Seaford Half Marathon

Peter Burfoot reports on this weekend's Seaford Half marathon:

"A small team of three male Waddies tackled the increasingly popular Seaford Half Marathon. This race starts on the Seafront and travels inland the short distance to Bishopstone before leaving the roads and rising steeply up the Downs. It is mainly single file on this stretch and there was a queue for the 1st stile. After a downhill burst there is a long climb to a col on the ridge of the Downs at around 550ft.

Every uphill is followed by a downhill and this starts gently soon after the the summit but gets ever steeper as you descend over a perilous flinty track down into Alfriston. At the steepest point and just before rejoining the tarmac, Club President Roger, camera in hand was supporting with Christine, waiting for their daughter who made her debut at Eastbourne in March.

The pace slows as the course meanders along banks of the Cuckmere partly between nettles on a narrow path, slippery after recent rain. In this section numerous stiles, kissing gates, muddy areas and cowpats have to be negotiated and you pass 1 of only 2 of the mile markers, I saw - at 8 miles.

Roger and Christine again greeted us as we crossed the A259 at the Golden Galleon while the runners prepared for the final hill which is punctuated by the 11 mile marker - an assault on the 282 ft Seaford Head, before taking their lives into their hands on the final helter skelter drop to the Seafront and the race along the Prom to the Finish.

The rain held off for the race but the cloud cover kept this normally hot race quite temperate this year. There were water stations aplenty, strategically placed, and squash and other things were also offered at some of them.

The results were split into male and female and the positions were also allocated on that basis:

Male results

86 1:53:47 Peter Burfoot
121 1:59:07 Albert Kemp
176 2:06:51 David Jones

Don't forget that Wednesday sees the resumption of the SGP series with the flat Worthing 10k, followed on 22nd June by the hilly Heathfield 10k.