Former winner Hannah Oldroyd, of Christchurch, continued her fine form by winning the open women’s marathon, while Daniel Jones, of Wellington, won the men's race.
Oldroyd finished in a time of 2hrs 53.9sec.
But of the 13,000-odd runners and walkers, perhaps one of the most inspirational was resort resident David Graham who, at "87 and three-quarters" had the honour of being the oldest competitor on any start lines.
It was Graham’s fourth half marathon — he finished on Saturday in 3hr 6min — having only taken up running at the age of 83, inspired by the Queenstown Marathon and his family.
Graham said he had grandchildren entered in the kids’ run, one son did the full marathon while another son and a grandson also did the half marathon.
Wanting to break 3hr 30min on Saturday, he was elated with his time, partly attributed to encouragement from the crowd, and partly his running companion, 67-year-old Jenny Downie, who flew in from Brisbane for the event.
Unfortunately her luggage did not arrive with her, so she ended up running in borrowed clothes, and shoes.
Fellow Queenstown resident Bradley Jackson (23) finished his first full marathon, two years after being diagnosed with a severe and aggressive form of terminal tongue cancer, also raising more than $10,000 for the Head & Neck Cancer Support Charitable Trust.
Crossing the finish line in just over five hours, Jackson said "the body didn’t know what it was in for".
"[I’m] just really humbled and grateful for the people that I have in my life, they’ve supported me through a lot of rubbish over the last two years and this is more for them, and for my family and friends and loved ones who can’t be here today, it’s really, really special."
Having registered for the Queenstown event he decided to see how his legs pulled up after the Auckland event.
"It just so happened that the recovery was pretty good, and I felt fine, so I said, ‘let’s go’.
"Coming through Queenstown right at the end there it’s just spectacular, the amount of people that line the streets and cheer you home is so unreal, it’s really cool."
In second was Hiro Tanimoto (Wellington, 2:32:05) and Ben Gatting, of Auckland, was third (2:37:53).
"There were way more hills than I remembered, I’m sure they’ve put a new one in under a bridge somewhere and up the other side, but the support was great. I just felt like absolute rubbish right from the start, but I survived."
The second woman home was Ranfurly’s Katie Morgan (3:06:57), with Dunedin’s Margie Campbell in third (3:07:21).
Auckland’s Jack Moody was the first man home in the half marathon in 1:08:13, — he also also won that in 2020 — followed by fellow Aucklander David Lee (1:10:30) and Dunedin’s Simon Cromarty (1:12:14).
Less than 40 seconds separated the top three men in the 10km event — Ben Scott, of Invercargill, won in 36min 37sec, followed by Dunedin’s Leon Miyahara (37:11) and Paul Nicholas, also of Dunedin, (37:.15).
Canterbury’s Natalie Dryden won the women’s 10km (39:41), Berber Swart, of the Netherlands, was second (41:09) and Sydney’s Fleur Starcevic third (41:55).
