Gold Coast Marathon

Gold Coast Marathon
Gold Coast Marathon
	Starting line of the 1986 race
Date	July
Location	Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia
Event type	Road
Distance	Marathon, half marathon
Established	1979 (45 years ago)
Course records	Men's: 2:07:50 (2019); Yuta Shitara; Women's: 2:24:22 (2024); Yuki Nakamura
Official site	Official website
Participants	5,769 (2019)

The Gold Coast Marathon is an annual road marathon on the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia, first held in 1979. Marketed as "Australia's premier road race",^[1] the marathon is one of two races in Australia to hold World Athletics Label status, the other being Sydney Marathon.^[2]^[3] The marathon is held on the first Sunday of July each year, with other races held the day before.

The men's course record of 2:07:40 was achieved by Naoki Koyama in 2023. Lindsay Flanagan is the women's course record holder with her run of 2:24:43 in 2022.^[4]^[5]

History

The inaugural Gold Coast Marathon was held on 2 September 1979 in the suburb of Evandale as part of a health awareness campaign for the Gold Coast. It started and ended at the Evandale Civic Centre and consisted of six laps over Chevron Island Bridge, through Surfers Paradise and over the Isle of Capri Bridge. There were 124 competitors in the marathon, 144 competitors in the half marathon and 423 competitors in an additional fun run. The winning male and female were Eric Sigmont from Victoria and Mary Murison from Lismore.^[6]^[7]

The 2020 edition of the race was cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic, with all registrants receiving refunds.^[a]^[9]^[8] Four days before the scheduled event, the 2021 edition of the race was cancelled due to a three-day snap lockdown in parts of Queensland, including the Gold Coast, that was announced earlier that day.^[10]^[11]^[12]^[b] The lockdown would have ended hours before the start of the event, which would have made attempting to hold the event impractical.^[13]

Winners

Key: Course record (in bold)

Ed.	Year	Men's winner	Time^[c]	Women's winner	Time^[c]	Rf.
1	1979	Eric Sigmont	2:28:44	Lindsey Simmons	2:50:17
2	1980	Andrew Lloyd	2:23:02	Mary Murison	2:58:33
3	1981	Rod Lyons	2:24:04	Margaret Reddan	2:58:33
4	1982	Alain Lazare	2:19:21	Jill Colwell	2:43:25
5	1983	Laurie Adams	2:16:22	Rhonda Bushby	2:49:17
6	1984	Pat Carroll	2:23:16	Margaret Reddan	2:57:13
7	1985	Pat Carroll	2:17:10	Margaret Reddan	2:54:55
8	1986	Peter Mitchell	2:14:59	Margaret Reddan	2:47:09
9	1987	Laurie Adams	2:18:24	Janet McAfee	2:54:22
10	1988	Pat Carroll	2:10:44	Ngaire Drake	2:39:25
11	1989	Brad Camp	2:10:11	Jan Fedrick	2:51:30
12	1990	Allan Carman	2:15:15	Hiromi Satoyama	2:40:57
13	1991	Shinji Kawashima	2:14:01	Jackie Hallam	2:36:23
14	1992	Katsumi Kitajima	2:14:14	Mari Tanigawa	2:35:45
15	1993	Sean Quilty	2:15:31	Eriko Asai	2:29:29
16	1994	Hajime Nakatomi	2:15:05	Yuko Yamazoe	2:43:20
17	1995	Roderic De Highden	2:13:59	Julie Rose	2:38:42
18	1996	Magnus Michelsson	2:20:20	Sylvia Rose	2:40:17
19	1997	Pat Carroll	2:11:21	Susan Hobson	2:32:43
20	1998	Fred Kiprop	2:11:15	Jane Salumäe	2:33:34
21	1999	Fred Kiprop	2:14:02	Hiromi Igarishi	2:35:19
22	2000	Joseph Kahugu	2:16:39	Samantha Hughes	2:44:04
23	2001	Phil Costley	2:13:36	Yuko Arimori	2:35:40
24	2002	Rod de Highden	2:15:22	Saori Kawai	2:37:48
25	2003	Dickson Marwa	2:12:53	Shireen Crumpton	2:40:10
26	2004	Gemechu Woyecha	2:15:47	Anna Thompson	2:40:53
27	2005	Dickson Marwa	2:16:10	Jackie Fairweather	2:34:42
28	2006	Lee Troop	2:14:13	Jennifer Gillard	2:41:06
29	2007	Toyokazu Yoshimura	2:20:07	Ayumi Hayashi	2:33:22
30	2008	Kazuo Ietani	2:14:17	Shireen Crumpton	2:38:16
31	2009	William Chebor	2:11:58	Lauren Shelley	2:42:22
32	2010	James Mbugua	2:13:53	Kaori Yoshida	2:31:33
33	2011	Nicholas Kamakya	2:10:01	Goitetom Haftu	2:30:08
34	2012	Alemayehu Shumye	2:10:35	Kaori Yoshida	2:30:36
35	2013	Yuki Kawauchi	2:10:01	Yukiko Akaba	2:27:17
36	2014	Silah Limo	2:09:14	Asami Kato	2:28:51
37	2015	Kenneth Mungara	2:08:42	Risa Takenaka	2:28:25	^[14]
38	2016	Kenneth Mungara	2:09:00	Misato Horie [jp; de]	2:26:40	^[14]
39	2017	Takuya Noguchi [jp]	2:08:59	Abebech Bekele	2:25:34	^[14]
40	2018	Kenneth Mungara	2:09:49	Ruth Chebitok	2:24:49	^[14]
41	2019	Yuta Shitara	2:07:50	Rodah Tanui	2:27:56	^[14]
—	—	cancelled in 2020 and 2021 due to coronavirus pandemic				^[9]^[11]
42	2022	Jo Fukuda	2:10:55	Lindsay Flanagan	2:24:43	^[5]
43	2023	Naoki Koyama	2:07:40	Rodah Tanui	2:27:10	^[4]
44	2024	Timothy Kipkorir	2:08:52	Yuki Nakamura	2:24:22

Notes

^ Registrants who paid by credit card would receive refunds automatically (minus credit card fees), while other registrants would receive a full refund via direct deposit after supplying bank details.^[8]
^ The lockdown was announced in response to an unvaccinated hospital worker who had been travelling throughout Queensland while she was potentially infectious for over a week.^[12]
^ ^a ^b h:m:s