Officials announced yesterday that because a marshal failed to show up, many competitors in the half-marathon run did not cover the full distance.
The distance of the half-marathon is 21.0975km, but many ran about 600m less.
Race director Becs Adlam said the incident occurred on at the corner of Halsey and Ward Sts. However, the marshal who was supposed to be stationed at this point did not show up, which led to some participants taking the wrong route.
"They were supposed to turn right and go down towards a turnaround point but they turned left and continued on that route."
She said those who had read the route and knew where to go did that and those right at the front were guided through the course by a cyclist. The top-three placegetters ran the full course.
Obviously it was not what organisers wanted, but Ms Adlam said they wanted to acknowledge the mistake. She did not know how many people were affected and it would probably never be known.
"We deeply regret the impact this may have had on your experience," she said in an email to competitors.
Half-marathon runner Maddie Hardie-Boys said she was pretty disappointed as it was her first time running the distance.
"I’m a bit gutted as I can’t really say I have done a half-marathon because I haven’t done the full distance," she said.
She recorded a time of 1hr 53min which she said was a surprise to her, but now she knew why.
Another runner, Rodrigo Figoeroa, said it was a little bit disappointing. He cut 15 minutes off his time from last year to record 1hr 45min and said he could now understand why he had such a good time.
Mistakes happened, he said, ... "but the race still had a good vibe".
He was aiming to run a full marathon next year.
