It was a long day, but Avon & Somerset won both the six man and nine man teams, as well as having the first two finishers; Frank Tickner and Ben Noad. I finished 67th, a solid run, if not my best this year.

It was a very slippery and sticky Wollaton Park, which I guess isn't really my thing, but at least the weather was kind - as there is a long cold wait between the senior womens race and the mens race. Charlie ran well for 47th and Sian was 126th, it wasn't quite as exciting as if Kate had been running, although it was very much a Hayley Yelling type course and there's no danger of that in Mombasa.

The start is up a hill, and with 300 very competent runners charging up the hill and along a slippery camber it's a little tricky. Domonic Bannister was already heading off into the lead, but I could just see Frank Ticker at the head of the chasing group - and I guess it's not difficult to work out what happened when the front of the race had dissappeared out of site.

I knew from the athletes I could recognise that I things were going OK, but I wasn't having a great race. Adrian Marriot was just ahead for half of the first lap, which proves you don't need to race off at the start to get a good finishing position. Jon W. moved ahead of me for the middle part of the race, but if I wasn't keen on the surface he must have hated it. Rich W. was definately having a bad day at the office, but with A&S well placed in both the 6 and 9 men teams had to keep to going. Dan wasn't far behind, and our nine were all home inside the top 90.

I didn't run too badly though, I began to get going a little better later on in the race and came across Scott Hazell -.who certainly is a good athlete. It was a little disappointing to be quite a way behind the faster vets, but I suspect I have been further adrift on that sort of heavy course in the past. On the final lap Jon was in a group of eight athletes, and I knew things were going to speed up a little, but there is a short faster downhill section near the finish, I consolidated my place down the hill and hung on to the finish.

I was the sixth A&S scorer, and so I won my first ever gold medal at a (senior) national event - I've also got Ben's team medal, as he had to travel home and missed the presentation - but he's a real athlete with lots lof medals, I'm sure this one will get to him one day.