The course was 10 laps of a circuit just short of 5km, so there was about a 400m run in at the start of the race. My target had been to try and get 3:30 and I was on course for that until after 35km when a combination of the rolling course, mud(!) and cold started to take its toll. The last 10km were absolutely brutal. A few encouraging shouts from my wife and daughters at the start of the last two laps helped me round, but they were fairly slow efforts.

There was a new national record of 2:56:51 set by Gary O'Hanlon (Clonliffe Harriers) - who went past me like I was standing still when he lapped me. I finished 18th from 157 finishers (41 DNFs) in 3:47:27

Report: Adam Leadbetter