Perfect conditions greeted the thousands of runners on Sunday for the Nike Melbourne Marathon Festival.
We had two members tackle the Nike Marathon; Ben Rowse finished in 2:57.10 (329th place from the 6206 finishers) and Stephen Murphy 5:09.20.
Charlie Blanch finished the Nike Half Marathon in 1:19.33 to finish 25th in the M30 age group and 89th of 5845 finishers.
The SriLankan Airlines 10km event was a popular event for our members. Archie Noakes (30:52) finished 6th out of the 3562 finishers and first in his age group. Archie’s coach, Charlotte Wilson was 4th female in a great time of 34:19. Alex Smith finished 38th in the men’s 25-29 age group in 41:56. Maggie Armstrong completed the 10km in 62:57.
Jonathan Neethling finished 9th from almost 3000 starters in the 180 Nutrition Good Sport 5km race in a slick time of 17:06 (4th in the 14 -17 age bracket).
Christian Knox ran as a guide in both the 10km and 5km events and worked with our volunteers at the 41km drink station between his events!
The club appreciates the time our volunteers put in to help make this iconic event happen. Coordinator and former member, Judy Tweddle, Duncan Knox, Brian Anderson, Adrian Fitzgerald, Danny Hawksworth, Matty Goodger and Maggie (after her 10km run) along with a number of our friends from the Red & Black Running Team helped raise over $700 for the club. They had the drink station set up by 7am and were still working away well into the afternoon.
Meanwhile, over in the UK, Damien Bruneau finished the TCS London Marathon in 2:32:09.
Cover Photo Credit: Scott Sidley (@ss_athletics)