Not for the first time it was a chilly ride out to Chesterton for the Andy Reading 10k though a tailwind meant I arrived in plenty of time without wasting energy reserved for the race. I collected my timing chip then striped down to vest and shorts maybe a few minutes early as the quarter hour waiting to start was rather cold and I had to resist running full pelt up and down the field just to keep warm.

We were led onto the road and started promptly, a lap of the village before the seemingly long road over the motorway bridge to reach the airfield. This was a PB attempt for me and after an on target first mile I saw my pace drop a little along here but it was slightly uphill and into the wind so I didn’t worry.

I seemed to be going well round the airfield, picking up a few places and managing to keep my pace under 7:30. A shout of ‘come on vegan’ just after halfway pushed me on a few seconds. The last mile of airfield was again gently uphill and into the wind and, while I was feeling good and was aware that mile 6 should be fast enough to recover a bit of time, I could see the PB wasn’t going to happen.

A funny little hairpin then back onto the road and I managed my fastest mile of the day retracing back over the motorway. Through the gate then about a 100 metres of grass to the finish where I managed to scrape 46:26 192/462, a course best and second fastest 10k to date but 27 seconds too slow for a PB. I was happy with this result and reckon I could have managed the half minute faster on a still day. If I had any doubts about whether I’d put enough effort in they were soon dispelled by the moaning from my legs as I struggled the fixed gear up the not very big hills on the way home!