KILLIN 10K

For the 3rd year Tay Fitness held their now annual running event on Saturday 24^th August in the village of Killin which is on the outskirts of Stirlingshire about 30mins from Callandar and 90 mins from East Kilbride.  This year they had their highest number of entrants in the 10k with 165 and 55 for the 1k fun run.

The 10k route started at the west end of the village in the Acharn Forest Car Park next to the war memorial.  From there the first 2k of the race was slightly downhill & flat took the runners over the Dochart Bridge, running down the Main Street and past the McLaren Hall (Event HQ) taking us out of the village and loop up Glen Lochay to the Hydro station before returning to the village and finishing in Breadalbane Park. The middle 6k was a slight undulating loop of Glen Lochay the last 2k was mainly downhill towards the Main Street.

To my surprise I was joined by Stuart Waugh at the start line which was unexpected however it played well in my race plan to get a pb.  Both Stuart & I ran the BMAF 10k last week and we were running close to each other so I knew if I could stay near to him I could get a pb.  Stuart was initially running consciously as he has an achilles problem so for the first 4k we were taking turns leading.  After that distance marker Stuart slowly started to accelerate away and I thought about chasing him down but chose to stick to my own race plan but keep him in sight.  Once we had climbed the hill at Lochlay Hydro station and looped the Marshall it was downhill from 7k.  I could still see Stuart at this point so at every distance marker I ran short hard reps for about a minute to make up time.  When I reached the 9k mark I was about 42 mins on my watch so I felt if I was going to get a pb I better up the pace.  So for the last 1k I just imagined I was running the last section of Chatelherault and ran as hard as I could to the finish.

Stuart’s debut time on this course was 46:22 and my time was 46:47 (2mins 17 secs faster the last year).  This is a season’s best for me, only second time under 47 mins and 13 seconds shy of my pb.

After the racing both Stuart & I enjoyed a free massage, well for a small donation, from the team of therapists from Athletes Angels and the lovely spread in the McLaren Hall, which was selling soup and sandwiches, tea, coffee and home baking, along with the heavily sponsored prize giving, courtesy of The Real Food Café in Tyndrum. 

Heres the link to Tay Fitness if any other Harriers fancy it next year: http://www.tayfitness.com/killin-10k/

Thanks to Richard for the report