Gutsell won in a time of 35min 33sec and was followed home by Stewart Paul (Waikouaiti) 36min 3sec and veteran Geoff Anderson (Caversham) 36min 9sec.
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Gutsell (49), the personnel manager at the freezing works in Mataura, had been pipped at the post by younger runners in 2008 and 2010 and finished runner-up both times.
Gutsell, who runs 160km a week in his build-up, knew that he had the stamina to set a fast pace and went to the front from the gun.
"I didn't want to wait for the sprint home," he said. "I had to go hard all the way."
At the end of the first of the four laps he held a 12-second lead over Paul and Anderson who were running together.
He kept up his unrelenting pace on the second lap and increased his lead to 20 seconds.
However, Gutsell knew he could not relax because Paul and Anderson were fast finishers and would be in for the kill if he faltered.
"I wanted to get a bigger lead each lap but it was hard into the wind," he said.
The strong northeast wind made running difficult over the last half lap but he had a 38-second buffer and it was his race to lose after that.
Paul (38), an environmental technician at McRaes, knew that it would be impossible to bridge the gap on the last lap.
"I was having a tough battle with Geoff and that is what I concentrated on," he said.
Paul closed the gap by eight seconds on the last lap but it was not enough and Gutsell had a 30-second margin at the finish.
Paul and Anderson were together coming into the Caledonian Ground but with 250m to go Paul made his bid.
"I didn't know how Geoff was feeling but I decided to have a go and he didn't come with me," Paul said.
Paul took six seconds out of Anderson in the last 250m.
Dunedin school teacher Sue Cuthbert was even more convincing when winning the women's race.
Cuthbert (44), a physical education teacher at Kaikorai Valley College, led from the start and was never in any danger.
She won by the convincing margin of 3min 34 seconds from Jude Patterson (Lawrence) in a time of 41min 09sec.
Patterson was timed at 44min 43sec and Sharee Sharam (Reservoir) was third in 45min 42sec.
Cuthbert led by 46 seconds after a lap and increased it to 1min 46sec after two laps and kept on going away over the last two laps.
It was a gutsy effort by Patterson (35), a sheep and beef farmer from Lawrence, to finish second.
She improved by 13 minutes on the time she ran in the same event two years ago.
Former international Trevor Mayhew (Encounter Bay) won the 5km walk in 29min 15sec from Tom Cockerill (Dunedin) 31min 07sec and Robin White (Queanbeyan) 31min 23sec.
