An Olympic Games gold medalist and World champion Olympic Games and World champion is planning to run in the Air New Zealand Hawke's Bay International Marathon this year.
Rowing superstar and single sculls champion Mahe Drysdale's intentions for May 13 were revealed recently in Air New Zealand in-flight magazine Kia Ora and confirmed, three weeks into his training, when he spoke as a guest at the inaugural New Zealand Rural Sports Awards in Palmerston North last Friday night.
Drysdale is currently taking a break from international rowing, but hopes to be in Tokyo in 2020 in a bid to win the singles sculls for a third time in a row, at the age of 41.
It won't be the first time Drysdale has dabbled outside his main sport in a post-Olympics gap year, having three months apart in 2013 done the Coast to Coast endurance crossing of the South Island and Ironman Australia.
He's already completed the first leg of a similar double-hit this year, having paired with fellow rower Nathan Cohen to win the Macpac Motatapu endurance event's new teams mountain bike category in the Queenstown lakes district on March 4.