Great North Run preview.
· Race strategy
The Great North Run was my first race, back in 2014. I entered the ballot as a bet with a friend, hungover after what felt like just another big night. Running was the answer. Get my life back in order. I got a place, so I trained. Lost some weight, got fit enough to finish, ran 1:44. I've been racing ever since.
It has been a city-to-coast race since 1981. Brendan Foster's idea. One of the biggest half marathons in the world. The roads have moved a bit. The idea hasn't: Newcastle to South Shields, west to east. 2021 was the odd year, a loop that finished back in the city.
Officially it's a downhill course, so records don't count. It does not feel like one. There is a net loss on paper. The hills aren't steep. They last. You finish wondering where the downhill went.
The course is balanced, not downhill
People call it downhill because the finish is below the start.
Ninety-two percent of the current course sits between -2% and +2%. Nothing on it reaches 6%. The named climbs average about 1.0-1.4%. You barely notice the gradient. You notice the length: 1.2km here, 3.1km through the 5-8km drag, another 0.9km later.
Newcastle to South Shields
Current course · west to east, inland start to the coast
Newcastle to the coast
Current course · 81m gain, 112m loss · 14m to 62m
Hills, just not steep ones
Current course · 81m gain, 112m loss · 14m to 62m
That's the useful distinction. A short 6% hill is obvious. A 3km drag at 1% is not. It still costs time, and it still costs more if you try to hold the same split you ran down the Central Motorway.
The race can finish with almost no net elevation cost. 81m of gain against 112m of loss, 14m to 62m. It still asks for a wide range of sensible paces. The opening downhill is quick. The long rise into 8km isn't. The 10-12km section starts giving time back, then John Reid Road asks for it again before the final drop towards the coast.
That's why one pace on the watch is a poor plan here. A kilometre can be ten seconds quicker than target at the same honest effort, then more than ten seconds slower a few miles later. Not because the course is hilly. Because the easy-looking bits last.
The useful version is:
Don't spend the opening downhill. Let the road make you quick without pressing it. Your quads still have John Reid Road to deal with.
Expect the 8km block to feel slow. That's the course, not your race coming apart.
Use the fast section, don't surge through it. Around 10-12km, relax and let the pace come back.
Keep something for the coast. Heat has had time to build, and a helpful wind can stop helping after the final turn.
Ten editions through the same window
The last ten editions don't tell you what Sunday will do. They show the pattern: what usually turns up, and which bits of the forecast are worth watching.
Same comparison each time: the 2015-2019 and 2021-2025 race dates, nine points along the current Newcastle to South Shields course, 10:00 to 13:00.
2023 is the sticky one. The route and time average reached 20.6°C, with a 17.6°C dew point. Most Great North Run mornings aren't like that.
2024 was quieter on air temperature, but the dew point sat almost on top of it and the sky was fully clouded. Same race, different way of feeling uncomfortable. Cloud cover is only a sun proxy. Low cover means more chance of direct sun; it doesn't know whether one street happened to be in shade.
Race day alone is still a small sample. Widen it to the five days either side of each edition and put 10:00-13:00 in one pile: 440 hourly samples.
What temperature usually does through the race
Race day ±5 days for ten editions · 440 hours on the course, 10:00-13:00 together
The typical hour in that window sits around 15.7°C. About one hour in five is 13°C or cooler. One in ten reaches 20°C, like 2023. It still warms as the morning goes on. 14.7°C at 10:00, 16.7°C at 13:00. The useful picture is the whole race window, not four separate clocks.
That's the first useful pattern. A start that feels comfortable isn't a promise about South Shields.
The wind is varied, not reliably helpful
The biggest advantage here is the wind. Point-to-point, mostly travelling east. A westerly can carry you a long way. An easterly takes it back.
The course mostly travels west to east, so the simple version says westerly good, easterly bad.
Leave 2021 out. That year was a loop. The days on this course are less tidy:
Wind on the last nine race days
Route and time average, 10:00-13:00. Impact at a 1:30 half. Plus means slower.
| Edition | Speed | Direction | Without drafting | With drafting | Drafting saves | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Impact | Time | Impact | Time | ||||
| 7 Sep 2025 | 26.4 km/h | SSE · 148° | +1.18% | +1:03 | +0.04% | +0:02 | 61 sec |
| 8 Sep 2024 | 12.8 km/h | NE · 34° | +0.25% | +0:13 | -0.40% | -0:22 | 35 sec |
| 10 Sep 2023 | 7.6 km/h | E · 91° | -0.41% | -0:22 | -0.72% | -0:39 | 17 sec |
| 11 Sep 2022 | 11.4 km/h | S · 184° | -0.03% | -0:02 | -0.54% | -0:29 | 27 sec |
| 8 Sep 2019 | 3.8 km/h | SSW · 199° | -0.17% | -0:09 | -0.60% | -0:32 | 23 sec |
| 9 Sep 2018 | 24.9 km/h | SW · 236° | +0.21% | +0:11 | -0.42% | -0:23 | 34 sec |
| 10 Sep 2017 | 23.1 km/h | SSW · 200° | -0.64% | -0:35 | -0.83% | -0:45 | 10 sec |
| 11 Sep 2016 | 20.0 km/h | SSW · 205° | -0.49% | -0:27 | -0.76% | -0:41 | 14 sec |
| 13 Sep 2015 | 14.4 km/h | S · 170° | +0.03% | +0:02 | -0.50% | -0:27 | 29 sec |
2025 is the one that costs you if you run it alone: +1:03. A pack takes almost all of that back. Most of the other years already help a little, or sit near zero, once people are around you.
Now widen those same ten editions to race day ±5 days:
The Great North Run wind window
Race day ±5 days for ten editions · 110 route-averaged samples · 10:00-13:00
W
Most frequent direction
16.6 km/h
Median route average
Wind speed
West is the most common slice, but only 17 of 110 samples sit there. South-westerlies are well represented too, along with plenty from the north and south-east.
A following wind is familiar at the Great North Run. It isn't the default.
Direction also changes meaning along the course. A westerly can help for most of the journey east, then become awkward when the road turns onto the seafront. A crosswind may barely alter the average pace while making exposed sections feel scrappy. The wind rose tells you what turns up. The course tells you where you pay for it.
Heat rarely arrives all at once
The race window usually warms while you're still moving.
Heat cost behaves the same way. It tends to tighten gradually through the race rather than landing as one obvious bad kilometre. The effort rises a little, then a little more. That is easy to misread as poor fuelling, lost fitness, or an early pacing mistake.
Sometimes it is one of those things. Sometimes the day has done more than warm two degrees. By South Shields the air is hotter and stickier, the sun is higher, and you have been producing heat since the start. That is a different race to the one you started.
Look at temperature, dew point and cloud together. A modest air temperature with a high dew point can still make cooling difficult. A warmer but drier, cloudier day may behave differently. One number doesn't tell the race.
Great North Run preview
It's too early to look at the weather impact on Sunday. The forecast still has time to change.
Sunday's numbers will sit on the Great North Run page. We'll post on Instagram when there's something useful to say.