Glasgow Mo 5k Race 2012

Last year I took part in the inaugural Glasgow Mo 5k race and placed 1^st MV50 and 17^th overall out of the 173 people who completed the charity event in Glasgow Green.  This year the organisers added a 10k race and, despite the Jimmy Irvine 10k and the Glasgow parkrun 5k both taking place in Glasgow in the same morning, managed to attract a total of 468 runners, many of them sporting either real or fake moustaches,  in support of Movember and their fundraising for Men’s Health and in particular Prostate Cancer.  Although having a bit of a cold, I decided to take part in the 5k and see if I could retain my Super Vet record.  I had also got into the spirit of things by growing a bit of a moustache and by wearing my Jammys running vest.

Start Line, Lynsey on the left and me on the right

I paid my £15 entry fee, warmed up and lined up with another 115 runners for the 10:20am Start.  I didn’t recognise any of those around me at the Start and decided to lead from the go.  I sprinted off, over the mats, around the monument and followed the lead bike along the paths. I was a bit confused to see the bike veering off to my right as I was directed straight on and around some bollards before returning to the path and behind the bike.  The 1^st kilometre had taken me an acceptable 4:12 but unfortunately I couldn’t maintain the pace and was overtaken by a handful or runners, including Lynsey Mackintosh as we made our way down towards the River Clyde and the Glasgow Green 3k route.  The second kilometre took me a disappointing 4:35 but by now the race had settled down and I was sure that I was leading the Super Vet Race.  I held off the challenge from someone for a while but he caught me just after the turn. I was glad to see that he was a youngster and I managed to stick in behind. The 3^rd k taking me 4:38, “not too bad” I thought as it had included a tight turn.  I managed to catch up with the other runner and after running beside him for a while, overtook him with the 4^th k taken me 4:27. Although I increased the pace a bit more for the final kilometre, I couldn’t stop him from overtaking me and leaving me behind.  That said, I did work hard and managed to complete the final and 5^th kilometre in 4:16, to cross the line in a time of 22:11. 

Finished

I fed my race number into the machine and pointed out to the organisers that the print out only contained my name and number and not my time and place.  “That’s ok, it’s set up for the 10k race” I was informed.  I congratulated Lynsey for being the first woman, I think she had finished two places ahead of me and asked her if she had placed 4^th but her boyfriend said that she had placed third, which would have made me 5^th .  I didn’t want to get too cold, so after chatting some more, I warmed down on my way back to the car, cheering on the other runners on my way.

Lynsey Wins!

I was a bit shocked when I checked the results on line to discover that, despite the use of electronic chips, my time was being displayed as 36:26!! Even worse was the fact that they had two other MV50+ crossing the line in 20:57 followed by another two runners crossing the line in 21:42.  Something was amiss and I’ve emailed the organisers to inform them of the anomalies but although it would be good to have won the MV50+ race again, I suppose it doesn’t really matter that much.  My time wasn’t great but it was 5 seconds faster than my last 5k of two weeks ago and my 4^th fastest of 2012 and it was for a good cause.

Results http://glasgow.mo-running.com/results-2012/#10k


Pics by Dafydd George Cuthbertson