07.01.2008

Tasmanians dominate at Cadbury

Glorious weather greeted a bumper field at the 25th Cadbury Marathon on Sunday morning.

One hundred and five competitors from around the world took off at 6am in the 42.2km event. It was the first time the event had hit triple figure entries and entrants came from as far as New York, UK, Mexico, Italy and Malaysia.  

The Cadbury Marathon titles were awarded to Jarrod Shaw and Melinda Shutt of Hobart. Shaw was in a lead pack of three for most of the day with Tim Sloan (second in 2.46.46) and David Bone (2.49.19). He broke away with 10km remaining to take out his first Cadbury Marathon title in 2.44.52.

"It was great to win Cadbury’s today," he said. "Last year I was selected to represent Australia in the Standard Chartered Marathon in Nairobi, but had to pull out with a calf strain. So to run and win a marathon today is awesome."

Melinda Shutt’s story continues to grow with each day she puts on her running shoes. After taking up running only 15 months ago, she completed the Melbourne Marathon back in October in 3 hours 28 minutes. In only her second effort over the distance, Shutt ran 3:11.56 to set a massive personal best and win the 2008 Cadbury Marathon and Tasmanian State Title.

The inspirational runner provided this advice to others seeking to step in her footsteps: "Don’t start out too hard, take exercise one day at a time and do it with others."

Her newfound hobby not only enabled her to lose 20kg in the past 15 months, but Sunday also won her $950.

Edson Sanches of New York City returned to Cadbury’s Estate 10 years after he completed the 1996 edition. Following his 486th marathon, he said "it was a lot of fun" Incredibly, Edson has averaged 30 marathons per year since he last visited the Cadbury Marathon a decade ago.

In the Cadbury Half Marathon, Launceston’s Mark Jackson was the stand-out. After recording the fastest marathon times by a Tasmanian in the past two years at the Gold Coast Airport Marathon, Jackson won his third straight Cadbury Half Marathon in 1:13.52.

Making her debut over the 21.1km half marathon distance was Hobart’s Angela Grimmond. A newcomer to the sport, she ran brilliantly to hold off Christie Harris (1:33.18) and Olivia Gillies (1:37.40) to stop the clock at 1:32.32. A new mark was also set for numbers in the Cadbury Half Marathon on Sunday with 239 entrants.  

For those who weren’t quite up to running a half or full marathon, there were two fun runs on offer. First up was the Caramello 1.25km, a one-lap sprint of the Cadbury Estate which was filled with primary school age students.

The Freddo 5k allowed runners to do four laps of the Cadbury Estate, with the pace much brisker as several of the established runners on the Tasmanian scene turned up. Alex Spinks ran away from John Jago in the third lap to win a mammoth box of chocolates for his efforts.

Courtesy Richard Welsh (Athletics Tasmania)