79-year-old set to smash his 200th half-marathon
Just nine years after he took up jogging, Hamilton runner Rod Gill will compete in his 200th half-marathon in Auckland this Sunday.
When he retired in 2014 and his wife Jean was still working, Rod Gill had to find something to do with himself.
While most people retire from running when they hit 70, the Hamiltonian feels very lucky that he was able to take it up.
"If I hadn't have been running, I might not have been here today", Gill tells RNZ's Morning Report.
Rod Gill started jogging after stepping away from full-time work in 2014.
Barfoot & Thompson Auckland Marathon
At first, Gill jogged around his neighbourhood and joined 5 and 10-kilometre "fun runs".
In 2016 he took it up a level, joining the Hamilton Roadrunners club and competing in the Rotorua Off Road Half Marathon which is 21.1km.
"One thing led to another, and after a couple of months, I'd done a couple of dozen, and I kept on going. I just loved doing half-marathons. "
"Injury-free" for the whole of 2016, Gill finished 52 half-marathons.
"It ended up a lot of planning. You had to be careful what you ate during a week and what you did, and plan months ahead."
But by the end of 2016, Gill's body was telling him that something was wrong. In early 2017, he was diagnosed with bowel cancer.
"The doctor shot me into hospital and they checked me out. And within a few weeks, I was operated on."
Four months later, though, he was lacing up his running shoes again.
"I've played sport most of my life and I think that's helped.
"Running, I think, sort of helped the cancer. If I hadn't have been running, I might not have been here today. But who knows?"
In his early years of running half-marathons, Gill crossed the finish line in under 2 hours, but nowadays his usual time is more like 2.5 hours.
Running in the Garmin Half Marathon with a mate this Sunday, he'll try to get under 3 hours.
Senior runners don't have to "burst their boiler" doing running events, Gill says - "you can run and walk and enjoy it" - but notes that event time limits can make that harder.
After sampling half marathons all around the country, the Garmin Half Marathon (part of the Barfoot & Thompson Auckland Marathon) is his all-time favourite.
"I've done the last ten there. The atmosphere is another thing I go for… I enjoy being out there."
