By Hilary Humphreys
The Jog Shop Jog has always been a bit of a cult race and is an ideal marathon training run; however, with race features like ‘Death Valley’, ‘The Snake’ and ‘The Big W’, you could be forgiven for thinking that this race takes place in the Wild West rather than among the gentle green hills of the South Downs national park in Sussex. Yet, as anyone who has completed the race will testify, those gentle hills are not as easy as they look.
The race, which this year took place on 25 March and commences and finishes in Brighton, covers just over twenty miles, most of which is within the quietly beautiful South Downs, with roughly 90% of the course being off-road. This race is not for the faint-hearted and tests the stamina of the participants to the full, in fact there are many easier marathons around!
Three brave Striders took up the challenge and they all excelled. Joel Eaton was the first Strider home in third place overall, in a time 2 hours 24 mins and 59 seconds. He was followed in 8th and 9th places respectively by Dave Dunstall (first in his age group, pictured) in 2:35:35 and Ed Tuckley in 2:36:00.