Singapore runners make up biggest overseas representation at 2023 edition of Gold Coast Marathon
Singapore, 6 July 2023 – In what was deemed as the bounce back year from Covid-19, the 2023 edition of Village Roadshow Theme Parks Gold Coast Marathon witnessed a record-breaking field over the first weekend of July on the beautiful Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia.
Featuring eight races over two days, including the Village Roadshow Theme Parks Gold Coast Marathon, CPL Wheelchair Marathon, ASICS Half Marathon, Southern Cross University 10km Run, CPL Wheelchair 10km, Gold Coast Airport 5km Fun Run, Health and Wellbeing Queensland 4km Junior Dash and Health and Wellbeing Queensland 2km Junior Dash, the event saw over 28,000 participants take to the roads clocking in some of their best times.
Singapore made up the highest number of international participants over the weekend, with notable running groups and clubs such as Singapore Runners Club and Running Department making up that number, as well as a number of elite and national runners, to complete the field.
21.1km ASICS Half-Marathon
Coming back for a second year after her Gold Coast Marathon ASICS Half-Marathon debut last year, distance runner Vanessa Lee hoped to go one better than her debut GCM timing of 1:22.26, although she admitted it was a tough time to beat.
"I did very well last year I feel. It was my first half marathon, and I did a 82.26," said Lee. "I am just hoping to come back and do a Personal Best. It is difficult to beat, but hoping to get a good timing."
"Gold Coast Marathon is one of the bigger names, so it's really exciting to see many Singaporeans around even on board the flight here. It's a good opportunity to clock a good Half Marathon time to qualify for the Standard Chartered Singapore Marathon elite pen this year. Hopefully I'll get to go to the Worlds this year too if I get a good time in this race."
Although Lee narrowly missed out on beating her Gold Coast Marathon ASICS Half-marathon timing set in 2022 by five seconds, she was upbeat in her Instagram post after the race saying: "The conditions were notably different this year. Overall, I ran well and felt much better at the 18km mark compared to last year. If I had the chance to do this race again, I would have increased my pace much earlier on."
There were many participants making their debuts in the Gold Coast Marathon this year, one of which was recreational runner Chermaine Zhou, and was both nervous and excited about her race leading up to the race weekend.
Said Chermaine: "It's my first time to Gold Coast Marathon, and I think I managed to hit my Personal Best (PB) today so I'm really happy. I heard many friends talk about Gold Coast Marathon and heard it's a relatively flat course and many people are able to get their PBs, so I decided to come over and try it."
Running Department pacer Samsidah and her husband Herrizuan also shared similar sentiments as Chermaine in their debut overseas run.
"We have been running together ever since we were married, which is almost 20 years. But this is our very first overseas run," reflected Herrizuan.
Samsidah added: "We decided to come here this year because we have been hearing a lot about this race from past runners who have come here. They shared about how Gold Coast (Marathon) has a fast and flat course and many of them achieved their Personal Best times, so we've been contemplating for quite some time so now that Covid-19 is over we said, why not?"
Gold Coast Marathon: 42.195KM Full Marathon
Day 2 witnessed the Full Marathon and 10km races, and similarly runners were enthused and overwhelmed by their experiences, even if not all of them managed to achieve their personal best times this time around.
Elite running couple Gordon Lim and Verna Goh, recognisable faces in the Singapore running community, pushed hard from the beginning and set the course alight with their speed but did not achieve their personal bests. Even then, both were satisfied with their races and the learnings that they took out of this year's Full Marathon.
"I did want to try to get a personal best, and hopefully with the personal best qualify for the SEA Games in 2025. However, as the qualifying window isn't open this race worked more as a trial for me. To test the progress of my training, and maybe we need to tweak a few things here and there," said Gordon, who was racing in his third Gold Coast Marathon.
Verna on the other hand, shared that this was a key race for her. "I have done a couple of races in preparation for this marathon, one in Taiwan and one in Singapore. This was my first Gold Coast Marathon, but my third overseas Full Marathon overall."
"I have to say the conditions today were quite good. It was significantly warmer though, compared to London, which was about 5 degrees lower than here, but I loved the crowds and the atmosphere."
Running nurse Wong Yik Siong, who was running in his first overseas marathon, was initially worried he would not be able to cope with the cold as he isn't used to the weather, but still managed to clock an impressive timing of 2:49:23, a personal best timing.
Said Wong: "As much as people said that yesterday's half marathon was 8 degrees and it was 15 degrees today, I still felt today was very cold for me as well. When I went out I just thought that the conditions may affect me, as it's not something I was very used to. But then things just came along and when the pack moved ahead I just stayed within my comfortable but hard zone, and then eventually it paid off."
Singapore running influencers Natalie Dau and Paul Martin were also in the thick of things in the full marathon.
"It is still as fantastic as I remember if not more so. Great crowds with perfect conditions to run in today. I'm sure nearly everyone broke their PB out there," shared Natalie who was competing in her second Gold Coast Marathon.
"I think the volunteers out there were good. Everyone supports this run whether they are running or not. The kids are out on the streets, and you know it's beautiful. What better place to race?"
For Paul, it was his first overseas full marathon albeit it was his tenth marathon overall. Sharing about his first overseas Marathon race experience Paul said: "I wanted to go slow, surprisingly I went to a cruising comfortable pace of 5 mins / km, which was surprising for a longer run then I saw Natalie, which gave me a bit of a push. Picked it up a little. But then I reached the 39km mark and my hamstrings started cramping up and I couldn't push the speed I wanted to, and I just took it over the line."
10KM Race
National runners Melvin Wong, Serena Teoh and Jeevanesh s/o Soundarajah, all opted for the shorter 10km distance for different reasons.
Melvin, who represented Singapore in the 2022 Southeast Asian Games in Vietnam, is going through a transition year focusing on shorter races and has not had as much training as he would have liked entering the 10km race on Sunday.
He shared: "I didn't have much expectations today. I had a bit of a bump in training due to military training and official duties at the recent SEA Games, so I am pleasantly surprised that I did pretty okay with today's 10km. The idea for me really was to try and have a good middle part of the race and to finish as strong as possible."
Serena on the other hand, suffered a bout of shin splints in early May leading up to Gold Coast Marathon and decided to shorten her race to the 10km two weeks prior to the event to prevent her injury from flaring up. Said Serena: "The objective of today's race for me is to finish well and healthy. I felt it was a very good course and at no point did we bump into the Full Marathon runners."
For Jeevanesh, having come back from 7 weeks of rehabilitation from injury, this was his first run after being cleared by his physio less than a week before the race.
"It was a different ball game today, usually when I come for a race I would be prepared to try my best or do a personal best. This time around coming back from an injury, for this event the objective was to enjoy the run so it was nice to run without the pressure of performing."