M65-69: Santonja Medina holds off the miles to claim the age-group win

• Fernando Santonja Medina won the M65-69 group in 4:17:06 (9:48/mi), finishing 33rd among the men at the line.
• John Jones completed the two-man field in 5:10:19 (11:50/mi), 53rd among the men at the finish.
• The gap between them: 53 minutes and 13 seconds — a wide margin in a compact group.
• Santonja Medina posted the 28th-fastest men's split on the 25K–30K segment in the field; Jones answered with the 49th-fastest men's split on the 30K–35K stretch.

With only two runners in the M65-69 group, this was never going to be a tactical chess match — but both men earned their finishes on a breezy London morning, with 14 mph winds keeping the overcast conditions honest across the full 26.2 miles.

Fernando Santonja Medina set the tone from the gun. Sitting 33rd among the men early on, he drifted back slightly through the middle miles before clawing back to 33rd by the finish — a composed, consistent effort that averaged 9:48 per mile. His strongest segment came between 25K and 30K, where he ran the 28th-fastest men's split across the entire field on that stretch — a genuine surge in the heart of the race that underlined his control when others were beginning to feel the distance.

John Jones told a different story: a steady climber through the first half, moving from 58th among the men at the early checkpoint all the way up to 53rd by 30K, where he held firm through the finish. His best moment came on the 30K–35K leg, where he posted the 49th-fastest men's split in the field — a sign that his legs still had something to give deep into the race. He crossed in 5:10:19, averaging 11:50 per mile.

Two finishers, two very different paces, one shared achievement: completing the TCS London Marathon at 65 or older is a result worth celebrating on its own terms.