Jan Taylor (46), a pre-school teacher at Longbush Rural Kindergarten, just north of Invercargill, completed the course in about 4hr 30min and is in only her second year of running, after shedding a whopping 63kg and winning the Weight Watchers' annual title.
She and husband Andrew farm at Wyndham and she found it a struggle to walk to the gate, so made doing that her first objective. Once she achieved that goal she began targeting walking lamppost to lamppost, in order to build up her stamina.
Then she was hauled into a team to represent the kindergarten in the annual Otago Central Rail Trail duathlon.
"I wanted to bike," she said. But she was left no alternative but to compete on the running section.
"That's what started me off, really."
Bitten by the running bug and advice from leaders in her Weight Watchers group to exercise in order to maintain a healthy weight, she targeted the Riverton to Invercargill marathon. An added incentive was the fact that it was celebrating its centennial year. She completed the 42.2km course in 5hr 15min.
Since that day in 2009, she has completed a further five marathons, including international circuit marathons Christchurch and Paris, along with the Wanaka Snow Farm's Big Easy and the challenging Motutapu event twice.
She made the targeted yesterday's Three Peaks as part of her build-up to the Great Wall of China Marathon on May 21.
Her very proud father, John Spicer, a past chairman of the Otago Rugby Union, was at the finish to celebrate his daughter's conquest of Dunedin's three surrounding mountains.
Putting his daughter's achievement into perspective, Spicer said he was told by former Highlanders coach Greg Cooper at the finish that it was the hardest thing he had ever done, and he was not going to do it again.
