Trawden Trio Raid Birchwood

After recent exploits on the Grand Prix circuit and fresh from the presentation night, Wallace and Gromit plus new TAC member Mark Fawcett made their way to Warrington for the Brichwood 10K.

When entering this race was advertised as a fast and flat PB course, and looking at past winning times of sub-30 minutes it promised not to disappoint.

Another early start for this one and we arrived in good time to collect numbers and go through our pre-race routines and warm ups. Prefect weather, not too hot or cold with a nice gentle breeze in the air as we made our way to the start.

Just under 800 runners lined up as we went through race instructions as 10.30am ticked down, then the hooter sounded and we were off.
 
Really quick start to this one as some of the top runners set of at a pace that would have been difficult to maintain, so I dropped back to my own pace and went through the first kilometre mark at 3.45 mins bang on six minute mile and on for PB.

There is not a lot to say about this course. It sets off from Birchwood retail park and out onto the surrounding roads. As promised it was fast and flat, although over the first 5K it seemed to slightly drop in places.

At each of the kilometre marks I was on for a PB hitting each one at 3.45 mins if not slightly under. Onto the 6K marker and the course turns for home and starts to rise in places, and we crossed over the motorway and made our way back to the retail park.

Between this and the 8K marker is where I think I lost a bit of time and was starting to see some runners who had dropped out and were walking. At least my legs were still going and I dug in as I passed the 8K mark and put a strong one in up to the 9K marker.

At last the course started to descend again and a quick look at my watch. There wasn't much in it and I pushed on for the finish with just the start of a stitch pinching my side.

I turned a corner for the sprint to the inflatable finish in 38.01 - only four seconds off a PB, but would chip time give me some valuable time back and break my PB? Good runs also from Wallace and Mark Fawcett with a new PB of 42.33.

This is a great course to run if you want a PB, though not very scenic, so if you are chasing PBs you'll spend more time looking at your watch and working out projected finish times.

Back to the results chip time matched gun time so no PB but so, so close! I really enjoyed this race and not too far to travel, plus we got a nice big bath towel for finishing…although it wasn't red!