F45-49 at UTMB 2026: Schmitz Dominates While the Field Battles Through the Night

• Emily Schmitz, 22:20:40 — won the F45-49 field by more than 4 hours and 27 minutes, finishing 3rd among all women across a 174 km course with 9,700 m of climbing.
• Fastest closing stretch in the women's race — Schmitz posted the fastest women's split from Champex-Lac sortie to La Giète, a decisive move that helped her climb from 14th to 3rd among all women.
• Ingrid Due-Gundersen's strong finish — she ran the 14th-fastest women's split on the final La Flégère→Finish leg, moving from 53rd to 26th among all women and taking 2nd in F45-49 in 26:47:54.
• Sarah Page and Sabrina Verjee completed the podium at 28:17:57 and 28:56:40 respectively — separated by just 38 minutes across a race lasting nearly 29 hours.

Emily Schmitz didn't just win the F45-49 field — she rewrote what it looks like. Her 22:20:40 finish came within 11 minutes of the women's course record, and she did it by racing the whole course forward: she entered the women's field at 14th, methodically moved through the pack, and by the time she posted the fastest women's split on the Champex-Lac sortie to La Giète segment, she had climbed all the way to 3rd among all women — a position she held to the finish line in Chamonix. At a 12:24/mile average across 174 km of Alps, with the race running through France, Italy, and Switzerland at elevations up to 8,297 feet, that is a performance that demands attention.

Behind her, the race for 2nd and 3rd was a long, grinding battle. Ingrid Due-Gundersen, 47, ran a tactically interesting race — she slipped back through the middle stages, falling as far as 62nd among all women, before reeling the field back in with the 14th-fastest women's split on the La Flégère to Finish leg. Her 26:47:54 was good enough for 2nd in F45-49, and her late surge was real. Sarah Page, 46, also had a strong closing stretch, posting the 14th-fastest women's split on La Giète to Trient on her way to 3rd in 28:17:57.

Sabrina Verjee, 45, had perhaps the most dramatic trajectory in the field — she started 109th among all women and finished 46th, a relentless forward march across the entire race that landed her 4th in F45-49 at 28:56:40. Mariela Vigliocco and Ruth Eagles rounded out the top six at 30:26:18 and 30:58:54, with 38 women total completing one of ultrarunning's most demanding courses within the 45-hour-30-minute cutoff.