It was after NSW Crown Lands came to the rescue two weeks before the event after North Brother Mountain nearly wasn't the biggest hill to overcome.

"After five years of running the event we learned we run on a significant portion of Crown land and council weren't able to approve it," Mr Maher said.

"Thankfully Crown Lands turned it around rapidly for us to ensure we could run this event."

The numbers make for interesting reading with a significant portion of people from outside the Port Macquarie-Hastings region making the trip to simply support family or friends.

Those numbers came as a surprise to Mr Maher with the data previously being overlooked.

"There was a significant amount of locals who had people come from outside the region to support them," he said.

"It's not something that is ever calculated with the data, but this year 472 people came in from outside the region just to support the 247 locals."

It equated to an additional 1065 additional nights of accommodation - and that's just for people with a local connection.

"Even if they're not racing, people are still coming into town to support other people that are. It's something that has been overlooked when you look at the economic impact of an event."

An additional 251 runners came from outside the region who stayed for three nights on average with another 118 making it a day trip.

The Cancer Council was also a big winner with the event raising just under $31,000.

"That's a significant increase on what we've been able to fundraise in the past and I think we promoted it a lot more effectively this year," Mr Maher said.

"Our goal was 15 ... we smashed it out of the park which was a huge surprise to us and a huge surprise to the Cancer Council as well."

Next year's event has been confirmed for October 2.

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