Runners have right stuff in weekend off-road challenge

Ian Calder cruised easily through  Athletic Whangarei's half-marathon (21.1km)  at Glenbervie Forest, winning the final leg of the club's two-day marathon.
The  challenging off-road run requires runners and walkers to complete a 16km hill run on Saturday morning and a 5.1km run on Saturday afternoon which, together with Sunday's run, give a total of 42.2km - the distance of a marathon. However, participants can choose, as Calder did, to enter in just one (or two) of the runs.
Apart from splatters of mud, Calder, 52, finished the half-marathon looking fresh in a fast 1:24:36  - well clear of Tim Goodwin, 37, the overall winner, who recorded 1:32:12.
"It seemed too slow at the start, so I though I'd just go at an even pace," Calder said.
 He went ahead running by himself for almost the entire race. He liked the course, but "coming downhill was a bit slippery".
"It was my long run as part of my [weekly] training for the Oceania Games, at the beginning of July," he said.
Goodwin, in turn, won the two-day event based on the combined times, and performed  impressively over the three races with wins in the 10km and 5.1km. He came  second place to Calder in the 21.1km, with  a total time of 2:56:45 for the complete off-road marathon.
Fred Needham, 61, came home an exhausted third in the 21.1km in 1:41:26, and second overall in 3:16:15; with Jim Kettlewell, 65,  Waipari Henwood, 46,  Phil Tetzlaff, 33, and John Kent, 59, following.
Amy Burke, 28, repeated her winning performance of last year with a clean  first in the 16km, 5.1km and 21.1km. She was  overall winner with a  combined time of 3:25:56.
After the 16km and 5.1km on Saturday, Burke felt "shattered" but still managed to draw on her reserves and enjoy Sunday's 21.1km. "It was loads of fun and great camaraderie here - a fabulous event," Burke said.
Estelle Tiller, 44, ran strongly, taking second place overall in 3:49:13, ahead of Carolyn Henwood, 46, Robyn Ackermann and Judith Bradshaw, 59.
The youngest runner in the 16km, 16-year-old Travis Connelly, demonstrated that he handles longer, tough races well, finishing seventh in 1:22:18.
In the 5.1km race, which included a children's section, Cole Miller won the under-8 years boys' race, while Phillipa Croft won the girls' race.
Jack Dempster took first in the under-12 boys' and Rachyl Edge triumphed in the girls' section.
Jackie Watson won the walk from Janet Tucker, who took second place.
Organiser Oringa Barack  would like to  cater for greater numbers in the future. "We would like to make [the two-day marathon] bigger, but at the moment it's only a club-run event - we'd need major sponsorship and a whole lot more helpers," she says.