Marathon Gold Drills for New Potential at Valentine Lake

TORONTO, Jan. 15, 2013 /CNW/ - Marathon Gold Corporation ("Marathon" or the "Company") (MOZ: TSX) today announced that it has commenced a 10,000 m drilling program at the Valentine Lake Project, located in Newfoundland, Canada. The winter 2013 drill program will focus on expanding both the underground and open pit resources at the Leprechaun Gold Deposit as well as targeting new gold occurrences from prospecting along a 17 km strike length of the Valentine Lake thrust fault including the Valentine East Area (includes VE Hill Zone, VE NE Zone and VE SW Zone), the Sprite Zone (includes Sprite Zone and Sprite NE Zone), and the J. Frank Zone (includes J. Frank Zone and SW J. Frank Zone) (Figure 1).

One drill is currently turning at the Valentine East Hill area where historical drilling returned positive results including 2.62 g/t Au over 3.2m in VL-99-18 and 5.67 g/t Au over 3.46m with 13.53 g.t Au over 1m and 2.20 g/t Au over 4.94m with 13.07 g/t Au over 0.44m in VL-98-1. These historic holes had incomplete sampling resulting in a discontinuous assay record over larger intervals of the drill core. A second drill is expected to start turning in the Sprite Zone in early February.

"It is anticipated that 2013 will be another exciting year for the Company as we launch our winter's drilling program focused on expanding the down-dip underground and open pit resource at the Leprechaun Gold Deposit with results expected to lead to a revised Resource in  2013. Additional drilling will focus on commencing resource development at the Valentine East, Frank and Sprite Zones," commented Phillip Walford, President and CEO of Marathon Gold Corporation.

Winter 2013 Goals:

• Update open pit and underground resource estimates for the Leprechaun Gold Deposit in 2013.
• Targeted drilling at the Valentine East, Sprite and J. Frank Zones and, if appropriate, to commence development of near surface open pit resources.
• Continued environmental baseline work including water quality and wildlife surveys.

To view Figure 1 please click on the following: Figure 1.pdf

About the Valentine Lake Project

Marathon Gold Corporation is the 100% owner of the Valentine Lake Project. The Leprechaun Gold Deposit is situated at the south-western end of the Valentine Lake Project, and the Valentine East Gold Zone is located 17 kilometers along strike running in a north-easterly direction.  The J. Frank Zone, which currently extends over an area in excess of 1.4 kilometers in length and 250 meters in width, is located up to 0.5 kilometers southwest along strike from the current Resource boundary of the Leprechaun Gold Deposit. These gold occurrences form part of a 23 kilometer long, highly prospective gold-bearing mineralized corridor focused along the Valentine Lake thrust fault.

Sherry Dunsworth, M.Sc., P. Geo., VP of Exploration, Marathon's Qualified Person, has reviewed the contents for accuracy and has approved this press release on behalf of Marathon.

About the Leprechaun Gold Deposit

The Leprechaun Gold Deposit has a combined NI 43-101 compliant Measured and Indicated Resource of 9,537,000 tonnes grading 2.22 g/t Au, for a total estimated 682,000 ounces of Au (October 22, 2012 news release). The Inferred Resource is 1,959,000 tonnes grading 2.30 g/t Au, for an estimated 145,000 ounces of Au. This Resource was estimated using a 0.5 g/t Au minimum cut-off for open pit resources and 1.5 g/t Au for underground resources. The Leprechaun Gold Deposit is open at depth and along strike.

About Marathon Gold Corporation

Marathon Gold Corporation is a North American gold resource development company, with projects located in the mining friendly province of Newfoundland and Labrador, the prolific Coeur d'Alene Mining District of Idaho and the historic gold rich Greenhorn District of Oregon, USA.  Marathon has a project pipeline consisting of early stage exploration to advanced resource development projects. Marathon is continually evaluating new gold resource development projects of merit that are located within the Americas.  Marathon's focused and low-cost approach to exploration and resource development has an established record of delivering rapid growth.  For more information visit: www.marathon-gold.com

CAUTIONARY STATEMENT REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION

Except for statements of historical fact relating to Marathon Gold Corporation, certain information contained herein constitutes "forward-looking statements". Forward-looking statements include statements that are predictive in nature, depend upon or refer to future events or conditions, or include words such as "expects", "anticipates", "plans", "believes", "considers", "intends", "targets", or negative versions thereof and other similar expressions, or future or conditional verbs such as "may", "will", "should", "would" and "could". We provide forward-looking statements for the purpose of conveying information about our current expectations and plans relating to the future and readers are cautioned that such statements may not be appropriate for other purposes.  By its nature, this information is subject to inherent risks and uncertainties that may be general or specific and which give rise to the possibility that expectations, forecasts, predictions, projections or conclusions will not prove to be accurate, that assumptions may not be correct and that objectives, strategic goals and priorities will not be achieved. These risks and uncertainties include but are not limited to those identified and reported in Marathon Gold Corporation's public filings, which may be accessed at www.sedar.com.  Other than as specifically required by law, we undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statement to reflect events or circumstances after the date on which such statement is made, or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events, whether as a result of new information, future events, results or otherwise.

SOURCE Marathon Gold Corporation

PDF available at: http://stream1.newswire.ca/media/2013/01/15/20130115_C5903_DOC_EN_22575.pdf