BUCS: The revenge of the cross country

5000m goal : 15:50

5000m PB : 16:29.9

5k SB (post-Sept 2011) : 17:03 (xc split)

Two years ago I was at the pinnacle of my athletics career (of the time).  Training alongside the mighty Steven Bayton under the impressive coaching of Coach ‘Hannah’ Mitchell, had seen me shatter my PBs in to fragments I could only dream of as I tried to (unsuccessfully) knock out 400 reps in under 80 seconds a piece the previous summer.

It was all set up for the main event, the BUCS Cross County Champs up in Stirling that year.  Buoyed by the event not being snowed off, I confidently engaged in a one pint wager with my arch nemesis, on the criteria of who finished first.  Little did I know that this was to be the stage which would be the first of a dozen consecutive defeats to the rapidly improving man from Halifax.  My race lacked urgency, I started off in an energy preservation mode and found myself near the back, and it was only half way through that the frustrated shouts of my coaching support team hit me.  No amount of ‘cutting up the inside’ could muster me a finish higher than 147^th.

Now, two years on, I am eligible to run in BUCS again as I represent the 2^nd finest educational institute in central Birmingham.  These XC Championships, this coming weekend, are an early morning train ride to Cardiff away, and are the venue for my post-injury return to student competition.  Recent training sessions suggest that I’m nearing my peak of fitness again, in particular after lowering my ‘asleep to bathroom’ PB to 25.4 seconds in the 8m event mid-last night.

A top 100 finish is surely the target, and I am wiser from lessons learnt in cross countries over the last 24 months.  These include, start fast, tread tentatively through muddy ditches, and don’t ponder whether you need to buy milk on the way home at crucial moments in the race. 

  

Top uni for architecture I’ll have you know…