‘Michael Page’ NWFPAC 2022 Championship – Race 2: Trafford 10k

After getting the usual pre-race entry list on Friday, I received a lovely picture of a pint from Dave Simmons, who was in the pub claiming to be carb loading, with a request that I write the race report … sure thing (I’m not even sure you’re allowed to say no, plus hanging on during a 10k gives you a lot of time to think of what to write!).

Dave always says the key to placing well on the end of season league tables is to turn up. Unfortunately, the early sell out for this race caught a lot of people out, including my teammate!

Counting the list of starters, I could see it would be a minimum of 7 points and, given that Dave’s subsequent messages from the pub made no sense, I discarded him and saw it as at least 8 points … it’s less than 2 years since I flogged myself in a virtual 5k for a mighty 3 points, so I figured that was decent inflation.

8 became 9 when we were treated to Adam Stirling’s email in the early hours of Sunday morning that he had gone insane and was undertaking the David Goggins Challenge and the times didn’t coincide with this (https://www.gogginschallenge.com/). I’ll leave others to question why he would choose to do this, but I’ve been tracking him on Strava and hats off for an incredible effort!

If I was secretly still reeling from the fact that my parkrun PB was only good enough for 17th place at Alexandra Park run, today was not the day that was going to change that – I’ve never seen so many Alphaflys(ies?) in once place.

Dave had picked a good race, a very popular race, on a very fast course (there were 5 PBs in the 15 NWFPAC runners taking part). So good was the course that clearly the great and the good of the running community had turned out in droves and they were quick, really quick – the first 5 finishers were sub 29 minutes and 30 minutes would only have gotten you 21st place!

After a couple of short warm up runs in weather conditions that perfectly matched Goldilocks’ third bowl of porridge, I lined up a bit closer to the start line than intended. I knew I was in the wrong place because I was flanked by Charles and Byron, with Charlie just in front, Rob Fairbanks a couple of rows back and Gareth Davies somewhere in between. The problem was Dave Chambers was a couple of rows in front and, as I figured I was really racing him, Rob and Gareth, I couldn’t risk letting him get away.

The first couple of k meandered down narrow country lanes and whilst I thought I was being held back by the throng, my watch said otherwise. I knew it was too fast when Charles overtook me (I was never supposed to be ahead of him), but I was shadowing Dave C and it felt just about the right side of comfortable so I thought I’d go with it.

I only really got into running of any sort in my early 20s to keep fit to play football. If you haven’t seen me play, I’m awesome, think Pele. If you have, you’ll know this is nonsense; my talents were not with the ball but being the dogged tackler tasked with winning the ball and giving it to the proper footballers! My favoured approach was to adopt a man-marking role and I figured the same tactic would serve me well here, i.e. try and keep pace with the people I was racing against, ignore the (very) many people going past me that I wasn’t and see if I could react to close them down if they tried to attack.

3k in Dave C and I turned a corner together and enjoyed a short conversation in which we both agreed this was too fast. I meant it, but did he, was it mind games already? This is a guy who last year ran 135 miles in a weekend just for fun, so he was hardly going to give up in a 10k. So instead of slowing, I tried to maintain the same pace and it felt like Dave had dropped back a bit, but I daren’t look round so early in the race. This was great, I felt ok, the pace was good, inside my 37 minute target and there was a bit of a gap (maybe), just keep ticking over, don’t overthink it, count down the ks, no bother …

5k in, the route rounded a hairpin near a church when a voice at the side of the road shouted encouragement to “go on Rob”. Now, I’m sure there was more than one Rob in the race, but our Rob runs an awful lot of local races (quickly) and I figure as such he’s likely a cult hero round these parts, so I had a hunch that this was he. That hunch proved true over the next couple of k when he appeared on my shoulder.

I may have had the element of stealth on my side here, as I’m not sure Rob knows who I am, which if he did, may have spurred him on to keep going past me. However, having learnt my lesson from the Alderley Edge bypass run last season of starting too fast and having to grind out the second half, I was hoping I’d paced this run better and I was also hoping Rob hadn’t. Judging by the rate of his breathing on my shoulder, he’d either put a big effort in to get on terms, or was trying the same sneaky tricks as Dave C by trying to pretend he was tired before going for the big finish.

I couldn’t risk it, but I was practically on the limit, when to kick, when to hang on … I decided a mile out would be good for an initial surge (well, it felt like a surge, but I’m sure it didn’t look like it), and there were a few bends to hide around and try and kick again out of sight … it was hard to look back when there were so many potholes in the final k and there were a couple of people finishing fast and one that I heard putting in a big effort which made me kick again just in case. Thankfully for me it wasn’t Rob, who was a mere 6 seconds back and definitely pushed me all the way, thanks Rob!

Even without any members using canine companions for extra propulsion, the large field of elite runners was always going to make the gender placing interesting for this event. As it turned out, Jill took the 20 points, albeit I didn’t actually see her until we were enjoying our well-earned post-race coffees and butties, but she looked annoyingly fresh from her win. Throughout my time with NWFPAC I think Jill has always been nursing one injury or another, but still turns up smiling, so it’s great that she can run fast again, congratulations on the win Jill!!

More excellent running from Charlie, congratulations on a massive PB, I hope that provides some consolation for missing out on top spot this time, and from Charles (also a PB, congrats!), both of whom I never saw again after the first k until we’d finished.

A solid time for Steve Henderson, I’d like to pretend that if I knew he was only 17 seconds in front of me I could have closed the gap, but it would be a lie.

Great to see Byron back running, albeit still troubled by an ankle injury, never more evident than the fact that he finished behind me! I won’t get used to it, but it’s a small (if somewhat hollow) victory after he breezed past me in race 1 (good luck with the specialist today Byron!)

With fast times all-round, Dave C held off Gareth, followed by the titanic 4-way tussle between Phil, Dave S (congratulations on the PB, just a stronger sprint finish away from sub 41 ;-), Steve Hughes and Josh (congrats on the PB). I reckon Steve would actually have won that battle if he wasn’t wearing his ultramarathon running pack all the way round!