Pollok Park 10k

7th August 2009

10k Results | Photos | Series results

The final race in this week's Tour of Clydeside 4-race series.

I started the race comfortably in 2nd place in the series, with no real possibility of gaining or losing a place. The race began with a quick sprint out onto the main road for the first clockwise circuit of Pollok Park.

I ran with or just behind Chris Devenney, the series leader until just before we turned back into the park at 2km, but then I droppped off the back of the front 4 runners - Chris, Daniel Bradford, Alun Myers and Denis Williams - and felt a bit stranded and worn out as I ran through the park on my own, just waiting to be caught.

I kept catching glimpses of Bellahouston vests just behind me, but it wasn't until we were back on the main road that Bryan Burnett finally made his move and went past. This strangely took the pressure off and I found I could just relax and follow him back around and into the park again.

Once we hit 8km I began to surge the pace and tried to pull away. I could see we were gaining on Denis and Alun, so I repeatedly tried to drive the pace to bridge the gap to Denis, and each time Bryan was responding. Once we got to 9.5km I was working really hard and couldn't tell if I'd dropped Bryan or not when suddenly Gerry Scullion came past, which totally surprised me. I let Gerry go, then spontaneously reacted and realised I'd just overtaken him with 250 metres to go and was closing fast on Denis Williams, but not really knowing where the finish line was.

I just failed to catch Denis, but held off Gerry and Bryan, so I was pleased enough to finish 5th, given it was my 4th race of the week! My time was somewhere around 36:10, and Ellie had a good run to finish around 40:34 as 2nd female in the series behind Ruth Joss.

Well done to the Tour of Clydeside organisers for providing a week of top class entertainment.

Photos courtesy of scotjem