Rocket City Front Half: Channing Lynch Runs Away with F25-29

• Lynch wins in 1:39:03 — a 7:33/mi average — taking the F25-29 title while sitting 6th among all women at the finish.
• Noelle O'Hara claimed second in 1:41:52 (7:46/mi), finishing 2:49 behind Lynch and holding 8th among women overall.
• Sheridan Santinga and Julie Anna Morard separated by just 27 seconds** for third and fourth — 1:48:21 vs. 1:48:48 — with Morard actually posting the 16th-fastest women's split on the 10K-to-finish stretch to Santinga's 17th, nearly flipping the result.
• Shannon Rearden was the only finisher to gain a place in the women's field over the second half, moving from 18th to 17th to edge out fifth in the age group.

Channing Lynch, making the trip down from New York, was the class of the F25-29 field on a muggy December morning — 70°F, 76% humidity, and a 17 mph wind that made every mile feel longer than it was. She ran a measured 7:33/mi and backed it up with the 6th-fastest women's split on the 10K-to-finish segment, meaning she wasn't just surviving the back half — she was still racing it. O'Hara, out of Douglasville, Georgia, matched that energy with the 8th-fastest women's closing split, keeping the gap to Lynch at a clean 2:49 and leaving the rest of the age group well behind.

The real drama played out in the battle for third. Santinga, a local Huntsville runner, and Morard, also from Huntsville, ran virtually in lockstep — separated by less than half a minute across 13.1 miles. Morard actually closed slightly faster over the final stretch, but Santinga's early cushion held, and third was hers by 27 seconds. Just behind them, Birmingham's Shannon Rearden ran one of the stronger back halves in the group, picking off a competitor in the final segment to claim fifth at 1:49:33.

The field of 20 spread out considerably beyond the top five, with Taylor Brown (1:54:56) and Ashley Thompson (2:03:32) rounding out the top seven before a significant gap back to the rest. Maria Smith and Bekka San Souci finished in the same recorded time of 2:27:39, with Smith edged into 11th by the narrowest of margins — a reminder that in a race this long, every second counts right to the line.