Herts Fast 5km, 18 Jul 2021

Racing the Herts Fast 5km was a bit of a last minute change in my race plan. I am currently studying a medical degree and have exams looming so last weekend whilst on the 100km Catenary group ride I decided that racing a triathlon right now wasn’t the best idea. I chatted to Tim about it on the ride, swapped to doing a 5km race and he quickly updated my training plan.

Heading into the weekend I wasn’t feeling 100% run fit but knew I would give it my best shot. We had an aim of 21mins for the race, but with the heat this would be a challenge.

I arrived, registered and soon got warming up as I didn’t give myself loads of time before the race start. Already sweating buckets in my warm up I knew it was going to be a survival race!

On the start line I headed to near the front as I was aiming for a fast-ish time and soon noticed the sea of carbon shoes around me (mine very much lacking in any form of carbon). I went off fast with everyone around me as I usually do but after the first small 1km loop I knew I would have to slow up slightly to cope with the heat and sun blazing down. Onto my first bigger loop I felt strong but slowed up and settled into a manageable rhythm. Concentrating on keeping good form and making use of the water station I found some extra speed in my final km and finishing straight. Everyone cheering along the course also really helped me keep going.

The course is super speedy and a great place to aim for PBs. Had it not been so hot (or slightly over distanced) I’m sure everyone could have gone slightly faster. I am usually someone who loves racing in hot conditions and copes well, but with lockdown keeping me landlocked in England for the longest period of my life my ability to acclimatise to heat seems to have disappeared!

I am super happy to have come away with 3rd female in a time of 21:27 as this is my post hip fracture PB! The race marked 18 months since starting to walk/run again, 2 years since the final operation on my hip and 3 years since finding out I had double hit fractures. Its been a very slow recovery for me for a number of health reasons, but I’m happy to be running (and competing in triathlon) again and even happier to be slowly edging back to towards a 20min 5km.

So all in all a great event and I look forward to my next race (once my med school exams are done)! Time for me to get my head down for 2 weeks of revision and exams with a little steady training in the background, before picking training and racing back up properly.

Frankie Durbin