The club have organised many local races over the 40 plus years of its’ existence with a number of well loved events sadly no longer taking place for various traffic and other reasons. The current portfolio of club races is shown below:
WESTON PROM RUNS
The 5 mile race route was first run on the Promenade in 1983. On that first December night, using the now standard 5 mile distance, the entry fee was 30p and there were 25 finishers. Since that start the race has developed to be a regular feature of the South West running calendar with a mid-week series of 9 races starting in September with the last race in May of the following year. The race HQ is now at the refurbished Bay cafe and features categories for senior male and female runners together with vet 40, 50 and 60 categories for both male and female as well as series team competition for both male and female. The race regularly now has of over 300 finishers with a record entry in 2017 of 384. Entry is open to both club and non-club runners.
On the same night as the monthly prom run the club now organise a junior 1 mile race which takes place prior to the 5 mile race. Please see the prom run tab for more detail.
BEACON BATCH
The Beacon Batch fell race was started by Bath AC. in 1989 and the organisation was taken on by Weston AC in 1999. Roger Hart and Rob Skeen have been the previous WAC race directors with Nick Briffitt being the current director. The HQ and route of the race has changed over recent years but the tough nature of the race remains with the highest point in the race always being the Beacon Batch Trig Point at a height over 1000 feet.
MENDIP MUDDLE
The Mendip Muddle is a tough 20K off-road race established by Pete Green, the race starts high up on the Mendips at Charterhouse and includes over 1500ft of climb. In 2001 Roger Hart took on the organisation of the race from Pete followed by Bryan Morley, Tony Hogg, Carol O’Leary and is now under the Directorship of Martin Hurcombe. The race has had the RNLI and more recently Weston Hospicecare as its’ charity with many 000’s of pounds being raised for theses 2 causes.
WESTON CHRISTMAS CRACKER
December 1988 saw the first ‘Cracker’ 10k race using a combination of beach, promenade and road. In the early days the race was organised by Wyvern Road Runners under the name ‘Wyvern Xmas Cracker’ with the name changing later to ‘Weston Christmas Cracker’ after the amalgamation of the 2 clubs in 1998-99. The success continues because of the splendid team work with all club members getting involved. Entry numbers have slowly been able to increase to the present limit of 2500 aided by ‘chipping timing ‘ and modern I.T. which reduces some of the work involved. The race has had Weston Hospicecare as the main race charity for many years with over £50,000 being raised by the runners for this cause.
Overall this means that Weston AC hosts 12 races throughout the year, raising thousands of pounds for charity and contribution to club funds to allow us to continually improve the service we give to our members and our race participants.