Two-times winner Rose-Anna Hoey, and Dennis Mbelenzi are top athletes who are entered in the Friends of Hospice/Hannover Re half-marathon on Sunday.

Hoey was the women’s champion in 2015 and 2016, while Mbelenzi has won a string of shorter road races on the island in recent months. The half-marathon is Bermuda’s second-oldest continuously held road race returns for its 47th year on Sunday.

First held in March 1972, the race was originally known as the BTFA half-marathon. It has been held on a variety of courses in different parts of the island, but for the past eight years has started and finished on South Road, near the Botanical Gardens.

The only road race in Bermuda with a longer history is the Bermuda Half-Marathon Derby, which dates back to 1909.

Sunday’s half-marathon is part of what is now known as the Friends of Hospice/Hannover Re Walk and Run event.

Runners and walkers can compete in a 10K, a 5K or the half-marathon. Chayce Smith won last year’s half-marathon in 1hr 18min 41sec, with Kristen Palmer the first woman in 1:39:28. Sunday’s races will start and finish near the Botanical Gardens’ southern entrance.

Competitors will do a two-mile loop towards Hamilton, turning around near BUEI on East Broadway, before running back past the Botanical Gardens and east along South Road.

Half-marathon athletes will go as far as a turnaround point on Paynters Road before retracing their steps to the finish.

The 10K race will have a turnaround point near the top of McGall’s Hill on South Road, while the 5K competitors will turnaround at Demco florist on South Road.

The event raises funds for the Friends of Hospice and the Bermuda National Athletics Association.

Entries can be made online at racedayworld.com