MARATHON WINNER GOES A ROUND WITH TYSON
THE champions of Sunday’s Gold Coast Airport Marathon planned to wind down after a gruelling day racing at Paradise Country yesterday.
It just turns out no one told the native animals at the Oxenford park.
“No running today,” said Japanese men’s champion Takuya Noguchi said after cuddling Coen the koala with his wife Takuya Noguchi.
“(The koala) was good, a bit smelly though,” the 29year-old said.
But it seemed the park’s marsupials took offence and stepped up for a fight like newly crowned boxing world champion Jeff Horn.
When a koala named Tyson was pulled out for publicity photos the gloves came off and the animal tried to give Mr Noguchi a love bite — seeming to copy the notorious actions of his namesake Mike Tyson in a bout with Evander Holyfield.
Mr Noguchi managed to dodge the attack.
And the umpire — in this case a park ranger — wrestled the pair apart.
To Mr Noguchi’s credit he continued to pose next to women’s champion Abebech Bekele, of Ethiopia, after the fracas. But Mr Noguchi stared the koala down.
Ms Bekele, who smashed the race record with a time of 2:25:34 at the weekend, made the wise choice not to handle Tyson yesterday.