I am very much looking forward to the National next weekend. It promises to be one of the highlights of the endurance calendar and this year we are fortunate as the race returns to its spiritual home of Parliament Hill in London. I was once told that Athletics Weekly always gets a good spike in readership on the week of the National, so it shows that there is still great interest in this area of the sport.

I have very fond memories of Hampstead Heath as in my very early years, when my Dad used to go to the Rugby League Cup Final with his mates (and before he considered I was old enough to go), my Mum and I would accompany him down to London. At Stanmore tube station we would go our separate ways - with my Dad heading to Wembley and my Mum and I heading for Hampstead Heath where I would spend the afternoon playing on the swings and my Mum would happily chat with the other Mums. The weather was always good as the Cup Final used to be held in May - little did I realise at the time that I would be returning to the same venue - in February - for a cross country race in totally different conditions!

My runs in the National are similar to my performances in the Northern - one excellent performance, coupled with a fair bit of mediocrity! In Sunderland in 2007, the same year that I won a Northern medal, I finished 12th at the National, which is easily my best return. On that day, I shared transport and overnight accommodation with Jonny Gilby from Derby. After spending much of the weekend together, Jonny and I finished the race almost stride for stride - both agreeing that we could have saved ourselves a lot of trouble if we had just gone for a run in Manchester. My best performance at the National at Parliament Hill was 2009 when I was 30th. My finishing number that year would have started with a "2" had it not been for me being "Burney-ed" in the last 200m by my good mate Richard Burney from Liverpool, who went flying past me on the final straight. This year, I would love to try and beat that performance, although it will take a significant improvement on my Northerns performance to do so. That said, at Pontefract, I wasn't too far behind the top 10, so if I can get it right on the day who knows? One thing is for certain, I am going to be hard pressed to get anywhere near Dave - we have always had a very healthy rivalry, in that we are both keen to finish in front of the other, but at the same time, both very pleased at the other's successes. I guess because we train together so much, we both have a healthy respect for how hard the other one works. I was very pleased to see Dave return to form at the Northerns, but since then I have been spurred on to train hard in the hope of closing the gap in London.

In terms of hopnours, I expect that Steve Vernon, the defending champion, will be extremely hard to beat again this year. The National course should suit him down to the ground and after years of wanting to win a National, I fully expect him to win two in as many years. On the team front, Altrincham's depth has been exposed and we are without a couple of bodies who won the gold for us last month, so I don't expect us to challenge. As a result, the inner Yorkshireman inside me would like to see the strongest Northern team, Leeds, put up a good fist of it and perhaps bring team honours, as well as individual ones, back "oop North".

On a final note, I am pleased to know that my blogs have been well received so far and that I have made what appears to be a worthwhile contribution to this site. Most importantly though, I am delighted that my biggest contribution has been to improve Jonny Mellor's English grammar to an almost acceptable level. If he could give me a few tips on running sub 8 minute 3k's and winning National track titles in return, that would be appreciated.