Mark Williams continued his domination of local distance running yesterday, smashing the Hong Kong record in winning the Gold Coast 15km Road Race.
The Welshman cruised to the finish in a time of 51 minutes and 56.0 seconds, well inside Mike Capper's former record of 52 minutes and 43 seconds.
Andy Naylor, Neil Tait and Chan Wai-kwok shared the pace over the first 5km as the runners ascended towards the Ting Kau bridge. Said Naylor: ' I heard the sound of padding feet and puffing. A second later Mark passed us like a locomotive and we never really had him in our sights after that.'
Williams said: 'I held off the pace at the beginning just to get a feel for the pack and knowing that the rest of the course was mainly flat I wanted to see if Andy Naylor's long stride would kick in. At 5km I felt Andy was cruising, but I still had plenty of room for more pace, so I stepped up the gear and just never really looked back.'
Apart from the course record falling the Sportsperformance team comprising Williams, Naylor and Tait also set a team record for the course with first, second and fourth place finishes overall.
