The strong winds fail to blow Woodgate off course

DAN WOODGATE made light of the tough conditions yesterday to stride to a convincing victory in the KPMG Easter Half Marathon.

The Aldershot, Farnham and District runner looked strong from beginning to end over the course, which had a new start and finish point based on North Beach rather than the Albert Pier, but which followed the traditional route to the north of the island and back.

For the first half of the race, Woodgate had Edinburgh's Neil Renault for company and the pair reached the turn at L'Islet in 36min. 06sec., six seconds ahead of Rowan Axe who was on his own in third.

At that point, the overall KPMG Easter Running Festival leader John McDonnell was fourth, a further 14 seconds back, but he was to enjoy a strong second half to his race as he passed both Axe and Renault on the way home.