Owls Count

As I was heading up to Stockport for the weekend, for the orienteering and to visit family, I decided I would also get up in time to run this 5k race. Originally I had planned to travel up on Friday, but plans changed and I ended up driving up on Saturday morning - meaning a rather early 4am start! Breakfast was cereal and coffee at a service station on the M6 and followed by a pre-race tea and banana on arrival with family.

I arrived at the park reasonably early, which meant I had time for a decent warm up and to scout out part of the two lap course. The park races are low key, which meant that the start was someone going: ‘Start on my whistle’ and then whistling, which caught most of the field by surprise.

I started a little too quickly, but soon calmed my pace down - settling into a comfortable pace. I was surprised at one point to be told ‘10:19′ at one point, which I realised 20 seconds later was my first lap time - I had simply not recognised that we had gone round once. The second lap was a little slower. I had one moment where I thought I might be going to wrong way when, suddenly, I was on a path and unable to see any other runners in front or behind.

My time was 20:48, which was quicker than I expected. I reckon, based on that time, I can do sub-20 at the moment - I did not go full out and could have gone faster at the end. There are a couple of photos of me. I recommend the event to anyone in the area - each Saturday at 9am - though possibly on more sleep than I had had!