Khairol Faisal taking a shower during run!
Me in action
Manchuria Team
Mancuria Team and "wana be" Machuria member on my right... : ))
Wow, it took me a long time before posting anything in this blog. During this hibernation period, so many things had happened, but mainly I've quit my job. Can't really explain why I quit, but mostly due to the fact am not getting any satisfaction from working in the bank. Then probably people will start asking, "What is it you want to do?" I'll leave it to that...as am not writing anything on that....this is more of article on sports...
Back to running. I've actually signed up for the Standard Chartered KL International Marathon...yeah, the full distance! I don't know why I did that, as I've been avoiding the distance since I last ran it in 2003. It is just so tough running it, what more to say training for it. I mean I could finish it but can I run fast? I've always want to go for a sub 3. I failed miserably in 2003 and could only clocked 3 hr 35 mins! Had to run and walk from only 28km into the race. Though I'm just not cut out for the distance. That's the reason I've been avoiding it. And also it's quite suffering running in one! So, June 28 will be the judgement day.
Well I've missed a lot of running for a few years, I mean, in a compettitive nature. I do run races a lot but am not competitive as I don't really train for the event....more of a "crash course" training runs. To get back into competitive level may take a while due to the "long break". Bidor Half was my first test after putting in some effort in training for 5 weeks. I'd always feel am still lagging in speed but Bidor offers me a chance to see where I stand right now.
Followed my team mates, Azri and Khairol up to Bidor, The Manchurian team (they are my ex-collegues from CIMB). Azri asked me if I wanted to run for his team (he came out with the name, never asked him why since he always use that name for team competitions), so I said am ok with it, as I thought I need some races to test myself before SCKLM. I will be avoiding races in a run up to SCKLM, except for Bidor and maybe the Klang Half Marathon in the first week of June. Thought that I need to put in more mileage than racing!
We reached Rumah Rehat Tapah where we will be staying. We rested before heading out to have our dinner. Reached one of the pasar (market) in Tapah. I've just realised I didn't take any photos of it. We bought a lof of food, chicken rice, fried rice, fish balls, corns, etc. we were just so hungry. Later that night, we asked the receptionist to change the Astro channel to ESPN to watch the Reds EPL game. They won comfortably so it was time to hit the sack.
The front entrance to Rumah Rehat Tapah
View of the cafe at night
We woke up around 5am, and drove to Bidor which is about 10km away. At the start, I slowly made my way to the front of the group but could not get near the top runners as they are just so...so..fast. I tried to stick to the back of Don, but for a 50 year old man, he is fast. I wasn't sure how my training has gotten me, so I held my speed. Just worried that I will run out of steam before the race is over. I was holding a pretty good pace till about 10km where I slowed down a little, trying to catch my breath. There's no one to chase in front as they were so far away to catch up (saw them during the last u-turn). But they were a lot of people behind me. At about 5-6km left, there's this young guy holding a small bag in one hand overtook me and I tried hard to stay with him. I almost gave up as he was pushing the pace so fast, but I was glad I didn't give up. I tried to leave him behind coming to a slight uphill but he just hung on to me, and overtook me again. This time I just stayed behind and with 1km to go, I moved beside him. Then I shift into another gear and push on. Lucky for me, he gave up. I finished in 14th place and with a time of 1h 29m 37s. It was a huge improvement from my last few years of half marathon races. I was satisfied with my performance but I know that I have much to work on as I am so far behind the rest of the field.
We made out way back to KL in mid day and had lunch near my condo. Guess it's back to training again and try to improve on things I find lacking.
Some results from Bidor Half Marathon:
1. Ahmad Lamchannak 1h 14m 28s
2. Lim Kien Mau 1h 14m 58s
3. Ruburn Kumar 1h 17m 16s
4. R. Subramaniam 1h 17m 26s
5. Jayakumar 1h 19m 54s
6. Casey Lim 1h 21m 02s
7. Richard Habeya 1h 22m 40s
8. Chow Yew Mei 1h 23m 14s
**1. Don Khor 1h 25m 11s (Veteran category)
9. Vigneswaran 1h 26m 08s
10. B. Rajasegaram 1h 26m 23s
11. Jasni Khairil 1h 26m 35s
12. Mohd Adry Bazmi 1h 27m 58s
13. Murali Nathan 1h 28m 13s
14. Khoo Yit Kiat 1h 29m 37s
18. Naresh Kumar 1h 33m 25s
19. Ronnie See 1h 33m 35s
22. Stanley Cheong 1h 35m 06s
66. Abdul Azri 1h 49m 00s
81. Khairol Faisal 1h 53m 13s
*40. Nik Raiha 2h 15m 54s
**Senior Veteran
* Women Veteran
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