USATF Half Marathon Championships

Jason Weitzel

Jack Mastandrea

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Greenville Track Club-ELITE's Jason Weitzel and Jack Mastandrea competed in the 2025 USATF Half Marathon Championships on a cold (33 degrees) and very windy Sunday morning in Atlanta, GA. The elite race started at 7:17 am, just before the Publix Atlanta Half Marathon, and covered a challenging (hilly) route through Atlanta with the start and finish adjacent to Mercedes Benz Stadium and the Home Depot Backyard public area. The race was the selection event for September's 2025 World Athletics Half Marathon Championships to be conducted in San Diego, CA, with the top three male and female placers in Atlanta earning spots on the USA team.

Weitzel, coming off his January personal best of 1:02:28 at the Aramco Houston Half Marathon, ran impressive 5, 10 & 15K splits of 14:27, 29:18 and 44:20, respectively, on his way to an 18th place finish in 1:03:16. That was a 4:50 per mile pace on the undulating course. Mastandrea split 14:45, 30:01 and 45:38 en route to a 30th place finish in 1:05:07 (4:58 per mile).  Jason's time is the number two All-Time Half Marathon clocking in GTC-ELITE history, only behind his Houston performance. 

The Atlanta Track Club once again conducted an extremely well-organized and executed event, hosting almost 100 of the USA's top road racers in addition to conducting the annual Publix Atlanta Marathon Weekend (5K, Half Marathon and Marathon).  

Jack and Jason doing some pre-race fueling on Saturday morning

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Greenville Track Club-ELITE was established in 2012 and is well into its second decade as a post-collegiate, Olympic-development program. The program developed and produced one participant for the 2024 Olympic Games marathon in Paris; four qualifiers for the 2016 USA Olympic Trials Marathon in Los Angeles; one qualifier/participant for the 2019 Pam American Games Marathon in Lima, Peru; three qualifiers/two participants for the 2020 USA Olympic Trials Marathon in Atlanta, GA; one qualifier and participant in the 2021 USATF Olympic Track & Field Trials in the 3000m Steeplechase in Eugene, OR; and three qualifiers for the 2024 USA Olympic Trials Marathon in Orlando, FL. The program's runners set four South Carolina State road race records in 2020 (5K, 15K and Half Marathon--twice) and three (15K, 10-Mile and 20K) in 2021. GTC-ELITE  produced the South Carolina Men's 2020 Long Distance Runner of the Year and recently had the top two ranked South Carolina road racers for 2024.

​The program is sponsored and supported by the 53-year-old Greenville Track Club, ASICS, Joy Real Estate (Adopt an Athlete partner), generous individual contributors and partnerships with Performance Therapy, Roll Recovery products, FinalSurge (on-line training log), ElliptiGO, NormaTec Recovery Boots, Coach Bob Williams Pace Calculator, the DorsiFlex (stretching device), the MOBO board (balance & mobility) and LEVER Movement (treadmill body weight support). The club is a proud and active member of both the Road Runners Club of America and USATF.​