Am I Nearly There Yet?

This week has been a particularly encouraging week for me, in fact I’m more than encouraged by the progress I’ve made, I’m amazed. For 10 weeks I had suffered the torment of not being able to run and then last Monday I was given the all clear to start again. I had tried to jump the gun four days previously but realised I wasn’t quite ready. Last Monday night I set out on my first, tentative, attempt to run. For 5 minutes I shuffled through the streets of Northwich, feeling like a pantomime dame with his feet tied together. It was slow, it was painful, and I was embarrassed. After that I thought it would be a long time before I found my running feet, and yet, yesterday, only 8 days on, I ran for 60 minutes over the undulations of Tatton Park. How was this possible, considering the extent of my injuries? Well here’s how I got from where I was to where I am now. It’s not a glamorous story, rather a patient torment and not giving in to the doubts.

Day 1 – Monday 29 April. Today I went to the physio, we talked, she prodded, and at the end of the session she told me to start running again, gently. I went home and later that day I set off on my first 5 minute run. I’ve already said how it went but I was running so tense, just waiting for the achilles to go again. My ungainly attempt didn’t leave me feeling any encouragement and I was left wondering if it was still too early.

Day 2 - Tuesday 30 April. This morning I was working in the gym, but before I started working with my clients I went for a 10 minute run. Surprisingly it felt a little better. I was still a little tentative, a little tense, and a little ungainly but I managed 10 minutes, a little faster than yesterday. When I was coming back from my last injury I started this way but ran twice a day with the aim of accelerating the recovery. It’s a risky method but I decided I was going to try it again, so this afternoon I went out for a further 15 minute run. Again it was faster, further and a little less ungainly. This was the moment where I started to believe I could get back, I just wasn’t sure when.

Day 3 – Wednesday 1 May. Maintaining the daily mantra of further and faster each time today I managed a 20 minute run and a 25 minute run. Still a little painful as I ran but no repercussions afterwards.

Day 4 – Thursday 2 May. Saw me working with Lee Riley. He was doing track work but there was no way I would be able to run 70 odd second laps, so I confined myself to jogging with him during his recoveries. I actually found this run really hard, perhaps it was the accumulation or maybe it was just the stopping and starting, which kept stiffening my leg muscles. I was finding out, during my running, that I was stiff for the first 5 or 6 minutes but then my ankle would loosen up and I could run properly. I decided I would call it a day with the one run today, but then I changed my mind and went out for a 37 minute run in the evening. That was a big breakthrough. During that 37 minutes I felt more like a runner than at any other run this week, things were starting to come together, I was floating along nicely, ok a little heavier footed and a lot slower than normal but I felt like I was broaching the 20 minute 5k barrier.

Day 5 – Friday 3 May. Having made it past the 30 minutes yesterday it was now time to cut back to one run a day, but make it longer, so this morning it was 45 minutes. Again a little faster but I was still experiencing a little pain. I was still so concerned about overdoing it, yet at the same time fighting to get fit for the BMAF Relays. All the tensing was making all my muscles ache and I was breathing a lot heavier than I should be for such a pace. I still felt like progress was being made so I was looking forward to tomorrow’s run.

Day 6 – Saturday 4 May. Carole and I had decide to spend the Bank Holiday weekend out of the country, for some reason we’d chosen Cardiff. Of course, when we’d decided, I wasn’t running, but now I was back into a rhythm and I didn’t want it to stop. We were going to head off early morning so I got up earlier for a run. My body was so stiff I decided if I ran now it would more than likely set me back, maybe I might do something in the afternoon. We got into Cardiff just after 12:00 and spent the afternoon discovering the town. I’ve been to Cardiff before in 1998, for the Inter-counties cross country champs, but then it was a case of bus up from London, race, bus back to London, so I never really got to see the place. I knew it had been developed a fair amount since then but I was surprised with how nice a city it was. Excellent shopping and restaurants/bars, all very close together, and Bute Park (where I had raced before) was a really pleasant park to walk around. Unfortunately all the walking made me feel a little stiff, so I decided to play the rest day card and went for a swim instead.

Day 7 – Sunday 5 May. It was a beautiful morning, perfect for a run in the park, and that was our intention. Before breakfast we were going to run up to the park together, about 4 minutes away, then I was going to leave Carole and try to pick up the pace. But within a minute I was feeling awkward, trying to run at Carole’s pace was putting too much pressure on the achilles so I decided to leave her and run on at my pace, solely concentrating on my own form. Another couple of minutes and I still felt like I was running awkward and I was feeling pain around the achilles. On the verge of giving in and walking back to the hotel, I decided to keep going at least to the entrance to the park, and then suddenly the pain eased. As I entered the park I started gradually increasing the pace. I was nervy, still a little tense, and not at my most comfortable, but I felt better at a better pace than I’d done all week. Not having a garmin I can’t be absolutely sure of my pace but it felt similar to how I’d run in Germany, when I ran a 17:37 5k. I had planned to only run for 30 minutes but in the end I tagged a bit on and did 38, not a huge difference in normal terms but significant enough when you’re on the comeback trail. I felt great afterwards and, thankfully suffered no repercussions. After breakfast we decided to pop out of Cardiff, into the countryside, and visited Dyffryn Gardens. With it being such a nice sunny day it was relaxing to stroll through the grounds and sit in the sun reading the Sunday paper.

Walking was just the thing I needed to enable the leg muscles to keep working and stretching. After a while we returned to the hotel and walked down to the Cardiff Bay Area. I’d heard it had been developed and was interested to see it, but I wasn’t expecting it to be quite so crowded, all the bars and restaurants were chocka. Admittedly the warm weather and the fact that they were setting up a stage for a concert, to celebrate Cardiff City FC’s Championship victory, probably made it busier than usual but it was a nice place to spend a sunny Sunday afternoon. We walked over the barrier towards Penarth and back again, returning to the hotel, where, because it was still warm and sunny, we plonked ourselves on some seats and enjoyed a couple of beers, whilst we waited for the Cardiff City FC bus to drive past, spraying spectators with champagne, whilst one of it’s occupants belted out a karaoke rendition of champione.

Day 8 – Monday 6 May. We were due to leave Cardiff and head home but first the small matter of today’s run. Uplifted by yesterday’s run I decided the time was right to start my speed work and decided on my old favourite the 1,2,3. This time I left Carole at the hotel door and set off on my own. I felt good all the way to the park and was ready to put in some efforts. The first one felt really awkward and slow, I really wasn’t sure if I was doing the right thing but I persevered and by the time I was on my 3^rd rep I was feeling more comfortable. I still wasn’t able to go as fast as I’d like to but I was running like a proper runner again. 38 minutes later I was back at the hotel feeling pretty happy with myself. Then it was breakfast and the drive back home.

On the way home we visited Tredegar House and Country Park. This was the scene of Herne Hill Harriers BMAF Cross Country relay victory in 2005, when we surprised the mighty Bristol & West. I hadn’t been back since but the start and finish area still seemed familiar to me and I recalled Dave Robinson flashing past the house to bring us the championship ahead of Bristol & West’s Nick Rose. Oh happy days. Then it was back home and a chance to sit in the garden before the sun went down.

Nice setting for a race, especially when you win.

Day 9 – Tuesday 7 May. A busy day at work but in between client sessions I managed to find the time to do a 60 minute run. It wasn’t as fast as I’d done in Cardiff, but it was over the undulations of Tatton Park. By now the pain around my achilles was becoming minimal and I decided to try another quality run tomorrow.

Day 10 – Wednesday 8 May. I made a big decision last night, today I was going to run my fartlek course. This morning I did it, still not at 100% effort but a little faster over an intense course. Just a slight niggle around the achilles but nowhere near as bad as it’s been this last week. Now I’m really starting to feel confident and can’t wait to try it out in a proper race. Tomorrow is the Mow Cop Killer Mile, but I think it’s too soon, so I’ll leave that for Lee to smash. The big question is no longer can I get round a stage of the masters relay, it’s can I get round fast enough to justify a place in the Salford team. The body is definitely moving more freely, I’m getting faster all the time and I feel that it’s the stiffness rather than my lung capacity that’s holding my speed back. Once I’m clear of pain and stiffness I’ll be able to really turn on the taps and push my lungs to their limit.

       

While I’ve been hiding out in a pair of cycling shorts those that can have been running. One guy in particular just seems to be getting better and better the older he gets, Kerry- Liam Wilson, one of my Scottish rivals from Ronhill Cambuslang seems to be winning everything put before him and last weekend set a pb over the marathon 2:27.20, at Belfast, pretty impressive for a 42 year old, earlier in the week he’d run a 5k pb of 15:02, possibly even more impressive. Well done Kerry, hope to catch up with you soon.

Written by Roger Alsop

www.rogeralsop.co.uk

Marathon The Final Tune-up

Many Marathon conversations have been going on lately, many of my running friends have voiced their own opinions over facebook. Most significantly, for British people anyway, is the decision of the IAAF to remove Paula Radcliffe’s World Record of 2:15.25, set at the London Marathon in 2003, because she was paced by male runners. Of course she’ll still be the World Record holder with her time achieved, in an all female race, of 2:17.42, her London time being stated as a World Best. Paula is keen to run the marathon at the 2012 London Olympics, but she has struggled with injury over the last two years. In a bid to show she deserves a place she entered this year’s Berlin Marathon and finished 3^rd in 2:23.46, well inside the 2:31 qualifying time. So it looks like Paula is on the way back and what a fitting finale it would be, to a great career, if she could win the gold at London, should she decide that it was then time to concentrate on other business interests.

At the same Berlin Marathon the world record was again broken, as Patrick Makau reduced it to 2:03.38. Getting ever closer to the 2 hour barrier that Michael Crawford attempted in the 70’s, in the film The Games – worth a watch on a wet afternoon with no real sport on.

At the end of this week the Chester Marathon takes place, this is now my local marathon, but more significantly, for me, it marks the marathon debut of my client, Ray Tran. You’ll have heard about Ray before, I’ve mentioned him in a few of my blogs, he’s also my Pennington Flash Parkrun buddy. Throughout the time that Ray has been training with me he has had a number of goals and one of these has been to run this marathon. Ray has been training hard for the marathon and is being realistic in his time goal (sub 3:30). You’ll recall I’ve previously mentioned the Yasso session we did, which indicated he was in 3:23 shape. Well this week it’s wind down time, which started on Sunday (after a final burn up session).

When I did my own marathon, in 2003, in fact the same one that Paula broke the World Record in, I had lots of knowledge about training for the marathon, gained from the many people I knew who had taken part in numerous marathons, I also had a great marathon coach in David Lucas, who had a reputation of coaching ladies to sub 3 hour marathons and also coached Junior Galley and Jim Estell to AAA Marathon Championship honours. However I also carried out some separate research and discussed my ideas with Dave, which Dave didn’t disagree with. One of the things I found out was that many top runners considered a 10k race, a week before the marathon, to be ideal preparation for the marathon. It also appeared that this fitted in nicely with the various regional 12 stage relays, held in Britain, which tended to be about a week before the marathon and had legs of 3 and 6 miles (approx). Of course, when I came to do the marathon, the Southern 12 Stage relay was being held in Milton Keynes and the long leg was nearer 5 miles. This didn’t phase me and, as I’ve always been a team man, I decided to do the relay rather than try to find a 10k. I requested a long leg from team manager, Alan Mead, which I got. Alan, being the sensitive type, gave me leg 1 so I could do some extra miles after the run. It was a typical long leg around the lake from the Open University grounds, typical being windy, I don’t think I’ve ever run there when there hasn’t been a strong wind out by the lake, those doing short legs have it so much easier. I hadn’t been doing any short distance speed work all winter, just lots of long hills and 1 mile reps so I settled into a steady pace around mid pack. However, as we hit the wind everyone around me seemed to slow down, well I felt strong so I pushed through and soon I found myself in the top 10. Once we joined the short stage path to home there was no stopping me, I just pushed all the way to the finish, coming in 7^th and running 24:50 for the close on 5 mile leg, I even got the better of local rival and now team mate, Dave Robinson, who I hadn’t beaten for some years, always a nice feather in your cap.    

But returning to Ray’s marathon, based on my own approach and the fact that Ray doesn’t have a lot of running years in his background, I decided to do my final pre-marathon session with Ray this Sunday and I decided I was going to pace him to an 8k at his predictor 8k pace, this turned out to be 4:45min/k pace. Session time was set for 16:00 and I’d worked out a fairly safe and flatish (or so I’d thought) run along the bypass towards Gadbrook Park, turning down towards town and back via the cemetery to the bypass, I was going to then turn back towards Leftwich but as it turned out the traffic junction at London Road was clear so we crossed it and carried on up the bypass. The finish was just before Hartford Hall, meaning that the last k would contain the steep hill, but it was the end of a race and I’d make Ray fight for it up that hill.

We started off with a 1k warm-up in 5:18 and then kicked off. As has often been the case in my racing career the first k was too fast, 4:25, but not so fast that we couldn’t correct and also I’m a great believer in going how you feel – of course on some occasions this has lead to me suffering mid-race, but on others I’ve smashed pbs. We edged back the pace but still only to 4:31 for the next k, but hey, Ray was still chatting away so I wasn’t panicking. Two further ks, each in 4:39, and this was looking good, we were half way and well within schedule. The next 2k had a long drag of a hill in it, I could sense Ray was struggling a bit, conversation was more one-way and it felt like we’d slackened the pace. I urged Ray on but we went over the 4:45 goal with 2 4:48s, but that was only a 6 second deficit and we only had 2k to go. We were reaching territory we regularly did reps on and Ray lifted his pace a touch with a 4:45 penultimate k and then it was the hill at Hartford towards the end of the final k. It is a tough hill to run up at the best of times but at 7.5k into an 8k hard run it’s a bit irritating, still I wasn’t about to let a hill ruin Ray’s run, I’ve already embraced this hill and made it my friend and at this point it was time for Ray to shake it’s hand, and he did so climbing to a crescendo finish with a final k of 4:43. All this gave us a final 8k time of 37:26, averaging 4:39, which, as Ray reminded me, would have been a pb at 10k if we’d carried on (particularly as the next 2k would have been flat), but there’s time for that in the future, now it’s time for Ray to ease back and smash that Chester marathon. We discussed the final week’s training and went home.

With the marathon in his legs it’ll be a few weeks before Ray and I train together but on the plus side I’ve just started running with the 38 minute 10k man, who shall be forever known as Rich (Ray, Rich, Rog, make sure you don’t get confused, I need a Julian or Henry for a bit of variety), we had our first run last Thursday and it was fast and furious. Rich is young and strong so over the next four weeks I’ll be expecting him to take me to pieces, but within that time he’ll gain an appreciation of my style of training (which has been proven to get you pbs and even world records) and I’ll also be passing on many tips for his marathon, he’s entered Edinburgh 2012.    

It was a Sunday session for Ray, that’s quite unusual for me, I decided a long time ago that it’s important to have a separation between work and play and that meant not working for the two days at the weekend, or even the extended weekend. I know this means that there are some lucrative opportunities I’m going to miss out on but life’s not all about making money. Anyway this weekend I found myself alone and I also wanted to do this final session with Ray, to ensure I gave him the best service I could prior to his marathon. Of course I’ll not always turn down weekend work, but it would need to be something of great interest to me, to tempt me away from spending it with Carole. I wasn’t supposed to be alone this weekend, it’s Carole’s birthday and we were planning to go somewhere exciting, such as Blackpool, but then Carole was given the opportunity to go to a conference in San Francisco and those who know Carole well know how driven she is when it comes to work. So Carole jetted off early on Saturday to the States. Poor Carole had to wake up on Sunday to take part in an organised wine tasting tour of the Napa Valley wineries. Over the next week she’ll be in networking mode for the benefit of her company and she’ll even have to take in a concert one night, featuring some singers from the past, Sting and Tom Petty. I feel for her, she could have been here being taken through her paces by me.

With Carole away it gives me the opportunity to do some things I wouldn’t normally do, like stay up a little later, watch non weepy movies and switch off the TV when Coronation Street and Emmerdale are on. It also gave me the opportunity to pay a brief visit to Edinburgh over the weekend. It was time to pick up the remnants of my previous life and move it to Northwich. Unfortunately I’d forgotten how many remnants I’d left in my garage and now they’ve filled up our house, a box of medals alone weighs about 6kg, I’d forgotten how successful I used to be, considering I haven’t won anything this year, mind you I haven’t entered much. The best thing is I now have my rowing machine installed in my gym and I believe it will help me add an edge to my training, it did before.

Whilst in Edinburgh it also gave me a chance to catch up with some people, I was only there a few hours so I didn’t make an effort to contact everybody but I had been invited to the engagement party of Richard Meade and Gail. Richard was in the group I helped to coach with Alex McEwen so I was keen to catch up with him and many other members of that group and other runners I’d met in my time in Edinburgh. Unfortunately I had to leave early as I was making an early start back to Northwich the next day. Before the party I had a bite to eat with fellow PT, Jim Buick, who’s working on his new website www.jimsgym.org

Finally while I was shopping in Chester, during the week, I came across the 2012 version of the Guinness book of World Records. I couldn’t resist having a quick peek and there in the Marathon records was a picture of Lee Riley. Incidentally Lee tells me that he’s managed to get Ann Packer along to support his mile world record attempt, for those too young to know she was Olympic champion over 800m at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics.

Memories of the Surrey 10000m Championship

At the weekend Chris Thompson ran a fantastic 27:27.36 for 10000m at Stanford, California. A time which ranks him 3rd on the UK all time list, behind Jon Brown and Eamonn Martin, though more than a minute off the world best of 26:17.53, held by Kenenisa Bekele, and only ranks as the 363^rd fastest 10000m, at this current time (multiple times by athletes taken into account). Coming up this month are the County Championships. While these would appear to be two completely distinct items, I’ve used a spurious link for this week’s blog, to reminisce about my participation in the Surrey 10000m Championships.

The 10000m is a tough race, both mentally and physically, and feels completely different to running a road race over the same distance. You would think that it would be easier as you can pace yourself every 400m as you run round the oval track 25 times. The track has no undulations, though you do tend to notice the wind more, as it hits you at the same place every lap. The 10000m can be hell as you watch people drifting further away from you, particularly when you can see them a clear 200m ahead of you, and it can be heartbreaking when you get lapped, even worse if you’re lapped by the same person more than once. Having said that, when you’re running well and challenging for position it can be a fantastic feeling to drop off your opponents. I’ve seen some great 10000m races in my time and one can easily conjure up memories of any of Haile Gebrselassie’s races, particularly against Paul Tergat. But one that sits most prominently in my mind is the 10000m at Tooting Bec in 1992, where Paul Evans ran an, almost, solo effort to run a qualifying time for the Barcelona Olympics.

My first experience of this race came in 1990 when I decided to enter the Surrey 10000m Championships. They were held at Woking and I was fairly positive going into the race, I was just into my second year running and had come off an improving cross country season. I had no illusions about where I would finish, I was up against guys that were finishing in the top 15 in the Surrey League, whereas I’d just snuck into 78^th position in the last race. I just wanted to see what I was capable of and I set myself the target time of 35 minutes. I don’t actually remember that much about the race but I was pretty much in no mans land for the bulk of it, not knowing how to pace myself, but I didn’t struggle as I finished in 7^th position in 34:52.1. The race was won by Terry Booth in 32:14.3. Clearly I had a lot in reserve as I ran my next race just over two weeks later in 33:34.7. 

I enjoyed racing, particularly as the distances got longer on the track, so I entered again in 1991. This time the race was held at Norbiton. It was a close race at the front, with my Belgrave team mate, Frank Ward, setting the pace, only to be outkicked over the last lap. Jerry Weightman won the race in 30:59.2, with Terry Booth coming second in 31:02.6 and Frank taking bronze with 31:04.9. I advanced a place to 6^th, running 32:31.3, which was a pb and would remain so for two years.

Having missed the 1992 event, because I’d missed half the winter with injury, I next ran the event in 1993. It was held in Wimbledon Park, at the time I was living in Southfields so I was able to saunter down to the track nice and relaxed. I hadn’t originally intended entering, my coach, Arthur Bruce, was now directing my race choices, to some extent, and he had wanted me to get a good win under my belt. So we had focused on the Belgrave club 10000m championships, but for some reason the club had decided to switch the race to a date later in the year. Arthur suggested I enter this race and see if I could get dragged round for a good time. Again I had no particular hang-ups when I saw the other entrants, as I expected to feature around the same place as the previous two attempts, though I had been running well of late. Some of the entrants had a history; Barry Atwell – someone I didn’t know at the time but he’d been pretty useful over the years, Terry Booth – the 1990 winner and 1991 runner up, Jerry Weightman – the 1991 winner and 1992 runner up, Mike Boyle – former international Marathon runner, Dave Robinson, a new name to me at the time but, as I’ve found out since, there were also a few other runners with decent pedigree.

The race set off at a fairly sedate pace of around 80 seconds a lap. I’d let the big boys sort out the front positions and I was tucked in somewhere around mid field. After about 3 laps of this sedate pace Mike Boyle went to the front and set off on his bid for victory. Mike covered all but the last 3 or 4 laps in an average of 74 seconds. The pack went with him and stuck like glue. I’d missed the initial break but ran consistently for a couple of laps to latch onto the back of the leading pack. Gradually, as we continued at this pace for a number of laps, someone in front of me would drop off the pace and I’d move up one position in the lead group. With seven laps gone there was a sudden surge from Barry Atwell, who ran round the field and picked up the pace considerably. I thought it was a brave attempt and Barry must be a great runner to run that fast so early. The pack picked up the pace and tried to bridge the gap, only for Barry to drop out after a further 200m. Clearly, for whatever reason, he’d decided not to continue and wanted to see what he could get to 3000m in. The pace settled down again and soon the lead group was made up of the two Herne Hill Harriers, Mike Boyle and Dave Robinson, Hounslow athlete, Terry Booth, and me, still sitting at the back. I had no idea what the pace was, I didn’t wear a watch in those days and was concentrating on keeping up with the others, I felt good, I also felt I had a chance of a medal.

Dave was the next one to drop off the pace, but every time I tried to go round him he fought me off. As this kept us in the lead pack I didn’t put up too much of a fight, afterall it didn’t matter what position I occupied at this point. A few laps later Dave drifted a bit more and I put in a spurt to go round and keep up with Mike and Terry. Now I was really confident I had a medal in the bag. With about 5 laps to go, I’m afraid I can’t remember the exact lap, Terry unexpectedly pulled up. There was a lot of shouting from the crowd and that made Terry carry on (I spoke to Terry after and he thought he’d pulled his hamstring). So now it was just Mike and myself. I was comfortable sitting behind him but approaching 3 or 4 laps to go (again I can’t remember the exact lap, I always thought it was 3 to go but a report I’ve read states 4) I sensed Mike was either tiring or wanting me to take over, there was a slight slowing down and I found myself level with Mike entering the lap. I looked across at Mike and thought I could see defeat etched in his features, so I went for it. It wasn’t an explosion but I managed to up the pace to 71 sec per lap, Mike couldn’t match me and I pulled away lap by lap. As I crossed the line a big smile came over my face, this was my first proper championship victory and I’d beaten some of the best runners in the county to get it. It was only later that I found out the time 30:33.7, almost 2 minutes off my pb. Mike finished in 30:42.1, with Dave coming in 3^rd in 31:00.7. Terry hung in there and finished in 31:10.9. Not bad times for a county championships. In fact 7^th place finished in 32:28.7, a time that could win some future championships.

Following the race I had many cut and thrust battles with Dave Robinson, mostly he came out on top. Mike Boyle was always that much better than me, and still is. Now, of course, we’re team mates and enjoy racing together in team events. I have video footage of the event, taken by Ray O’ Donaghue. I used to watch it before a major championship, to get me in the right frame of mind, sadly I no longer have a video and am looking to get it converted to DVD.

I didn’t enter again until 1996, choosing to concentrate on shorter distances. The 1996 Championship was held in Walton. I’d never been to the track so left early to ensure no panics. Unfortunately, for me, they cancelled the train I was due to catch so I had to wait on Wimbledon station for 30 minutes until the next one. It was a hot and sunny day, the temperature was rising all the time and the race was due off early afternoon.

It wasn’t a good turnout for the race and my main rivals were Pete Groves, silver medallist the previous year, and John Towse. I was a different athlete to the surprise winner from three years ago, I’d produced some fast times over 1500m, 3000m and 5000m and was in reasonable shape this year, though I’d only ran 32:22 at the Inter Counties, a few weeks earlier, and I didn’t have any knowledge of John Towse, so, though I was confident of winning, it wasn’t a foregone conclusion.

Because of the heat I’d walked from the station to the track and did some light stretching whilst the other competitors ran around warming up. We set off and I immediately settled into third place, letting Pete and John take on the pacemaking. Water tables were out and every few laps we took on water. I noticed that Pete and John were drinking theirs from the plastic cups, whereas I didn’t really need a drink but didn’t want to take on the pace either, so I just poured mine down my chin. At half way, I decided to make my move, I made the move over towards the water table prompting Pete and John to do the same, but whilst they took a cup I switched back inside and injected some pace. I made a good gap over the next lap and just maintained pace and by the end of the race I was 32 seconds in front, as Pete and John settled for battling out for 2^nd, John got the better of Pete running 32:25.1 to 32:31.9. My time was 31:53.9.

I won again on my next attempt, in 1999. By now the champs had moved to September and were being held at Tooting Bec. I’d not been having a great year, failing to get under 15 minutes for 5k, but I was in reasonable shape and knew I had a chance to win again, depending on who turned up. The main opposition in this race came from my mate and Belgrave colleague, Paul Coughlan. I was confident I could out kick anyone in the race so set off at a sedate pace, but Paul was having none of it. His attitude was that if he was going to lose he might as well go down fighting. So Paul picked up the pace and I just went with him until I felt the time was right to make a break. I ran 31:43.2 and Paul was second in 32:29.3 with Rob Jacobs taking bronze in 33:29.4. It was nice to be cheered on by my old rival, Mike Boyle, particularly as there wasn’t a lot of love lost between Herne Hill and Belgrave. But that just shows the respect that racers have for their rivals.

In 2001 I decided to dispense with my three yearly outings at the Surrey 10000m Champs and entered again. I’d had another non-descript year but felt I had a chance for a 4^th title. Again the field was small as people started to avoid county champs. My main rival this year was Karl Corpes. I knew Karl well from years of racing him, he was a tough runner who could have some great races in cross country but he wasn’t anywhere near as good on the track. I pretty much knew I’d won this one from the off so didn’t hang around. As I entered the last lap I’d lapped everyone but Karl so put in a bit of a spurt and sprinted down the last 100m to finish about 10 metres ahead of Karl’s 24^th lap. A bit mean, I know, but not often you get a chance to lap the entire field in a championship event. My time was my slowest in the event at 32:34.7, with Karl 2^nd in 33:56.8 and Rob Jacobs again taking the bronze in 34:02.1.

2002 was to be my last attempt to win the championship. Having dispensed with the three yearly entry, I guess I got greedy for my 5^th title, but it was not to be as Jason Simpson entered the race and won in a time around 30:33.0. This year the Belgrave championships were incorporated into the race and I only came third in that as Mike Trees finished second to Jason in 31:52.3, with Charles Herrington finishing 3^rd in 31:55.2. However, as Mike and Charles didn’t qualify for Surrey I took the silver medal as I’d finished 4^th in 32:29.1.

I lost interest in the track after this so failed to enter again, when I could, then I moved to Edinburgh in 2005 and now live in Cheshire so I’m unlikely to enter again, but never say never.