Rocket City 5K: Tamez dominates the M60-64 field

• Gerard Tamez won the M60-64 group in 21:07 (6:48/mi), more than three minutes clear of the field.
• Chip Barton ran a solid 24:12 (7:47/mi) to claim 2nd, with Jim Tompkins taking 3rd in 27:52.
• The top three finished within a 6:45 window; places 4 through 6 spanned nearly 33 minutes behind Tompkins.

Gerard Tamez, 63, from New Market, AL, made this look like a different race than the one his M60-64 peers were running. His 6:48/mi pace held up across all 3.1 miles to deliver a 21:07 finish — brisk work on a mild December morning in Huntsville. The three-minute gap back to Chip Barton wasn't a photo finish; it was a statement.

Barton, the youngest in the group at 60, answered with a respectable 24:12 (7:47/mi) to lock up 2nd, while fellow 60-year-old Jim Tompkins of Athens, AL rounded out the podium in 27:52. The pair of 60-year-olds finishing 2nd and 3rd ahead of the 62-year-olds in 4th through 6th is one of the quiet storylines of the day.

Behind the podium, the times tell a different story. Alan Johnston of Huntsville crossed in 52:44, and Craig Eichelkraut of Madison finished in 1:00:27 — both completing the course on their own terms. Pruitt Marshall's listed time of 9:55:42 stands apart and likely reflects a timing anomaly rather than a race effort. All six men showed up and got it done on a cool, overcast Saturday, with Tamez making sure nobody in the M60-64 group had any doubt about who owned the morning.