Gold Coast Airport Marathon

Gold Coast Airport Marathon

It was a cool and crisp morning on Sunday the 1st July and even thought we Dalbyites are accustomed to the cold, we were feeling the chill. This year there were 5 competitors from TEAM DALBY, “Eddie’s Angels” Bron Green (Half Marathon) , Clare Byrne (10km) & Rachele Cumming (10km) and in the boys corner Mark Green (10km) and Jackson ‘Jacko’ Cumming in the Junior Dash (2.25km).

Bron started our well oiled machine off at 6.30am, joining 5000 other hopefuls in the 21km half marathon. This was Bron’s 5th Gold Coast Half Marathon and had hopes to do well. It was an awesome sight to see thousands of runners, all shapes and sizes out there doing their bit. Bron had an awesome race, she put the foot down in the last 5km and cruised in at 1 hour 34 minutes, she finished 11th in her age (35-39) category. (Pony also made the run in 1 hour 34 mins).

Jackson was next at 7.15am, the up and coming of Queensland talent were all there to be seen decked out in all the gear. Jacko had not had a good lead up and had been quite sick in the weeks prior to the big race, but he’s tough and he toughed it out. This was Jacko’s first big event and the excitement was very noticeable. There were 400 kids in this race and Jacko completed the 2.25km course in 12 minutes finishing 53rd in his 7 – 8 years category. He raced against kids up to 18 months older than himself. Well done little dude.

Next up it was the SOUL 10km with Greenie, Clare and Rach taking part. Although still a little cool, it had started to warm up into a lovely day. With 4000 competitors it wasn’t going to be easy to find some space to run comfortably. The gun went and it was about 2 minutes before we had crossed the START line. Our times are calculated by a computer chip on our shoes that registers went we cross start/finish, so an accurate time can be given. All 3 runners had had varying levels of training throughout the lead up and were all anxious to see what they were capable of doing. This was Clare and Rach’s first big running event and both were a little overwhelmed by the sheer amount of people. It took about 2km to get some space, very crowded and hard to get a rhythm going. We were all reasonably happy with the end result but knew we could go faster had it not been so slow at the start and again at the finishing shoots (2 traffic lanes down to ½). Greenie finished in the time of 46 minutes which placed him 60th out of 296 in his age category, Clare in 51 minutes which placed her 21st out of 225 age competitors and Rach in 54 minutes which placed her 67th out of 396 in her age category. Another Dalbyite Lyn Cuskelly was also a face in crowd in the 10km; Lyn had an awesome run in 52 minutes which placed her 14th out of 170 runners in her age category.


All in all the goals that we had set at the start of this year had been met (and then some). We are all keen to step up again next year and maybe a few Marathons might be run !! OR maybe just a half