Thousand Take To Wellington Bays This Weekend

Almost 4000 people will line up at the Westpac Trust Stadium this weekend for the annual Shoe Clinic Harbour Capital Marathon, among them some of New Zealand’s best runners.

Organisers are looking down the barrel of a record entry for the 22nd edition of Wellington’s biggest marathon event. With entries still flowing in they are expecting close to 4000 starters spread over the Full Marathon, Half Marathon and 10k events. This is a continuation of the events reputation as New Zealand’s fastest-growing running event.

Established in 1985 by the Wellington Marathon Clinic, for almost 20 years this race was a popular mid-winter goal attracting around 1000 entrants. But four years ago a shift from the Overseas Terminal to the new Westpac Trust Stadium saw an overnight growth that shows no signs of slowing down.

On Sunday runners and walkers from as far afield as Italy will line up for the scenic tour of Wellington’s bays. But the smart money for line honours is resting on the event’s defending champions.

In 2006 locals Grant McLean and Dougal Thorburn gave Wellington Scottish a clean sweep of the feature races and they are favourites to repeat this weekend. McLean is the clear favourite to defend his Full Marathon title, which he won last year in a race record time of 2hrs 31min 38secs. The 39 year old says he probably isn’t in quite the same shape this year, but he should have no trouble holding out a mostly local field.

Favourite for the women’s Full Marathon is well-performed South Islander Tania Smellie. The Dunedin runner has been in the best shape of her life this year and was holding second place in Queens Birthday Weekend’s SBS Marathon in Christchurch when she suffered a slight injury. Rather than risk worsening the problem Smellie withdrew to get ready for the Shoe Clinic Harbour Capital event, where she hopes to break the course record of 3hrs 14min. Smellie has a best time of just under three hours, so providing her body holds together she is clear favourite.

The Half Marathon event, however, is more open. Defending champion Dougal Thorburn is back hoping to eclipse the race record that he missed by just nine seconds last year. But he will be chased hard by Wellington Harrier’s Nic Browne and Jason Cressingham, with multisport standout Luke Vaughn from Christchurch also expected to be toward the front.

The women’s Half Marathon will be a battle royal between two veteran campaigners for the Wellington Harrier Club. Vicki Humphries and Gabrielle O’Rourke have been racing each other for more than 20 years and will go head to head again on Sunday.

Humphries currently has the upper hand after finishing second to O’Rourke’s fourth in the prestigious Dorne Cup cross country race last week, but O’Rourke is more experienced over the longer distances and has a better pedigree over both the Half and Full Marathon. Waiting in the wings, however, will be Hutt Valley’s Sarah Lynskey, who finished between these two at the Dorne Cup and could be well-placed to pick up the pieces if either of the favourites fail.

Sunday’s event kicks off at 7:30am with the Full Marathon, then 9:00am for the Half Marathon and 10k events. Entries are being taken right up until race day from the Michael Fowler Centre on Friday and Saturday, and the Westpac Stadium on Sunday before the start. For further info: www.harbourcapital.co.nz.

ENDS

© Scoop Media