The Great British Seaside Marathon and Ultra 2024 – Report
A fairly new (only its second year running) and low-key event by Curlys held on the seaside. The event is more or less a coastal out and back apart from about 10k that is on roads for some extra variation. Both races start at the same time at Skegness, with the Marathon turning around at Sutton on the Sea and the Ultra continuing on to Mablethorpe.
I was entered into the Marathon and anyone who knows me, knows I don’t do Marathons but for some reason since doing my first marathon last year, I am somehow on my 4th but I am still adamant, I don’t do marathons.
An 8:30am start on Saturday the 23rd March, it was a cold morning and luckily with collecting my number the evening before, knowing there is no bag drop at the start and my Airbnb only being 5 minutes from the start line, I was still cutting it fine by getting out the door at 8:15am but still arrived at the start with a little bit of time to spare. I like to make things hard for myself, not even 6 days ago, I ran 20 miles at Ashby and was still feeling those miles in my legs.
I was treating this event like one of my adventure runs (so I wasn’t racing but using it to gauge my pace and fuelling for events coming up for me later in the year), it was recommended to be self-sufficient in the guidance with a standard mandatory kit for all participants.
The course itself was a bit of a mix bag, starting at the pier in Skeg, we ran out along to coast for a couple of km, then cut inside along pavements for another km and then back on the coastal paths, this seemed to be going well but then hit the first section of soft, deep sand which stopped me in my tracks and was completely unrunable and unavoidable (we had sections like this at least three more times in the race). After 10 miles we left the coastal paths for another 6 miles on road with a huge head wind to challenge us all the way to the half marathon point (I lost my visor twice on that section).
Past turnaround, with the boring road section behind us and the headwind blowing to our backs, it was time to run back, only thing at this point, the race become very lonely, with hardly another runner in sight (although the elite ultrarunners started coming passed at 27km), but the course did became more interesting with an array of trails, off road paths, mud and unfortunately more sand.
This race was one of my more challenging runs, it was completely flat and I am convinced that is harder. Sand is the worse thing ever to try and run on, saps all your energy from yours legs and I had the most freakish weather of all, high winds, sunshine (I actually got sunburnt), rain and even hail. I was really starting to feel it in my legs after 20 miles and struggled to keep up any form of momentum, this was truly the business end of the run and had to just grit and keep ticking those last miles off. I was quite relieved to be back in Skegness with the last 2km to go, just along the pier and a last cut inside to finish in the centre.
Overall, it was a challenge, I am glad to have done it in a reasonable time as well. I think I finished about 49 overall in 5:04:32 (gun time, no chip at this event). Curlys always put on a good event, it was well marshalled, sign posted and really friendly, I got a little medal and event t-shirt as part of my entry.
Winner of the Marathon was Tom Penzer Adams in 3:02:11, first Lady was Paula Downing in 3:41:52. Winner of the Ultra was Mark Robbins in 4:22:43 and first lady was Angela Bullingham in 6:14:32
