 seconds clear of the rest of the field.
• Places 2–4 finished within 9 seconds of each other: Molly Good (27:53), Joyce Chino-Kaydahzinne (27:55), and Elyse Weng (28:02).
• Places 5–7 were separated by just 6 seconds: Niya Wu (30:00), Brittany Stromgren (30:04), and Kelly Allen (30:06).
• 34 women finished the F40-44 race on a cold, wet Napa morning — 41°F, light rain, and 85% humidity.

Denise Neves, 40, of Loomis, made this race her own from the start. Her 8:15/mi average wasn't just fast — it was a different race entirely. The gap between Neves and second-place Molly Good (27:53, 8:58/mi) stretched to over two minutes, a margin that speaks to a dominant, wire-to-wire performance in difficult conditions.

Behind Neves, the real drama played out in a tightly bunched chase pack. Good, also 40 and racing on home soil in Napa, held second, but Joyce Chino-Kaydahzinne of Vacaville finished just two seconds back in third at 27:55. Elyse Weng, another Napa local, crossed fourth in 28:02 — meaning three athletes fought over those two spots within a nine-second window. In a 5K run through cold rain, margins like that come down to the final stretch.

The battle for fifth through seventh was similarly tight. Niya Wu (30:00), Brittany Stromgren (30:04), and Kelly Allen (30:06) were essentially racing in a pack, separated by just six seconds across the line. Lourdes Barrera rounded out the top eight in 30:11, just five seconds further back — making for a remarkable eight-runner cluster between 30:00 and 30:11.

Further down the field, Annita Moraes of São Paulo and Erin Brower of Medford finished 13th and 14th in 34:07 and 34:08 respectively — a single second apart after covering 3.1 miles in the rain. With 34 finishers braving the wet and cold, the F40-44 race delivered genuine competition from top to bottom.