Elite Men at CIM 2023: Albertson Seizes the Lead Late and Doesn't Let Go

• CJ Albertson wins in 2:11:10 (5:00/mi), moving from 4th place at 30K to the lead by 35K and holding it to the tape.
• Milton Rotich led or co-led through much of the first half, finishing 2nd in 2:13:04 — 1:54 back.
• Charlie Sweeney, 24, climbed from 11th at the opening checkpoint all the way to 3rd (2:13:41), the strongest mover on the podium.
• Amanuel Mesel posted the fastest split of the first half and led as late as 25K, but faded to 5th by the finish (2:14:11).

The story of this race is a patient hunter. CJ Albertson of Fresno spent the first 30 kilometers running conservatively — sitting as far back as 4th — before unleashing the fastest 30K→35K split in the men's field. That single segment rewrote the leaderboard. He moved from 4th to 2nd in one burst, then took the lead outright and never surrendered it, crossing in 2:11:10 at a 5:00/mi clip. In a field of 64 elite men on a mild Sacramento morning — 63°F, light wind — that kind of late-race acceleration is decisive.

Milton Rotich, 37, ran the opposite arc. The Duluth-based veteran went to the front almost immediately, holding 1st at both the 10K and 15K marks and posting the fastest men's split on that opening segment. He was still in the top two at 20K, but the back half cost him, and Albertson's surge pushed him to 4th at 35K before he rallied to finish 2nd in 2:13:04. The 1:54 gap to the winner tells the story of a front-runner who couldn't quite answer when the pace truly bit.

Charlie Sweeney's march through the field deserves its own mention. The 24-year-old from Boulder started 11th and worked his way forward checkpoint by checkpoint, never dropping a position after the halfway mark. He backed that up with the 3rd-fastest 30K→35K split — the same segment where Albertson made his decisive move — and landed on the podium in 2:13:41. Matt Baxter (4th, 2:14:08) and Amanuel Mesel (5th, 2:14:11) were separated by just three seconds, with Baxter recording the 3rd-fastest 40K-to-finish split to edge his Flagstaff training partner at the line.