 The Beachyhead Marathon is one of the first events on my race calendar each year. Starting in 1981 as the Seven Sisters Marathon, 2023 would see the 43rd running of the event and my 9th appearance on the start line. Ignore me saying it's my 10th in a minute, maths was never my strong point. With over 2,000 participants each year, it's arguably the biggest trail marathon in the UK and certainly one of the most seen. I lined up with some of my friends from Zwift for what was to be in terms of the weather anyway, another epic year in the history of this race. It may be pouring with rain but it's a celebration today because this is my 10th Beachyhead Marathon and we have had a heck of a year, we've done the Grand Slam, we've got under three hours for the marathon in April. So this is like a celebration end of the year run. Here's Amy and Seb and Jonathan, all runners on Zwift. We've all come together to run this today. We're going to have a very wet day but we're not going to worry about that because it's Beachyhead Marathon and we love it and we love the Seven Sisters. This is going to be awesome. So this is Alan and Alan did the Transvolcania Ultra on my recommendation. What did you think of it? It's pretty good time but well worth it. Five, four, three, two are off on the Beachyhead Marathon 2023. So the first thing we do with Beachyhead Marathon is climb up a little hill. Neil from our club is in the lead going up the hill. Okay, we've started. No gantry this year because of the wind and the rain. It's not too bad at the moment but I think it's supposed to get worse later on into the run. There are so many people that it's going to be a walk up the hill. All right Amy. Right, that's the sub three hour time out the window already. It's important not to go crazy up the first climb. I like to ease my way in so a walk or a gentle jog ensures my heart rate doesn't go sky high in the first five minutes of the race. It can also be quite slippery so always best to avoid an injury DNF in the first 200 meters. Top of the first hill bit flat now. Beautiful views over Eastbourne even though it's a miserable day. It didn't take long for the weather to kick in once we reached the exposed ridge of the South Downsway. This first section takes us along the bridleway past Eastbourne Downs golf club before dropping down through the trees and into the valley. There's the trick point we're going to go downhill now into Jevington so around 5k in heading down the hill now. And amazingly there are people supporting. I would say there's definitely a little bit of rain in the air and maybe a gust of wind. I have felt something yes definitely a gust or two of wind. This is Elana and Elana ran the autumn 100 with us last weekend and she's here doing the marathon. How are you feeling? Okay yes enjoying the weather. First water stop for people and lose if people need them and now we've got another climb. So climb up to the top and then down into Al Friston which is the next village on our little journey. We climbed out of Jevington and made our way through Friston Forest where I came up on one of my Zwift friends Jonathan wearing his Harry Morgan jog on t-shirt. How long have you been at Harry Morgan Ambassador then? I think for the last year I think six months. So I'm not one of the actual ambassadors but there's people who are doing a lot of outreach and community stuff which is really good. Yeah but yeah nice and part of the community which has been really good fun. Yeah if you haven't watched Harry Morgan's channel by the way really good video. A great guy. Yeah so go and subscribe to his channel and if you haven't subscribed to my channel you know what to do as well. Absolutely. Cheers Jonathan have a good one. What's your name? Sarah. Sarah well done Sarah. Along another ridgeline in the howling wind skirting the top of the long man of Wilmington a huge chalk figure carved into the side of Windover Hill. No one knows how old it is some say it's Roman or prehistoric others that it was made as late as the 14th century. How's it going? Going good? Nine and a half miles in. Approaching Alfriston that's the Cookmere River there. I cannot tell you how many times I've featured this white bridge across the Cookmere River in my videos over the years. It's such a landmark point on so many races in Sussex. However rarely has it been quite this wet and it was about to get a whole lot wetter. Now it really is raining. Well done you guys. Absolutely throwing it down. Brilliant though. You love it. It's definitely wet. Right I've just hit 10 miles in 1 hour 47 so it's going to be a four and a half hour marathon probably something like that. Climbing the big hill out of Alfriston. There are just two slight annoyances about the beachy head marathon. Firstly it doesn't have a UK athletics license so it will never appear on your power of 10 or run Britain rankings stats. And secondly it's almost always slightly short of a full marathon. Interestingly in 2022 the route was altered slightly making it a full 26.2 however this year they reverted back to the old route which is generally about half a mile short. Okay we're at halfway in 1 hour 18 minutes. So it's definitely looking like four and a half 445 today as a finish time. We'll see how we go. Very windy. The rain is sporadic so it's like sometimes it'll rain really hard and other times it's just spitting a little bit like now when we get up onto the seven sisters in a bit it's going to be pretty exposed pretty blowy. With the worst of the weather behind us we turned off the south downsway heading towards the coast. The rain might have abated somewhat but we now had to contend with some very slippery sticky mud. I was wearing my Hoka Tecton X2s which despite being very decent trail shoes don't have the deepest lugs and I soon found myself at slower than walking pace trying to prevent myself from falling face first. Definitely a bit muddy through here. Eventually though we made it onto the grassy descent down to the banks of the river. We always come down this hill and we always focus on getting to the next aid station but if you look behind you there's a horse on the hill look just up there I don't know if you can see it but always worth looking back having a little look at that because we never also we never see the long man of Wilmington on this run and we go right by it. So there we are we're just coming up to the next aid station at 17 miles where we get a cup of tea. Right this is the checkpoint at nearly 17 miles. Cups of tea bananas biscuits sausage roll if you want it. So good checkpoint here. This is Littlington village. Go on then. Well done guys. The next village is West Dean which years ago was a port and quite an important port about a thousand years ago. Anyway I'm going to drink my tea. It's good. So that's my cup of tea drunk. We've got a little way to go now through the forest up some steps through the village of West Dean before we get on to the Seven Sisters Hills about 20 miles into the run. So we've got about three miles to go to get to the coast. If you're new to the Beachy Head Marathon this is where things might start to bite. Having already climbed a few hills these steps back into Friston Forest can sap what remaining energy you have and there's still the Seven Sisters cliffs to negotiate. Okay that's one set of steps done one more to go. The second set are decidedly more horrible and steep so we'll look forward to them. Oh really get yourself in the mood. With the first set of steps done we carried on through the forest and down into West Dean. Immediately out of the other side of the hamlet is the second set of steps. Just a reminder if you're enjoying the video finding it useful or interesting then please do consider subscribing to the channel. As of the release of this video we're about to hit 15,000 subscribers so I'm very thankful to all of you for your support. And this is our second set of steps. So since I was last here they've installed this handrail which makes it oh I mean it's just like cheating going up this hill with this handrail. You say it's not hoping enough. There's a man with tough legs bouncing up the hill. See this is why going to the gym helps and now we have the most beautiful view of the race when we go over this little section here. So this view is so popular there is a queue to see it. And there you go that is the Cookmere Valley and the Cookmere River in the sunshine amazing. So another water station there. Right always nice coming through Exiat. Now we have to slow jog up this little hill. Just hit 20 miles in three hours 35 minutes. What a beautiful view it's not raining even the sun is coming out occasionally quite tired now but 10k to go. Another interesting fact for you in the 1940s during the war just on top of the hill up there where you can see the trees there was an airfield Friston airfield just basically a field where the Spitfires used to land on and there is a memorial up there there's a plaque up there a stone or something I've not seen it I did go and try and find it one time but I couldn't find it but there is a a stone up there remembering the Friston airfield. Oh thank you my legs are killing me I'm gonna do it. Having had such torrential rain earlier on it was bizarre now to be running over the seven sisters hills in glorious sunshine even if it was still very windy. However having run 100 miles the week before by now my legs were feeling pretty done in. We're 36 kilometers in to the beachy head marathon this is Berlin Gap so we've got four miles to go from here there used to be an aid station at Berlin Gap no longer and it is missed. Four hours and seven minutes for 36 kilometers so hopefully we can get in under five hours. Thank you. What was your PB before? Five hours and four minutes my PB so I'm hoping to beat that. Nice but I forgot that one was there. The last 10 kilometers of the beachy head marathon are beautiful but bumpy the seven sisters cliffs are short but steep and on this occasion I had to walk the majority of them. Two kilometers to go four hours 39 minutes there's the beachy head hotel we've reached the top of the final climb we're on our way home it's been a struggle legs really hurting back really sore from about halfway my back was hurting really badly and it's really stiff now. The final descent back into Eastbourne is perfectly runnable and I usually absolutely bomb it down here to the finish I just didn't have it in me this time and I jogged down the hill being very careful not to slip over in the mud. 41 kilometers done just need to be really careful on this very muddy downhill now just so somebody go over on their ankle. Last year beachy head added a little section in which made it the full 42 kilometers but this year that section I noticed wasn't there so once again the marathon is going to be slightly short not that anybody cares but it's definitely going to be a little bit short. Here we are beachy head marathon done. I crossed the line in 246th place and 29th in my age category in a time of four hours 50 minutes and six seconds that's more than an hour and 10 minutes slower than my best time on this course room for improvement I'd say. That was hard work this year. You got it you beat it. Brilliant well done mate thank you very much that was hard work today wasn't it in the mud and that well done though good effort that last 10k it's horrendous isn't it. I didn't know about it. I kind of like twinge twinge twinge all right yeah my legs went my legs went just before that last 10k and I thought Jonathan's going to come up behind me any second. Oh no. Oh my god and you still haven't got your jacket on we were looking for a pink jacket. So that's it from the beachy head marathon 2023 here in Eastbourne it's been a really weird race with rain and wind and then sunshine but we've enjoyed it. Amy Green is the final Zwift runner to finish. She did it in 6-4 so you're well done to her even falling over in the last half a mile. We'll be back next year to do this again because we do it every year and we absolutely love it. If you want to see any of the videos that I've done from previous beachy head marathons click that link right there and I'll see you there in a second take care bye bye.