After 903 Days Absence, The Cardiff Half Marathon Is Back And Better Than Ever

By Adam Cleary

The Cardiff Half Marathon returns on Sunday for the first time since October 2019 after a pandemic enforced break.

Race director and former marathon olympian, Steve Brace, was delighted that the famous event was making a long awaited return after seeing the 2020 and 2021 races cancelled.

“Cardiff Half Marathon is such a feature of Welsh running culture,” said Brace.

“It’s our London Marathon and it’s the target event for our runners. Unfortunately we’ve had to put it off for two years now but there was an opportunity to put it in the spring for people who entered two years ago.

“It’s great to have it back and it’s such a feature of Welsh sport, Welsh culture and it’s great for the city.”

Brace admits that the cost of putting the event on has gone up significantly since the pandemic began. However, there will be two half marathons this year with Cardiff hosting it’s usual October race as well as Sunday’s March edition.

A closer look at the @cardiffuni Cardiff Half t-shirt designed by @nathanwyburnart at today’s Cardiff Half Marathon media day, hearing from some of the inspiring runners on the start line this Sunday! pic.twitter.com/wgbl0zTZSt

— Cardiff Half Marathon (@CardiffHalf) March 21, 2022

“We’ve had all of the entrance fees for the period over the pandemic but it’s a lot more expensive to put on now,” explained Brace.

“However it’s the same course and people will get the same experience. We are doing a more breathable event which means that people will get a little bit more space with all of the covid precautions.

“We wanted to put it on to get running back, clubs have still been waiting for the big events to hit the scene. It’s such a target event for the sector.”

At the Cardiff University School of Journalism this morning for the media launch of the Cardiff Half Marathon. @Dai_Sport_ pic.twitter.com/bWEexLIJ63

— Adam Cleary (@AdamCleary7) March 21, 2022

Sunday’s race will see a largely domestic field with a lack of African athletes competing due to covid and visa issues. Despite this it’s still expected that there will be around 25,000 runners taking to the streets.

“We’ve just focused on getting a domestic field. It’s nearly an all British field, we have one or two foreign athletes from Morocco and Ukraine who actually live in the country so there are no visa implications.

‘We will be reverting back to our full international half marathon in October. This will be nice for the Brits to race each other and be in the front because sometimes they’re a couple of minutes behind.”