Race report

Well, I said I would post a little about what the Rotorua Marathon was like. So here it is.
We left home pretty early (about 6am) to get there in time to find a parking spot, pick up my race number etc without having to stress about being late for the start (which was at 9am). The weather didn't look fantastic - cold, grey and breezy. At least it wasn't raining I guess.
After a haka, we were off through the streets of Rotorua before heading out of town and around the lake. I was feeling good - it was feeling easy. At about 18km we hit the first of the two big(ish) hills - Hamurana. It was mildly steep, but didn't feel that bad to me - it still wasn't feeling hard. I went through halfway in 1h54 I think it was. At 24km you hit the other hill - Mourea. This one still didn't feel that bad - on the way up at least. Going down the other side is when I started to feel the pain - my calves and quads started feeling pain. I managed to hang on for quite a while - keeping on going until 32km when my legs were hurting too much and I started walking/hobbling. This is where cold weather doesn't help - the last 10km of the race is fairly flat and exposed - so a cold breeze just meant my legs seized up even more. I managed to "run" a little bit more, but not much. I was determined to run the last km, so I gritted my teeth and ran. 4h23min at the end. 1078th out of 1901 finishers. And a lot of pain.
By the evening, my right knee had started aching a lot - I've worked out that it's my ITB that's flared up badly, probably caused by having to run on the right hand side of the road the whole way - the camber exacerbates the problem.
So, I ran, I finished. I missed my PB from Gold Coast last year by 2 minutes (or thereabouts), but this course was a lot harder. So I guess I have to be happy with that. And live with very sore legs for the next week.