Cleveland 10K M20-24: Kelly Runs Away from the Field

• Joseph Kelly (1st, 35:42) won the M20-24 age group at a blistering 5:45/mi — nearly four minutes clear of 2nd place.
• Andrew Lescsak (2nd, 39:28) and Owen Pastirik (3rd, 41:27) locked up the podium, separated by just under two minutes.
• Alexander Hackney (9th, 51:46) and Andrew Hackney (10th, 51:46) crossed in the exact same displayed time — but the results confirm Alexander edged ahead by the finest of margins.
• 37 men aged 20–24 finished on a humid, breezy Cleveland morning — conditions that made every second earned.

Joseph Kelly simply wasn't racing the same race as anyone else in the M20-24 group. The 23-year-old from Lakewood rolled through 6.2 miles at 5:45/mi, finishing in 35:42 — a gap of 3 minutes and 46 seconds over runner-up Andrew Lescsak. In a field of 37, that kind of margin doesn't just win a race; it redefines the conversation about who's competing for the top step.

Behind Kelly, Lescsak (39:28, 6:21/mi) and Pastirik (41:27, 6:40/mi) ran solid, distinct races of their own. Lescsak's pace was noticeably quicker than Pastirik's, and that difference built the nearly two-minute cushion between 2nd and 3rd. Andrew Schuller (4th, 44:31, 7:10/mi) and Isaiah Dawson (5th, 45:57, 7:24/mi) rounded out the top five, with Maxwell Lee (6th, 47:09) and Caden Barker (7th, 47:58) keeping things competitive through the mid-pack.

One of the day's more interesting footnotes came at 9th and 10th: Alexander Hackney of Lakewood and Andrew Hackney of Jamestown — same last name, same age, same displayed time of 51:46 — ran the 10K in near-lockstep. The official results separate them by the slimmest of margins, with Alexander just ahead. Timothy Sweeney (8th, 51:44) finished just two seconds clear of that pair, making three runners within a two-second window. With 67°F temperatures, gusty 15 mph winds, and 83% humidity pressing down on the course, every runner who crossed the line earned it — and Kelly, for his part, made it look easy.