Standard Chartered KL Marathon 2009

Datran Merdeka - Race Pack Collection Centre

It's my first overseas marathon that ended with a disappointing result as I didn't get to sleep the night before makes it a very tiring run for me. I somehow just could not motivate myself to run as I struggled to recover from breathlessness. For the very first time my heart actually gave up on the race even before I reached the halfway mark, feeling very tired as I ended up walking for about 6km.

Mount Faber Run 2009

This will be my 4th consecutive race for 4 weekends and I am also into the 2nd week of Sundown Marathon reverse tapering. But with an eye on the coming KL Marathon, I decide that this will be just another "training run".

It's a cooling morning I managed to reach Bukit Merah View 15mins before the race starts while getting ready with stretching and warm up. I unexpectedly got to rush off with the run as the race started 5mins earlier at 7:25am. As I get on with the run and so far so good as I still managed to reach the 5km mark in 25mins, but soon hill running started to take the toll on me as I don't do hill trainings on such long hilly route. I find it really difficult to keep up with my usual pace. At that moment my only thought was hopefully I can make up loss time during the down slope run.

As I finally reaches the main roads I was forced to control my pace to avoid sudden stops as I was surprised that road marshalls actually stops runners at the traffic lights. I was lucky that I only stop once as I managed to keep a steady pace all the way to the finishing line in 54mins. Overall I had a bad run for the 2nd part of the 5km route, way off my PB, and I do feel that the event will be a better one if roads are closed, ideally I prefer distance marker for every 1km.

Klang Pacers 1/2 Marathon 2009

This will be my 1st overseas running event and as usual I will set a finishing time for myself. Ideally I will hope to finish in 1hr 45mins, which will requires me run at a pace of 5min/km. However, I myself is also doubtful as it's just 1 week after Sundown Marathon and I hardly do any running.

Overall it's a well organized ran with good weather, except that there are no distance markers and only plain water are served during the race and just before the race starts I realised that my Polar foot pod runs out of batt. Well I just have to "feel" my running pace and estimate the distance.

The race started off at 6:30am and as adrenaline rush I pick up a fast pace, and very soon my hip gives me pain again, wonder if I am running too fast and halfway through the race, guess around 10km and again I got stitch. Got to endure the pain throughout the rest of the race but really glad to have received cheers from my follow Safra runners. What a painful run! At least managed a Sub 2 hours with a time of 1hr 53mins.

Sundown Marathon 2009

After months of preparation and finally comes the real test of my endurance, hope I can fulfill dream for a sub 4 marathon. After months of training with competitive races I managed to clock a sub 50s 10km with a PB of 48 mins and a 1hr 16mins 15km run during last week's Passion Run, so I am hopeful that I can achieve my aim. According to plan ideally I will need to maintain a pace of 5:30min/km pace throughout the marathon.

On race day 30 May 2009 I managed to reach the starting line at about ½ hour before the race to lookout for the 4 hour pacer group, and as the race started at 00:00hrs I followed the pacers closely, determined not to fall back too far behind. Everything goes well although I realised that the pace is faster then I thought, but in my mind I was still hopeful that I can do it!!! and don't give up!!! Well soon I started to feel tired and after the 7km mark at the turn after Changi Coastal Road I struggled to keep pace with the pacers as I can only maintain a visible distance. Soon things goes from bad to worse as my hip started to feel pain :( kind of feeling very demoralized but no choice have to slow down and run at my own pace, while also regret that I over paced myself as I failed to recover fast.

Despite of that I managed to hit 55mins at the 10km mark :), not too bad but still the pain is getting unbearable and I could not run faster :( . By around the 15km mark, all my hopes were gone as the 4 ½ pacers overtook me while the pain just get worse I could not even keep up with the 4 ½ group. Finally at around 18km I had to stop running and limp with my mind filled with thoughts of giving up. I walk for more then 5mins, feeling better before I decided that I will just run, well just go for the best result and no more stop. Still I feel kind of sad as I cross the 20km mark in 2hrs 7mins, hmm...that’s very very slow. Well, I'll just run and hope that I can pickup pace later on and hope I can still hit 30km in 3hrs. As I reaches 26km near Bedok Reservoir Road it's almost 3hrs, another disappointment!!! At 30km it's 3hrs 14mins, hmm.... lousy... that's very close to my last marathon timing, was thinking must try to at least get a better timing as I set a new target of between 4:30 to 4:45hrs.At around 39km it was already 4:30hrs, very tough as I got to go for a 5min/km pace to finish in 4:45hrs as I started to pickup pace, I aimed to reached the bridge to the jetty which I thought is almost the ending point. But to my disappointment the route has changed as compared to last year and now I got to take a right turn to the main road which is about 800m longer :( 4:45hrs gone too. I finally crossed the finishing line in a time of 4hrs 50mins.
Points to note as on the positive side I got a PB, which is a 4mins improvement. However, consider the weekly mileage I clocked during training I felt that this is a poor result. I have probably over-paced myself as the pacers are running at a faster pace. My long term hip injury affected me too and running in the wee hours makes me feel real sleepy. Overall I feel that I still lacked the endurance to get good results for longer distances. Dream on....... Sub 4 hours....For future trainings I will need to clock longer weekends LSD. Now I can only hope to do better in KL.

PAssion Run 2009

It’s Sunday 24th May 2009 with just one week to go before the highly awaited Sundown Marathon and this race is meant to be part of my tapering for the Marathon .With 1 hour to go before the race starts I am still pondering over the right pace to run for this event. As so far I have always been disappointed with my 15km race results and I do hope to change that. The only thing that holds me back is my preparation for the coming marathon as I am in the process of recovering from months of rigorous trainings and I do consider that a marathon pace of 5:30mins/km will be a more appropriate option. But nevertheless with just 10min before the gun goes off, I decide that I will just go out there and do my best and just enjoy this race.

With a slight delay of about 10min the race starts at about 7:10am. I started off enthusiastically with a pace of about 4:20 - 4:30mins/km and feeling so far so good till at about 3km before I slowed down slightly to catch some breath, hmm…. Think I have over paced myself. But as soon as I reaches the 5km mark I took a glance at my Polar watch which shows 24min, overall still quite pleased with myself as 1 hour 15min is still achievable.

Along the way I saw a number of familiar faces from Safra Running Club, especially Lawrence at just over the 6km mark taking photos, well think he caught me with his camera from close range :p. Soon as I reached the 7km mark I started to feel really tired and I had to slow down to a pace of about 5:30mins/km, guessed I really over paced myself during the earlier part of the race. At the same time I was trying really hard and telling myself to run at least 5mins/km

Just after the 9km distance marker I met Vincent Leong (Safra running club) doing his own training run, wow…. so nice of him to cheer me on. Meanwhile I realized that I am slightly behind time as my watch shows 46min, oops… I am supposed to reach 10km in at least 50min, and as it turns out I took 51min. But still I am really that glad I have finally reached the NSRCC U-turn checkpoint and that means I have only 5 km more to go!!! I was hoping that for the remaining part of the race I can go below 5mins/km to make up loss time for a better timing. Meanwhile I met Shirlyn (Safra running club) at the 11km mark while she was running towards NSRCC while I eagerly run and push myself as I was almost reaching the Sailing Club. Tired and trying hard to maintain a pace of at least 5mins/km until I notice some discrepancy from the 12km to 13km distance markers, I pulled back a little so as not to burn out. As I finally reached the F2 carpark area, I am certain that there was only 1km to go I made the final effort to finish strongly, just hope to get over it fast as I started to feel pain from stitch.

Finished in 1hr 16min, average pace of 5:03mins/km.

Suburban Run 2009

Had a tiring 10km run at 8am on Sunday 15 Mar 2009, I did not really placed too much expectation for a good timing for this event as I just did a 22km LSD on Saturday from Home to ECP and back again. Well to make things worse I did not had a good start too, only have myself to blame for been late to reach the starting point, argh.... what a long queue at the toilet area, should have queue up earlier. While inside the toilet I can hear the gun goes off and as soon as I am done I run to the starting point and realised I was about 3mins 26 seconds late. My thought then is just to run as fast as I could hoping that I can make up some "lost" time hehe.... really had a hard time finding my way through the slower runners and very soon I started to feel really tired and can no longer keep up with the fast pace, well no choice as I looked at my polar watch I tell myself to at least maintain a pace of 6mins/km so that I can slowly recover. Somehow it's just not my day and the recovery is slow, maybe it's just one of these days.... no form and momentum at all. Just have that feeling it's a never ending 10km, unlike 2 weeks ago's Newton Run where 10km is no sweat. Somehow I just hate the repeting routes.... seeing other runners coming back running towards the finishing line I starts to wonder am I still far away from the turn? It's only when I reached the 8km mark, the point where the last U turn is for all 10km runners that I started to feel more motivated. Yes! 2km more to go as I step up a gear and started to look out for faster pace runners around me to keep pace with. Then comes the last 1km I spotted someone 20 meters ahead where I managed to keep pace throughout before finally over take him at the finishing point.....sigh... only managed a gun time of 55:27.8. Well... this time no more sub 50.

Newton Active Run 2009

This is my first competitive run for year 2009, an event I look forward to as part of my long term training towards a sub 4 hours marathon. I took a day off yesterday from my training runs hoping that I will be fresh enough and finally go below sub 50 minutes for 1okm. My strategy is straight forward, that is to run below 5 minutes per km.

As the gun goes off at 7am I started off by over taking some slowly runners, oops... almost fall as I tried to find my way through the crowd. As the roads are quite spacious I managed to find some space around me and starts to settle down with steady pace. I took a glanced at my Polar watch and it shows 4:90 minutes per km, deep inside I hope I can maintain this pace throughout and so far so good and feeling strong as along the way I get to wave at some familiar Safra runners and enjoy the nice Sengkang Riverside park scenery. However as I leave the Riverside park I started to feel a little breathless, well no choice but to slow down as my watch shows 5:30 minutes. Feeling a little disappointed with myself but then I thought I should just run and just do the best that I could and I tell myself I must not go any slower.

At about the 5km make I met Safra runner Lawrence not to far ahead of me as I tried to keep pace with him knowing that he is definitely capable of finishing the race in 50 minutes. Soon I gradually find some momentum in my run as I slowly catch up and managed to overtake him, consider my pace I do wonder perhaps its also not his day too. As I continue with my run I spotted a girl about some 50 meters ahead looking strong with very consistent pace. I tell myself that is a good pace and should I overtake her I don't think I will not fare too badly too haha. Well she is indeed very consistent and somehow I just could not close up the gap fast, it is only at about the 2km mark that I managed to close the gap to about 20 meters. The last 1km is tiring as I run faster with bigger steps. With 100 meters to go I can see the gun time showing 48 minutes, feeling very surprise while so glad that I am still below 50 minutes and also wonder how did I make up so much time? But without too much time for a second thought I decide to take a 100 meter sprint to the finishing line wanting to finish below 49 minutes as I also overtake all remaining runners that are ahead of me and the moment I cross the finishing line I turn back to have a glanced at her and to my surprise she is one of the elite MF Safra runners who broke the sub 4 hours mark in one of her marathons.

Really glad to have finally break the 50 minutes mark and to my surprise my polar watch only shows 9.1km. Upon verification from other sources that the route is definitely 10km that I realized all these while I have been running longer distances during my training runs. Think back keeping my watch this way is not a bad way to train too :p

Gun Time 00:48:29.68