Day 197 Sunday 15th July 6.2 miles : miles to date 1288 The Voldemort plan continues to reap benefits, as I smashed my 10k PB with a 39.59 and 33rd place out of 588 entrants at today's St. Ives race. I just don't run 10k's, mainly due to the fact that they hurt I suspect. My previous best was 43:54 and with the rest varying between 44-52 minutes some years ago. Having never come close to 40 minutes before, I set the garmin for exactly that time hoping I might be able to just dip under. I had hoped to dip by more than a second, but what the heck I'm in the 30's and right now I don't mind admitting that I feel quite chuffed. I had looked at the last two years results, which had the just below forty peeps in 34th and 35th place, so I found myself in the rather unusual surroundings of being near the front at the start. Having never been that far up, I was caught in the flow as the gun went off running around a 6.10 pace, when target pace was 6.24. I finally got my head around my km running pace having only ever run a race in mile terms. This was quite easy to work out ie four minutes per km. I slowed intentionally to 6.25 pace and kept that steady for the first 3k and was around ten seconds up at the km marks due to the faster start. A problem flared between 3-5k as we ran straight into a strong headwind on a wide open airfield. I slowed and by the turn at the 5k mark, I had lost time and was now behind. The wind in our faces did not translate into any wind on our backs although I was able to pick it up slightly to regain the lost time, albeit it I still needed a lung buster in the final 800 metres covering the second half in a negative split which is another rare event. Even two months ago, I would have doubted being able to dip under forty or be close to nineteen for a 5k for that matter. It has to be down to the plan and I am so hungry for more. Bring on the pain. Another great run came from Julie Pritchett who also PB'd, which was even more impressive considering that yesterday she ran an unplanned fifteen mile cross country with the crew, followed by an open water swimming race a few hours later. An amazing achievement by any standard. We were also joined by Shaun Kirtley from the club, who also popped in a new record. Unfortunately it was a personal worst!