2011 Gold Coast Airport Marathon – Australia – 02.07.2011 – 03.07.2011 (QLD)

The 2011 Gold Coast Airport Marathon will be held on the weekend of 2-3 July, ideally placed for a running holiday during the winter school holidays. It will also be hosting the Australian Open Running Club Championships.

Visit www.goldcoastmarathon.com.au for more information.

2010 Report

In glorious Gold Coast conditions, two long-standing race records, an age group world record and Kenyan and Japanese clean-sweeps in the full 42.195km marathon, were highlights of the new two-day Gold Coast Airport Marathon event held on the weekend of 3-4 July.

A record total of 23,812 runners greeted the starter across all events including more than 5,000 in the full marathon, making it the third largest marathon race in Australia of all-time and the largest in 10 years.

Rising marathon star from Kenya James Kariuki put on the afterburners in the closing stages to win the gold medal in the men's Gold Coast Airport Marathon in 2:13:53 from compatriots Peter Cherus and Ben Chebet.

Japan's Kaori Yoshida blitzed it in the women's marathon winning in 2:31:33, only two minutes outside the race record. She took the honours from fellow Japanese runners Chiharu Matsuo and Mayumi Fujita.

To cap off a great 42.195km race, New Zealand's Bernie Portenski achieved a new world record for age 60-plus women clocking 3:01:30.

A long-standing record was broken when Victoria's Lisa Weightman smashed an 18-year mark in the ASICS Half Marathon. The 2010 New Delhi Commonwealth Games representative covered the flat, windless Gold Coast course in a new Australian Allcomers Record of 1:09:00 to smash the 1992 mark of 1:09:38.

In further good news for Australia's Commonwealth Games hopes in October, Jeff Hunt and Martin Dent took first and second place respectively in the men's event ahead of Japan's Hironori Arai.

On Saturday the 14-year Southern Cross University 10km Run race record of 28:57 was broken when Gold Coast speedster Michael Shelley set a new mark of 28:53 to win the event for a fourth time.

The women's 10km Run was won by Brisbane's Lucy Kennedy (34:46) in a massive two minute personal best.

Canberra's Richard Nicholson took out the Wheelchair Half Marathon, the first race to open this year's Gold Coast Airport Marathon.

Source: Athletics Australia