A look ahead to Saturday’s action, with Jonny Mellor, Adam Hickey, Charlotte Purdue and Rhona Auckland among those set to compete

The Highgate Harriers Night of the 10,000m PBs returns for a third year on Saturday (May 16) as the setting for several top athletes to seek championships qualifying times.

With last year s men s winner, Andy Vernon, having already secured the qualifying times for this year s World Championships (27:45) and the Rio Olympics (28:00), no men are targeting similar times here. However, Jonny Mellor (pictured) is hoping to cement his return to form with a mid-28-minute performance that will improve on his PB of 28:42.

He may be helped along by Belgium s 28:35 man Mats Lunders, while Wales Commonwealth Games representative Dewi Griffiths is looking to cut time off his personal best of 28:48.

Jonathan Davies, the National cross-country under-20 champion and winner of the recent high-class Trafford 10km in 29:18, wants a time of around 28:50, while Ben Tickner, who clocked 29:25 in the Brighton 10km last month, is targeting five seconds quicker.

Adam Hickey, who enjoyed an excellent cross-country season, wants to go sub-29, while Ben Lindsay is looking to build on his recent 29:19 road breakthrough.

The women s field features a few going after the qualifying standards, which are 32:15 for Rio and 32:00 for Beijing. Charlotte Purdue, who clocked 32:03 in 2012 and more recently 16:30 for 5km on the roads, put down 31:55 as her target. Elinor Kirk ran 32:17 last year and wants to take 17 seconds off that time, while Alyson Dixon is chasing the same sort of clocking.

Rhona Auckland, the European under-23 cross-country champion, will be hoping to translate her form from that discipline and improve on her PB of 33:09, while last year s third-placer Beth Potter is hoping to beat the 32:33 with which she finished fifth in the Commonwealth Games.

It is not just about the elites, though, as six graded races will feature athletes down to 38-minute level.

Spectators will get in for free and will be encouraged to line up in lane three to cheer on the athletes. Although the event is a national championships, there will be no official trial in the 10,000m for this year s IAAF World Championships.

An inter-schools relay starts at 4pm with the first 10km an hour later and the last race at 9pm.

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