Men's Half Marathon: Garner Dominates in Huntsville's Muggy December Heat

• Ben Garner won the men's race in 1:10:35 (5:23/mi), the fastest finishing time by a commanding margin — nearly 6 minutes clear of runner-up Samuel Ongaki.
• Azariah Kaplelach ran the second half faster than anyone in the men's field not named Garner or Ongaki, climbing from 5th to 3rd with the 3rd-fastest 10K→Finish split to edge Patrick Mills by 46 seconds.
• Gerard Tamez, 62, finished 10th in 1:37:38 — and had already raced the 5K earlier in the weekend, finishing 6th among men there.
• Justin Blankenhorn pulled double duty as well: 4th among men in the 5K, then 11th here in 1:38:40 — two competitive results across the same event weekend.

Seventy degrees, 17 mph winds, and 76% humidity in December made this a legitimately taxing day, and Ben Garner from Boulder, Colorado made it look routine. The 25-year-old led wire-to-wire, holding his gender lead from the opening checkpoint through the finish line, and posted a 5:23/mi average that no one in a 135-man field came close to matching. His 10K→Finish split was the fastest in the men's race — a strong closer as well as a dominant front-runner.

Samuel Ongaki of Birmingham held second place throughout, finishing in 1:16:23 at 5:50/mi — a pace that would win most road races outright, but good only for the runner-up spot here. The real drama behind him was a two-man battle for the final podium step. Patrick Mills had run himself into 3rd through the first 10K, but Azariah Kaplelach — also out of Birmingham — was moving. Kaplelach's 3rd-fastest 10K→Finish split in the men's field was enough to overtake Mills and lock up 3rd in 1:21:58, with Mills crossing in 1:22:44, 46 seconds back in 4th.

Anthony Parameswaran rounded out the top five in 1:29:37, while Jody Cardwell of Knoxville — at 48 — ran a sharp 1:31:27 to take 6th ahead of Eric Thomas (1:32:05). Further back, the double-duty stories stood out: Tamez, at 62, navigated the humidity to finish 10th in 1:37:38, and Blankenhorn crossed 11th in 1:38:40, both having already competed in the 5K. That kind of back-to-back effort on a warm, windy December morning deserves its own recognition.