Pentland Road 10k

By Ewan Smith

The Pentland Road 10K is one I've had my eye on for a long while. 10K with hardly any uphill and 300 feet of gradual descent; what's not to like? In fact it's a sure fire pb course (weather permitting!) The only problem is that it's held in Stornoway on a Friday night in April which makes getting there a bit awkward to say the least. Last year I thought it was bound to work in with my holidays - but I didn't reckon with the organisers' disinclination to hold a race on Friday 13th.

This year, however, the dates worked perfectly. Entry opened the week after a 5K pb and I was the first name in. Having studied past results and looked at how other runners had performed, I reckoned that sub38 was easily possible. I had got new pbs over 3 distances in 2018 and was hopeful of repeating that in 2019.

However, no sooner had I got carried away with my own stupidity than I was brought back to reality with a bump. I'm still not really sure what happened but by a couple of weeks after the Nationals in Falkirk it had all fallen to bits. Both legs were stiff and numb 24/7, my ankle was weak, my back was sore and running even a few k meant coming down stairs sideways in the morning.

As the weeks went on, things slowly improved but not fast enough. Training was still pretty minimal but given that this might be the only shot at this race, I decided I might as well carry on anyway.

The evening of the race came round with near perfect conditions. Lewis is generally a windy place but not that night and the sun was shining as we were bussed out to the start. The race starts out on a peat moor in the middle of the island on a road which is one of my favourite training runs with one of the only uphill sections right at the start - given that I nearly always go off too quickly this was not a bad thing.

The first k passed reasonably in just under 4 mins and I was happy with that as most of the downhill was still to come. The 2nd and 3rd Ks were about 3:50 pace which was fine but I knew it wouldn't be enough for a pb. By 5k the lack of fitness was evident and I had a stitch which stayed with me until the outskirts of Stornoway.

The last 2K take you through the grounds of Stornoway castle and I battled on knackered but determined not to be above 40mins. The final k was twisty and provided me with a unique experience and a unique excuse, The paths in the castle grounds were being resurfaced and I got to race a road roller ( I won). However I could feel the new tar sticking to the nice new white racing flats and that's my excuse.

Finally, I crossed the finish in a disappointing 39:32, almost 6 minutes behind the winner and with the dubious distinction of being one of the few runners who hasn't managed a pb on that course. However to quote the Big Fla "First World problems"!