One of Queenstown's fittest men, Adrian Bailey, of Active Qt, will compete tomorrow in the 29th annual Race the Train event in Wales.
The Welshman won the 25km race 10 years ago, and has high hopes of repeating the feat tomorrow..
Up to 3500 competitors will line up alongside the famous Tywyn steam train to race the route taken by the Talyllyn Railway on its journey to Abergynolwyn and back.
Mr Bailey drew on his experience of the Welsh event in January, when he organised the inaugural race the Kingston Flyer Steam train fun run.
Brought up in the small town of Dolgellau where his parents still live, as do his sister and her family, he had plannedhis trip around the race, but was not heading home just for it.
The course covers public roads, lanes, unmetalled roads, tracks, farmland and grazing pastures, which the 36-year-old says are not short of hillclimbs.
The race, for him, was a training run before he competes in Waitakere, Auckland in the more challenging Lydiard Legend half-marathon next month.
He also took part in the Gold Coast half-marathon last month.
Before he left for the United Kingdom, Mr Bailey's training course consisted of variation between Queenstown's surrounding mountains, such as The Ben Lomond and the trails around Moke Lake.
