Kirikiriroa Marathon 2018

Given a goal for this year is marathon related I thought I should catch-up on my  marathon posts.

In the UK I did 4 marathons, I think I blogged the other ones (Just checked, no think I started blogging after the first 2.

Anyway, marathon V was Kirikiriroa, my home town at the time in Hamilton, 2018.

It had been 7 years since my last marathon, Nottingham and while I'd tried to stay fit I had a long road to go to get marathon ready. Marathon training with young children was not so easy. Not least because a 3 hour training run means 3 hours of time missed with the kids. So my training was no where near as intense as when I was in London without kids.

But I was determined to get back to running so slow and steady I got in to it. I was only doing 2-3 proper runs in a week, with quite a few very short runs to work in the meantime.

A new development for my training was that I had a GPS watch, a standard Garmin watch which not only kept my time but how far I ran and mapped my runs for me. I'd resisted getting a Garmin for a while but actually really appreciated having it as it helped with motivation.

The Kirikiriroa marathon runs along the banks of the Waikato River, which is a relatively narrow, quite undulating path. I did all my long runs along here so knew what I was getting myself in for.

I was training to be able to do the marathon in under 6min/ks.

Another thing I tried for this marathon was energy gels. It was hard to know if they were helping but it seems it's the standard thing to do now so I figure it must be the right thing to do.

On the day, our friend Ann picked me up, she was also running the marathon. It was dark when we arrived. The crowds were minimal, unlike any of the previous four marathons, really just a couple of hundred people maybe.

We were quite early, so a fair bit of standing around.

The start was cool, they had a Maori challenge to get us underway which was great. The sun was beginning to rise as we took off.

Hills right from the start, a very slow first km. Slowly in to a rhythm. Hopefully the Strava frame below works which shows the map, time etc. If you're on Strava you should be able to see more details via the link


I made it under 4h 12m which was my goal, I was fading real fast towards the end but was happy in the end.

So I was back on the running wagon, no more marathons in 2018 but two in 2019 which I'll write up soonish, hopefully before I get on to #VIII.