Beth Potter breaks 5k British and World Record
Scottish athlete Beth Potter ran 14:41 at the Podium 5k race this Saturday night and broke the British and World record for road 5k.
Having won the Super League Triathlon Arena Games event at London’s Aquatics Centre last weekend Scotland’s Beth Potter arrived in Barrowford, Lancashire for the Podium 5k and missed the start of her listed race and had to join in the faster men’s B race in weather conditions that were perfect for fast running. Potter’s style was so easy, every pace seemed to propel her forwards and she had the lead runners in the front pack well in her sights. The final lap saw the run power of Potter as she glided down the final stretch towards the finish line with the clock still well under 15 minutes and looked surprised to see the clock showing a blistering fast time of 14.41, smashing her previous road 5km best of 15:24 which was set at the same Podium event in August.
Beth Potters time beat Beatrice Chepkoech’s official world record of 14:43 by what appeared to be a couple of seconds and sliced 10 seconds off Paula Radcliffe’s British record of 14:51. There is still some confusion around whether the time is officially recognised with suggestions the race only had an Association of Running Clubs (ARC) license and would not be recognised by UK Athletics (UKA) which being countered that there was a full UKA License listed on Run Britain for the event. Even if correctly licenced the World Athletics rules have stringent demands on world records (e.g. distance measurement, drug testing etc) and so we can only now wait for the governing bodies to make their decision on whether the time is official. See here for race results:
Listen to the pre-race TriNation Podcast with special guest Beth Potter.
Beth Potter was not the only women Scottish Triathlete in the race event, Sophia Green from Stirling University Triathlon Centre was running in one of the heats and ran a magnificent PB of 16:12.
The Elite Men’s A Race
Such was the interest in the men elite race it attracted betting giants William Hill with odds being placed on the runner who would win.
There was a foray of triathletes in this elite men’s road race all vying for 5k PB’s. Olympians Jonny Brownlee and Gordon Benson were on the start line with Commonwealth Games athlete Grant Sheldon lining up with fellow Scotsmen from Stirling, Cameron Main and Luke Howard (host of the TriNation’s Podcast). Super League triathlete Chris Perham was also racing. A fast pace was also set for the Men’s A race with top elite runners Tom Mortimer and Phil Seseman in strong form. It came down to a two-man shoot-out between Mortimer and Seseman, both dipping under 13:40, but Mortimer taking it at the line.
All the triathletes performed well as they came down the finishing stretch with the clock still well under 14:30. Jonny Brownlee came in 4th with a time of 13:50 closely followed by Chris Perham in 13.52 and Cameron Main in 6th place with a time of 13:53 ahead of Grant Sheldon 13:55, Gordon Benson 14:02 and Luke Howard 14:23. See here for full results.
With this being one of the first events since the lock-down all the hard training was paying off for the two young lads from Stirling University Triathlon performance centre, performing when it mattered and both coming out with PB’s. Cameron Main (running for Moray Road Runners) clocking a scintillating time of 13:53 and Luke Howard (of TriNation) taking a rewarding PB of 14:23.
