Hugh Wilson 10K

Felt in decent condition for this race and the weather was OK too - a bit drizzly but not cold enough for gloves. I set my 10K PB of 33:51 here several years ago and hadn't run it since. The course seemed to have changed a bit, didn't remember turning round at the halfway point before. Goal time was anything less than 37 minutes.

I set out trying to keep to an ambitious 3:30 per kilometre as long as I could, and managed 3:31 for each of the first two before dropping to 3:38 and not bothering to work out my splits after that. I was a shade over 18 minutes at the 5K mark, fourth for Garscube. There were about about 10 places between me and the third Garscube runner in the distance. I thought if I kept a steady pace I would probably go past a few runners - as it turned out, I made up about 6 places before the end. Legs felt really heavy on about 8K but I managed to pick it up for the last kilometre or so. My finishing time was 36:14 which was not a bad outcome for my longest race in a few years. This was 3 seconds per mile slower than I ran in the Glasgow University race (5:49 vs 5:46), but a fairly reliable race time predictor I have used in the past said I could expect 36:30 for 10K based on 28:50 for 5 miles. I have still never run 35:anything for a 10K (33 once, and 34 and 36 several times each) but that curious record may have to go in the near future.