Definitely Not an Easy 7K

Beachy Head Half Marathon 2026 Training Block - Week 10/11

It's Saturday, so that means parkrun. With both Worthing and Lancing Beach Green cancelled this week, it was the perfect opportunity to try somewhere different and pay a visit to the new North Farm parkrun on the Wiston Estate.

I've run this route a few times before as part of longer easy runs, so I knew roughly what I was letting myself in for. This is not one of those lovely, flat parkruns where you can settle into a comfortable rhythm and cruise around for 5km. The main feature is a climb of around 130 metres up to Chanctonbury Ring, followed by a descent back down. In other words, today's easy 7km from the Runna plan was somewhat shelved.

The early stages were a little congested, with the narrow path making overtaking difficult. It was very much a case of being patient, finding a gap when one appeared and settling into the climb. My plan was simple: take the uphill section at a steady, sustainable effort, then make the most of the descent on the way back - as fast as was safely possible.

The climb was slow progress, as expected. There isn't much opportunity to make up time when you're heading steadily uphill, and I reached the turnaround point at Chanctonbury Ring in around 17 minutes. That was the hard part out of the way. The descent was very welcome after all that climbing. It was a chance to open the stride a little, let gravity do some of the work, while still keeping things under control on the uneven path. Around 12 minutes later, I crossed the finish line in just a few seconds over 29 minutes.

Given the nature of the course, I was pretty pleased with that. It felt like a decent effort, and the final result put me 122nd out of 328 parkrunners.

North Farm is a great course, I'll certainly be happy to return.