San Francisco Marathon M45-49: Cazorla Runs Down the Field to Take the Crown

• Julien Cazorla (London, age 45) won the M45-49 race in 2:47:21 (6:23/mi), climbing from 33rd among men at the opening checkpoint all the way to 19th by the finish.
• Gareth Williams (Hampton, age 46) was runner-up in 2:49:21 — just over two minutes back — after an equally aggressive late surge from 47th among men down to 25th.
• Seiichi Matsushita (San Francisco, age 48) rounded out the podium in 2:53:34, the hometown finisher holding a comfortable cushion over 4th.
• A tight cluster of five runners finished between 3:05:20 and 3:08:15, with Jun Xie (5th, 3:05:20), Constantin Fleicus (6th, 3:06:21), Juan Arnoldo Chocooj Iten (7th, 3:06:50), and David Horton (8th, 3:08:15) separated by fewer than three minutes across the board.

Julien Cazorla delivered the most dynamic race of the day in the M45-49 field. Running at a 6:23/mi clip — the sharpest pace in the group — the Londoner spent most of the race hovering around 30th–33rd among men before unleashing a sustained late charge. From the 18-to-24-mile stretch onward, he climbed steadily and crossed the line 19th among men, taking the M45-49 title in 2:47:21. His split from 18 Miles to 24 Miles was the 14th-fastest women's split on that segment, underlining just how much he had left in reserve.

Gareth Williams told a strikingly similar story. Also buried deep in the men's field through the first half — sitting 47th among men at one point — Williams ran the 18-to-24-mile leg as the 9th-fastest women's split on that stretch, a genuine surge that pulled him all the way to 25th among men by the finish. His 2:49:26 at 6:28/mi left him two minutes and five seconds behind Cazorla — close enough to confirm the race's best battle was at the front, and that both men were running a very different race to everyone else.

Seiichi Matsushita, racing on home turf in San Francisco, took 3rd in 2:53:34 (6:37/mi). Unlike the top two, his trajectory ran the other direction — he started 23rd among men and gradually settled back to 38th — but his consistency held the podium spot comfortably, finishing nearly eight minutes clear of 4th-place Stuart Taylor (3:01:19, 6:55/mi). Taylor, for his part, was one of the day's quiet movers, climbing from 143rd among men at the opening checkpoint all the way to 72nd by the finish and posting the 32nd-fastest women's split on the final 24-miles-to-finish segment. In a field of 279 finishers, there was no shortage of stories — but Cazorla's relentless second-half charge was the defining one.