Burgess Hill Runners send an incredible 60 athletes to Brighton Half Marathon

Burgess Hill Runners sent a quite incredible 60 or so runners (from a membership of a little over 200) to join approx 7,000 others in Sunday’s Brighton Half marathon which despite all the recent weather problems was run in near-perfect conditions.
By The Newsroom
Published 17th Feb 2014, 16:32 BST
several of the Burgess Hill Runners with their medals.several of the Burgess Hill Runners with their medals.
several of the Burgess Hill Runners with their medals.

With such a huge contingent it’s impossible to mention all the fantastic performances that were put in on the day, but in amongst the multitude of great first-time efforts (including many runners that started with the Beginners Group) and personal bests there were some quite stunning performances.

Firstly, and fresh from his recent back-to-back ultra distance wins was Paul Sargent who led the club home in a remarkable personal best and new BHR club record for the distance of 1hr 16mins 26 seconds and 24th place overall.

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Mark Nicholls and Neil Grigg were battling it out close behind and finished in 1.22.35 and 1.22.44 for 105th and 109th places respectively followed by Jon Boxhall (1.30.57) and James Sorbie in an excellent PB of 1.31.08.

Others managing to break 1.40 included Andrew Bishop (1.34.53), Alan Fry (1.35.12 PB), Andy Sayers (1.36.31) and Neil Phillpot (1.39.37).

Alison Dunks led the ladies team home in a superb 1.40.14 for 40th place in her category, followed by Cath Beckett (1.46.34 - PB), Emma Buckland (1.47.15) and Susan Lyle (1.50.58). Other notable performamces on the day included Martin Skeats achieving 16th place in his age category with 1.40.20, Sheryl Caldecourt who broke the elusive 2hr barrier after years of trying in 1.57.11 and big PBs for a number of others including Vicky Connolly (1.57.28), Paula Ridley by 8 mins (2.10.24) and Stephanie Harding (2.05.24).