Top fields set to include the likes of Susan Partridge, Alyson Dixon, Lily Partridge and Paul Martelletti

The Vitality Reading Half Marathon returns this weekend and will be run on a new route that organisers boast is “flatter and faster than ever before”.

Sunday’s event, which incorporates the English Championships, kicks off the Run Britain Grand Prix series for 2015 with top fields including the likes of Susan Partridge, Alyson Dixon and Paul Martelletti.

Last year’s event saw 40 male athletes break 70 minutes, while 20 female runners dipped under 80 minutes, led by Partridge with her winning time of 72:20.

Those times made Reading the UK’s fastest half-marathon in 2014 and this year organisers are hopeful that the number of sub-70:00 runners will increase to 50 and that 25 females can break 80 minutes.

The course, which previously saw runners directed away from the finish line in the Madejski Stadium – home of Reading Football Club – to do a lap of Green Park, will now see participants head straight into the stadium after the final A33 dual carriageway stretch.

Partridge is back to defend her title, the world marathon 10th-placer going for her third victory having also won in 2010.

Dixon finished third last year and will be buoyed by her recent Locke Park 20 and Trafford 10km victories this month. She is due to be challenged by not one but two Partridges, as English National and Inter-Counties champion Lily is set to swap the country for the road after a strong start to her year which has also seen her win the Cardiff Cross Challenge and finish third at the European Clubs Cross Country Championships in Spain.

Louise Damen, Helen Clitheroe, Emma Stepto, Jessica Coulson, Georgie Bruinvels and Katrina Wootton are among the other athletes entered.

Over in the men’s race and last year’s second and third-placed finishers, Nick Torry and Phil Wicks, go up against a field including the likes of Martelletti who secured his fourth half marathon win this year with victory in Bath at the beginning of this month. Martelletti finished ninth in Reading last year in a race won by Olympic marathoner Scott Overall in 64:44.

Derek Hawkins, Paul Pollock, John Gilbert and John Beattie are also included in the entry lists.

There is up to 30,000 in prize money up for grabs for British athletes, with additional time bonuses also on offer.

The race boasts prizes of 750 for the top British under-23 athletes, while the top three veteran athletes (M40 and W35) will take home 500, 300 and 200 with further awards for the best V45, V50, V55 and V60 runners.

Not only that, but as the event is the first in the 2015 Run Britain Grand Prix, athletes will also be competing for points to help them towards overall series success.

Joining the Vitality Reading Half in the six-event series are the Bupa London 10,000 and Bristol 10km events in May, the Cardiff 10km in September, the Lloyds Bank Cardiff Half Marathon in October and the Age UK Leeds Abbey Dash 10km in November.

Under Run Britain rules, British athletes earn points for finishing in the top 250 of the men s and women s races. Additional points will be awarded to men who run faster than 65:00 and women who run faster than 71:00 for the half marathon events and sub-30:00 and sub-33:00 for the 10km races respectively.

The best four scores from the six available races count at the end of the series, where there is a total prize fund of 18,000 which is shared by the top 10 male and female British runners.

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