Realistic 10k target time

I know that in many ways it will be difficult for anyone else to help me with this but I'm looking for a decent, realistic but challenging target time for a 10k race I'm doing in September.

Not done a 10k race before. Have done 3 Half Marathons, the quickest of which was 2:08 (was aiming for sub 2 but fell apart in the final 3 miles). My time at the halfway point of that was (just) sub 1hr. In training runs on a hilly course, I've managed to do 5k in about 26 minutes.

So, I'm thinking sub 50 might be a decent goal but am not too sure. Does anyone else have any thoughts?

The race is in 10 weeks and I intend to increase my current weekly mileage of around 20 to around 30 between now and the race. I thought about going to some Park Runs and trying to do them as quick as I can to get my 5k time down below 25 which I don't think should be too tricky.

So, am I being unrealistic or am I taking it too easy?

Have a look at the mcmillan pace calculator to get a 10k time based on your 5k result.  This now takes age etc into account, so I couldn't get a figure for you.

As a rule of thumb you can use the "double it and add 10%" rule that would give you a time of 55 mins from a 26min 5 k (i.e. 2x 26 + 2.6 mins).  So a 50 min 10k is probably a good target as its a bit faster than you've achieved so far. 

I would totally agree with what stutyr sayd, the mcmillan pace calculator has been spot on for me with distances from 5k to half marathon and slightly beyond (havent tested any of the others)

I was sceptical at first and would take it with grain of salt but it has proven itself right on numerous occasions - as long as you are realistic/truthful with your input times and target times.

mark.

Thanks stutyr and mark. Have used the pace calculator and it's come up with 54 minutes. I think 50 minutes would seem a good target based on that, being as I'm at the slow end of the scale, so I think improvement shouldn't be too difficult, as long as I put the miles in. I think I'll see how I'm getting on at halfway and then, if I feel it's going really well, maybe try and push it lower.