Shepparton Running Festival participants jet off the starting line. Photo: Shepparton Running Festival
A forced last-minute course change couldn’t quell what was a record-breaking Campbell’s Shepparton Running Festival.
Hold tight - we’re checking permissions before loading more content
Despite flooding inundating segments of the Victoria Park Lake course and forcing a move to Princess Park, it failed to stop runners pounding the pavement in the 2km, 5km, 10km, half-marathon, and marathon races.
Race director Matthew Morris said the event, which has been held since 1998, ran smoothly, and saw a record number of registrations for the August 16-18 action.
“It went very well,” Morris said.
“We have a very good team that can get the job done.
“The weekend was great; the weather was perfect. It was a good day for it really.
“We had over 1700 registrations which is a record for the fourth year in a row for us, and we had records in the 5km, 2km, 10km and half-marathon fields.”
Members of the Shepparton Runners Club dash around the course. Photo: Shepparton Running Festival
The festival team put in a mammoth shift to make the necessary changes at such short notice, but the result was well worth it.
Runners from across Victoria and further converged on Shepparton to test themselves in a pulsating community environment, and for several athletes, Sunday’s long-form races proved a back to the future experience.
ACT runner William Rocks defended his men’s marathon title in a faster fashion than last year’s race, slicing more than three minutes off his 2025 effort to finish with a time of 2:27:09.
After claiming the Run Echuca Moama half-marathon earlier this month, local runner Hayley Waterson claimed the women’s marathon in Shepparton in a time of 2:56:07.
Nathan Stoate was another to better his race-winning effort of last year, taking out the half-marathon in a time of 1:05:52, while Rae Carter’s 1:23:28 run took out the women’s half.
14°C