Started out near the front as my goal was a sub-3. After the Mayor finished telling us to spend lots of money in Victoria he counted us down and we were off. Tried to settle into a good pace early on, checked my watch at 1k mark and was at just below 4min (target= 4:15/km) I was expecting this. I felt really good though so I kept it up. Found a pretty good groove and a few others as well which made it easy to keep the pace. One thing I found over the first part of the course, on the uphills I would always get a bit ahead of my "group" and then on the downhill they would either catch or pass me. I gotta figure that one out. Felt pretty good as I was coming up on the halfway point, hit the mat and I now have my fastest half marathon time 1:25:59! As I was heading to the turnaround point the leaders passed me going the other way - man was it awesome to see them running so fast and still looking so strong. Shortly after the turnaround it started to hurt. I could definitely feel my legs trying to tell me to stop or at least slow down. I was at 30k and kept telling myself it's only 10k more to go - that's easy 40-45mins!! I can do that! It was the longest and hardest 10k I've ever done, ever. It started to rain which didn't bother me at all, I'm glad I wore the long sleeve at this point. Now I just tried to focus on the people in front of me and tried to keep up and not loose them. It was all about seeing how slow I could run and still beat 3 hours. At about 1k-ish to go passed a friend of mine who sounded excited that I was going to beat 3hours. The last part seemed to take FOREVER! But when I turned that last corner and saw the finish line I sprinted as fast I could - which probably wasn't very fast. I looked at the clock and saw 2:56:?? and was thrilled!! It was very emotional after that, I almost broke down just getting my medal. I was finished! Months of hard work paid off! My first Marathon!! And in my goal time!! Looked around frantically for my wife and gave her a looong hug and cried just a bit, I just couldn't help it. That was probably the hardest physical thing I've done and it took a lot of focus and determination to finish it. I was happy!

5k Splits:
5k: 19:54
10k: 20:23
15k: 20:18
20k: 20:51
25k: 20:10
30k: 21:04
35k: 22:02
40k: 22:14
2.2k: 9:38

First half 1:25:59
Second half 1:30:38

Not much, maybe train a bit faster. I always seem to run faster than what I should. And train to stay fast after I get tired.

Put my jacket on from my wife and a plastic sheet they were handing out to keep the rain off. Started to get cold so I ate a bit then walked back to the hotel. Tried to jog but that wasn't going to happen!! Did some stretching and had a nice shower!


Lack of experience. My training wasn't exactly the way I wanted in the last few weeks because of my achilles acting up. However, they didn't bother me in the run so I must've done something right!


Great race, loved every minute of it. Course was great too! Would definitely recommend it!