Although I’m clearly an obsessive runner, I’ve never considered myself to be an athletics person. That kind of elite-level track running has always felt a bit too serious, geeky even. Rightly or wrongly, in my head, the kind of marathon and ultra running I do has always felt like a totally different sport to the stuff done by the people in short shorts and t-shirts with the sleeves missing. Last night that all changed when I had my first taste of the Highgate Harriers Night of the 10k PBs. Within 20 minutes of being trackside at this magic event I’d changed my mind. If there’s a better way to get people excited about track running, I’m yet to see it.
Walking down the hill from the Hampstead Heath station, with banging tunes and crowd cheers wafting over the summer breeze, you already get a sense that something special is taking place even before you lay eyes on the track. You feel like you’re approaching a festival site not an athletics event. And that carries into the venue.
Celebrating it’s 5th birthday in 2018, the Night of the 10k PBs is a volunteer-powered event hosted by Highgate Harriers. Open and free for spectators, so that anyone who happens to be strolling past the Parliament Hill track while taking a turn on Hampstead Heath can pop in a catch some of the action, this day-and-night long festival of speed brings together some of Europe’s finest middle distance runners all with one thing in mind, running for a personal best.
But it’s not just about the superfast, throughout the day the track plays host to some plucky amateur events and local community initiatives get to parade on the lanes too. There’s pumping music, flowing beer, food stands and supporters are allowed to watch from the track itself, turbo-charing the atmosphere and ramping up the support. As a spectator you’re almost close enough to feel the sweat flick off the runners as they whizz past. This is a totally unique way to do running. This is athletics turned up to 11.
Chasing a PB and being hunted at the Strava Mile Pursuit
I was there for the first time to take part in the Strava Mile Pursuit. One of around 20 lucky runners invited to take on a mile in between the real 10k races, we got to pretend for a while that we were athletes and experience the event as a runner. Thankfully we were saved any negative comparisons to the real runners out there as we only had to do a mile.
This would be a mile with a twist, however, because we’d be chased by British athlete and all-round speedster Hannah England who’d start 45 seconds after us and then hunt us down. This is the first time I’ve ever been chased by a 4.30 miling British athlete and I can tell you it’s fun and not fun at the same time.
Among the other prey, were founder of ParkRun Paul Sinton-Hewitt, Advent Running co-founder James Poole, and Guardian running blog runner-in-chief Kate Carter.
As a spectator you’re almost close enough to feel the sweat flick off the runners as they whizz past. This is a totally unique way to do running. This is athletics turned up to 11.
I was coming off the back of a cold, with no running in the three weeks since the Hamburg Marathon and so I wasn’t expecting much. But actually once I was out there everything seemed to click. Whether it was the crowds, the atmosphere, the company or being chase, something made the legs and lungs respond and I managed to run a decent race, clocking a tidy 21 second mile PB in the process.
That’s the first of the 2018 PB targets to fall and it’s a relief to finally have one on the bag. Just four little PBs to beat!
My PB does mean I have to put in a little disclaimer here. Running a PB on a night like this is guaranteed to colour my experience of the event. I doubt anyone has ever hated a marathon course where they’ve run a PB but plenty will gripe at a race where the wheels fell off. And I was buzzing after.
Night of the 10k PBs: The best event in athletics?
I’d heard people describe the Night of the 10k PBs as the best night in the athletics calendar but I didn’t really get it until I was standing a couple of paces from a pack of runners hammering out their 25-lap assault on a 10k PB and I looked down to see what my 2.9-year-old son and my non-running wife were making of it all. My son has been to marathons and cheered me on at ultras in the past but I’ve never seen his eyes open as wide as they did as the pack went rushing past. And my wife who rolled her eyes when I suggested we keep the 2.9 up way beyond his bedtime to go to a track meet, was clapping and cheering like a lifelong athletics fan.
But being able to watch some of Europe’s most talented 10,000 runners at such close quarters and in such a festival atmosphere is stirring stuff. and the number of families at this event doing exactly what mine were doing can only be a good thing, not just for athletics, but generally for inspiring people to be active.
Taking the barriers down makes athletics feel much more raw, human and accessible and track athletics is in a unique position to be able to do this, to shed the stuffiness and bring people right into the action. As inspiring as the Olympics was in 2012, even that can’t offer what you get from this free event in Hampstead. It was a real pleasure to be part of it, I’ll definitely be going back next year and I’d recommend you go to. Particularly if you think you don’t like athletics, who knows it might just surprise you.
Now read this: What’s it like to run 26.2 miles in Eliud Kipchoge’s shoes?
