European masters - 400m hurdles M45 heat.

Saturday - first race. 15 have entered, so two heats with the first 3 plus 2 fastest losers to make the final.
I'm drawn in the strongest heat (World champion, word silver and world finalist all in one heat) I expect their random distribution is a little on the dodgy side.
I draw lane 5, Neil Tunstall (World champion) has lane 4. My coach has encouraged me to go easy. 17 strides rather than my usual pattern. run my own race and see what happens.
Got to hurdle 4 and Neil drew level. He kicked again at 5, putting in two lots of 16 strides and left me for dead. I came back at him in the last 100, but with both of us playing a game of 'who can finish looking easiest' we cross the line in 59 and 59.3 respectively.
Turns out everyone in our heat was quicker than the second heat.