I had never competed in this race before but having shuffled along at the back of the Hurts pack for a while now I gathered it was a big Hurts event, I just didn’t expect it to be such a big event for 10,000 others.

The evening started with a dash out of the office to meet the group and catch the train.  A leisurely walk, from a train station conveniently located only 1km from everywhere you would actually want to go to, afforded me ample time to pick up some tips from Coach Micky.

Arriving into Centennial Park was one of those moments you just stop and realise how great it is to be running in Sydney. I stopped admiring the view and started a nice warm up with Ellie and Erika. Chris encouraged us along by pointing out any other woman he thought might be faster than us.

A couple of token strides ahead of the starting line. This was mainly because Superstar Renee was there gathering material for her award winning slideshow and also because everyone seemed to be doing this much to the annoyance of one steward who kindly reminded us this was not the Olympics. The Corporate Olympics begins.. It feels like a Hurts session, everywhere I looked there they were. I made sure there were no Hurts runners behind me so I was correctly seeded, my new race strategy. I have also taken to waving to any runner up front to legitimise my optimistic placing to those around me.

Then off and up that hill. I stayed with Craig W and luckily my innate inability to run up hills ensured I didn’t go off to fast. Then the downhill section and my lack of concern for my quads really allows me to pick up some people on those sections.

4 km came with a bang, my mind started drifting to the usual self-doubt and I wondered if I should just Ian ( Ian is the verb used to describe taking repeated ill-timed breaks to switch to a different sport, like walking, during competitive events). I pulled on through and hit 5km, quick glance at the watch revealed that I was actually at my 5km pb time so not so bad and not so far to go.

Bruce’s earlier warnings of this being “the longest 600m you will ever run” lead me to believe that he had never been paced up Heartbreak Hill by a spouse.

The support crew were out in force now. JP Morgan legend Laura was on hand with baby Archie shouting out support. JC was there to capture key moments on video, Enda and Charlie reminding us of the horrors of injury. I made a last minute, unsuccessful dash to catch a place, still I was very happy to finish in 11th.

On to the Allen’s tent to hear about the great runs of the night. Ellie and Erika proved that they can just rock up to any event and take top ten places, the two Jacks battled it out at the front, a return to racing for Gidon and Brendan, a pb for Eoin and Jeet… but most importantly Chris bet Ian.

When self-taught sommeliers Taffy and Timmy got out the red wine I knew it was time to skip off.

A big thank you to Jerome, who glided into 14th place, for all his coaching, to Tom for the hospitality and to all Hurts for being our Sydney family.