The Jog Shop Jog has its origins back in the 1970's, when local legends Sam Lambourne, Steve Fortune and Alex Ace Angeli, among others, realised that track workouts wouldn't be enough to get them through the rigours of a full marathon. With a copy of an Ordinance Survey map in hand, a long, challenging route over the South Downs was chosen. The original marathon preparation route took in many of the features of today's course, and, to a large extent, remains unchanged to this day.

As the training route strayed far from human habitation, there were few named landmarks, so the group decided to give memorable sections of the run names of their own.

The first section of the run to be named was The Yellow Brick Road, when Steve Fortune burst into song hallway along this aptly-named oddity. Names for the other landmarks followed soon after.

The race began officially in 1992, which of course meant that it had to be properly measured. Andy Wright undertook this task, covering the entire route by wheel, which took him 9 hours. The course came out at 20 miles, 420 yards.

In 1995, the Belgian Marc De Belder completed the race, writing a humourous account of his adventures which is well worth a read.

Finally, if you would like to see some action shots of the race, have a look at our photo story (requires Flash) for a brief history of the race.