Fun walk/run/cycle event on Raetihi-Pipiriki Rd at Easter

Former event organiser Lucy Conway wants to do the 18km walk this year and get a medal. Photo / Supplied

Raetihi is gearing up for its 10th Gutbuster event on the hilly, scenic, historic little road between Raetihi and Pipiriki.

It's on Easter Sunday, April 4, between 9.30am and 2pm, with 18km, 25km and 50km options for walkers, runners and cyclists. This is its 10th year and there will be medals for all competitors, with gifts of local products such as honey, lip balm and Central Plateau vegetables.

It's a fun event, organiser Donna Journeaux said.

Cyclists power up a hill in the Raetihi Gutbuster. Photo / Supplied

People in the 25km cycle ride to Pipiriki will get a bus to take them back to Raetihi. Those in the 50km ride pedal all the way back, a climb of almost 500m.

The road is sealed all the way, but there are many twists, hills and a one-lane bridge to travel before the prizegiving at 2pm.

The purpose of the event is mainly to promote Raetihi. It comes under the umbrella of the Raetihi Promotions Charitable Trust, which also runs the town's information centre and holds other events.

Journeaux said next year she was hoping to have a more ambitious Gutbuster - perhaps a marathon or half marathon hill run across farms and based at the showgrounds with local food and entertainment added.

The Gutbuster event began with Lucy and Mike Conway and Raetihi Promotions' cycling subcommittee in 2011. The Raetihi-Pipiriki Rd had been sealed in 2010, and the event was a celebration of that.

There are two women who have done it every year since it began, Lucy Conway said. And in its first year three men did it on a three-seater bike.

It has always had a rural flavour, but Conway wanted it to be a "decent proper event that people liked and would enjoy". She decided each competitor should get a race pack, as people who run in marathons do.

The "logical thing" to put in the packs was fresh locally grown vegetables, donated by the growers. So she did that, with an Easter egg added.

"People seemed to love it, so we have kept doing it," she said.

Registrations for the Gutbuster start at 9.30am on Sunday, April 4, and the different sections start at intervals from 11am. Entry costs between $35 and $60.

It will be based outside the Waimarino Museum and Rural Fire Depot in Seddon St, with food stalls available.