All photos as taken from photovendo.ph site - thanks - just posted here for illustration
Photo 1- see we are at a banana plantation :-) (greenfields of lallang and banana- though the plantation portion was actually decent running track as there were no cars!)Photo 2-the scorching sun @ the barren lands!!!
Photo 3-this was near the starting line - the greenfield city was quite a "designer" city at some areas where nice rich apartments were built.
Photo 4-Greenfield was on the way or near Tagaytay (home of Taal volcano, the first tourist place i visited in philippines... it took us 2.5 hrs to get to tagaytay the last time!)
Photo 5-The start/finish shot
Who would've imagine I would get up at 2:30 am for a 21k run?
This would be the last 21k I would run in philippines, for the time being. We signed up for this a few weeks back, but JS could not make it because she had injured her knee.
The race starts at 5am, and unfortunately after I had signed up and the subsequent weeks after, up to yesterday, I found out the location was very far away, in fact on the way to Tagaytay (the Taal Volcano trip we went on our first weekend in philippines) - that trip took us about 2.5 hrs to reach tagaytay! With a lot of reservation, first I tried car hire, then taxi booking, both were a bit unsuccessful, so finally since I was the only person going I decided to signup for the free shuttle bus service - luckily for me the shuttle bus was still available the day before even though the signup had closed two days ago!
I slept at 1040pm - this is really a trying one for me to getup at 2:30am. The bus schedule was assemble at 3:30am, leave around 4am, and ETA around 440am - I was a bit worried about this, as the various people had said this place was between 1hr to 1.5hr away despite it being wee hours in the morning....
I somehow managed to get to the bus assembly point at 330am, right on time - and found the bus (in the strange darkness) - got on the bus, it was full, and luckily one more spot left. The trip there was in silence with a Singapore Marathoner sitting next to me, and tried to catch some sleep, despite the bus was really cold.
Got to the starting line with 20 mins to go, the bus left at around 345am, and had time for a toilet stop, which was a must because the bus was SO COLD!!!
Greenfield City, Laguna was indeed another attempt of the local government to create a "holiday" looking vacation city close to Tagaytay on the outskirts of the Makati city center. The race starts at Paseo Greenfield, which was a outlet mall, so already it had a very american feel even as we assembled in the starting area.
The race started promptly at around 5am. This was when it got interesting. Suffice to say that this race, I really really regret not training for it, I only did one 20km @ bukit aman, and 2 6km spans one each week. Regret also because I am terrible at waking up early, and for such a small race, the lack of pacers really bogged me down.
At about 10km onwards, at 630 am, the sun was scorching hot. This is so different from Malaysia runs. The other problem I had was the route was barren - we were running next to literally "green fields" - they were fields of green "lallang"... and no cover for sun. Stretches of long barren land in the blazing sun was not easy without a pacer. I took off my shades on the return route from 14km onwards. The shades made me feel shorter due to the optical effect, and my stride felt heavier. I guess when I reached around 17 km, I was almost done and started to walk. All in a very very bad time, not my worst but still not good. But good training under the blazing sun...
Some observations :
1. Everyone started rather casually on the starting line - no one pushed forward. I guess because it was 21km, nobody was really rushing. Moreover, there was perhaps around less than 150+ people for 21km. Again, I got a bit worried...
2. Unique for the event was the route, before dawn (dawn was around 515?), the route on the first 5 kms was lit with torches (interesting huh... like a tribal function...)
3. Another unique for the event was the eagerness of the organisers to be a running event for runners - music pipping from loud speakers in non-residential and stretches of the road for the first 10 kms, some even with a bit of zen like music!!!
4. The provision of rush (electrolyte water like 100plus uncarbonated) was a good call, I survived on rush. Water stations aplenty.
5. They ran out of medals - I was not happy, but too heat treated at the end of the race to even bother too much.
6. The photovendo guys who offered free photos at end of race, and a long line to do so - that was not smart, and not cool.
7. Between starting so early and having such a closely starting time for the race meant some people sat around and waited for the 21km runners. I guess it is just difficult to cater for everyone (2k, 5k, 10k, 21k - what a range!)
8. The route - flat, nice countryside running - but VERY VERY hot... sigh....
9. Providing ransport is good, but they could've got the bus to run on the return trip earlier. Everyone was really tired when the bus left... (3 hrs after i finished 21km!!) - and the shops were not open!!
10. I did love the scenes of families bringing their kids for the 2k run, and getting up early for a family day. This is one great thing about running in philippines - its good family affair - and not just for avid runners but social runners as well
Who would've imagine I would get up at 2:30 am for a 21k run?
This would be the last 21k I would run in philippines, for the time being. We signed up for this a few weeks back, but JS could not make it because she had injured her knee.
The race starts at 5am, and unfortunately after I had signed up and the subsequent weeks after, up to yesterday, I found out the location was very far away, in fact on the way to Tagaytay (the Taal Volcano trip we went on our first weekend in philippines) - that trip took us about 2.5 hrs to reach tagaytay! With a lot of reservation, first I tried car hire, then taxi booking, both were a bit unsuccessful, so finally since I was the only person going I decided to signup for the free shuttle bus service - luckily for me the shuttle bus was still available the day before even though the signup had closed two days ago!
I slept at 1040pm - this is really a trying one for me to getup at 2:30am. The bus schedule was assemble at 3:30am, leave around 4am, and ETA around 440am - I was a bit worried about this, as the various people had said this place was between 1hr to 1.5hr away despite it being wee hours in the morning....
I somehow managed to get to the bus assembly point at 330am, right on time - and found the bus (in the strange darkness) - got on the bus, it was full, and luckily one more spot left. The trip there was in silence with a Singapore Marathoner sitting next to me, and tried to catch some sleep, despite the bus was really cold.
Got to the starting line with 20 mins to go, the bus left at around 345am, and had time for a toilet stop, which was a must because the bus was SO COLD!!!
Greenfield City, Laguna was indeed another attempt of the local government to create a "holiday" looking vacation city close to Tagaytay on the outskirts of the Makati city center. The race starts at Paseo Greenfield, which was a outlet mall, so already it had a very american feel even as we assembled in the starting area.
The race started promptly at around 5am. This was when it got interesting. Suffice to say that this race, I really really regret not training for it, I only did one 20km @ bukit aman, and 2 6km spans one each week. Regret also because I am terrible at waking up early, and for such a small race, the lack of pacers really bogged me down.
At about 10km onwards, at 630 am, the sun was scorching hot. This is so different from Malaysia runs. The other problem I had was the route was barren - we were running next to literally "green fields" - they were fields of green "lallang"... and no cover for sun. Stretches of long barren land in the blazing sun was not easy without a pacer. I took off my shades on the return route from 14km onwards. The shades made me feel shorter due to the optical effect, and my stride felt heavier. I guess when I reached around 17 km, I was almost done and started to walk. All in a very very bad time, not my worst but still not good. But good training under the blazing sun...
Some observations :
1. Everyone started rather casually on the starting line - no one pushed forward. I guess because it was 21km, nobody was really rushing. Moreover, there was perhaps around less than 150+ people for 21km. Again, I got a bit worried...
2. Unique for the event was the route, before dawn (dawn was around 515?), the route on the first 5 kms was lit with torches (interesting huh... like a tribal function...)
3. Another unique for the event was the eagerness of the organisers to be a running event for runners - music pipping from loud speakers in non-residential and stretches of the road for the first 10 kms, some even with a bit of zen like music!!!
4. The provision of rush (electrolyte water like 100plus uncarbonated) was a good call, I survived on rush. Water stations aplenty.
5. They ran out of medals - I was not happy, but too heat treated at the end of the race to even bother too much.
6. The photovendo guys who offered free photos at end of race, and a long line to do so - that was not smart, and not cool.
7. Between starting so early and having such a closely starting time for the race meant some people sat around and waited for the 21km runners. I guess it is just difficult to cater for everyone (2k, 5k, 10k, 21k - what a range!)
8. The route - flat, nice countryside running - but VERY VERY hot... sigh....
9. Providing ransport is good, but they could've got the bus to run on the return trip earlier. Everyone was really tired when the bus left... (3 hrs after i finished 21km!!) - and the shops were not open!!
10. I did love the scenes of families bringing their kids for the 2k run, and getting up early for a family day. This is one great thing about running in philippines - its good family affair - and not just for avid runners but social runners as well
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