By the time this race came round, I felt in real need of a performance to give me that spark to push on again. I'd been seriously below par since returning from holiday but my performance in the Scottish 5000m was the prompt to get my act together and got me back into the sort of training I know best and which has got me my best results in the past.
Leaving no stone unturned, I booked a Travel Lodge in Stirling for the night before to ensure I wasn't worrying about getting there from East Kilbride for the 10.15am start on race day. I got a call on the Saturday afternoon to say, due to heating problems, my booking had been changed to Falkirk but this was still fine and I stayed overnight as planned. I did take a bit of a risk since the hotel had no restaurant and simply gave me a breakfast pack with, amongst other things, cornflakes (which I don't like), a cereal bar and a muffin. I had the muffin with a cup of tea while watching "Last Night of the Proms" on BBC on Saturday night and relied on the cereal bar, some Jaffa cakes, fruit pastilles, tea and Lucozade as my race day fuel. I arrived an hour before the start, quickly collected my number, snuck away to warm up in peace before re-appearing just after 10am to stand on the start line.
The course is an out and back of sorts, going outwards for about 6km then taking a slightly shorter route back to the start/finish at Forthbank Stadium. A good start was necessary and I pushed myself up into the large leading group. My plan was to simply stay there while others dropped off and hopefully still be there at the end. The field contained a number of prominent names, Andrew Butchart, John Newsom, Tewolde Mengsiteab and Robert Gilroy to name only a few off the top of my head. I would be lying if I said I felt comfortable but I was moving well and after 3km as we crossed a bridge into some countryside, I had stayed in the group.
Robert Gilroy has re-emerged as a real threat in these races and we spent much of the time either exchanging positions back and forth or side by side. He was slightly ahead as we went through halfway. My watch said 15:01! Any lingering doubts about my pre-race fuelling strategy disappeared. As we came to the turning point, I was just off the group. I saw them bunch and bump into each other, an amusing moment to briefly take my mind off what I was doing.
On the road back, I feared being dropped and managed to pull myself back up. Andrew and Tewolde made a move for home at between 7-8km. I tried to go with them but simply couldn't sustain the pace and had to relent. In doing so though, I had pulled away from others. I found myself in 4th place a short distance away from 3rd placed Michael Crawley and a possible individual bronze. I was working hard though more to hold the others off than catch him. In the last couple of kilometres, Lachlan Oates then Patryk Gierjatowicz overtook me. In my effort to maintain position, I managed to overhaul Patryk with 400-500m to go and came close to catching Lachlan to no avail.
The end result was 5th place with a new personal best of 30:35. Andrew won the race in exactly 30 minutes with Tewolde 2nd in 30:12, Michael 3rd in 30:27 and Lachlan 4th 2 seconds before me. Myself, Robert and Kerry-Liam Wilson (1st vet with a personal best of 31:29) took team bronze for Cambuslang behind Central and Shettleston. This was easily one of my best days in running for some time. You can't beat the feeling when it all comes together. My birthday curry and pint (my birthday was the day after this race) that night tasted all the better. Especially when you've only had a cereal bar for your breakfast.
Now the hard bit- keeping it going again.
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