Conditions were near perfect for the 2012 edition of the Wokingham Half Marathon and having bumped into one another just before the start, Ben Paviour and Brian Wilder resolved to have a crack at the 70 minute barrier. For Ben the first couple of miles felt much harder than they should have and Brian moved ahead. Luckily, Ben was able to latch onto the back of a group of about half a dozen running around the right pace and settled in to a good tempo.
The group caught Brian around the 5 to 6 mile mark and ran together until about ten miles where Ben consciously surged to keep on pace. As a result, he was rewarded with a 26 second PB of 70:13. Brian limped across the line about 50 seconds later with a pain in his left foot, which started as a niggle following the 20 mile race he’d competed in the week before; further exacerbated by a session of 40×200 the previous Thursday. Despite this, he still managed to claim the prize for the first V40 which offset, to some extent, the disappointment of now being out of action with yet another injury :-(.
Ben Paviour and Brian Wilder.