When all is done, and the people have packed up and gone home, the barricades are down and only a handful of really supportive full marathon runners are still around - I was completely pumped up and overwhelmed when in the last 50m, people actually clapped... despite finishing at a lousy 6hrs 42mins.
June 28th, 2009 - my first marathon in Malaysia. See how happy I was at the finishing line :-)....
Pre-marathon
I wonder if there is a day when I will say, I have had enough training. You see, it is all about passion, mental and also the determination. Each marathon target I go for, I regret not having enough training before the race, during the race, and after the race. I tell myself never to run another marathon during the race. And I tell myself when is the next one after the race.
For SCKLM - I had the least amount of training compared to previous marathons - Sundown and SCSM Singapore Marathon - both last year. For Sundown last year, being my first marathon, I did not know what to expect. I did my first daylight race for SCSM and got fried for not having enough practice. For this race, I had little / no training in the gym - I did a lot of road running and training - almost every weekend, and for 4-5 months, I accumulated at least 4-5 21km+ runs during weekends, much better than I did before, and at least 10km+ every weekend though with some lapses. This is definitely not sufficient for marathon training....
Marathon day
I was kind of upset to find the company's running club vest did not fit me - it was almost 2 sizes larger!!! But I was more comfortable in my nike whites... this time I tried to do tights instead of shorts wary that the last two marathons, I suffered chaffing badly that I nearly could not walk for a day....
First time I drove to a race!!!! I drove early and was fortunate to get a parking below the Dataran - brilliant strategy - do not have to crawl far to go home...
0-10km
Pace was good, I ran a comfortable race. At 10km mark, Kit jogged past me - he had a slow grinding pace which was decent - I could see him finishing ok with his style and pace, continuously.
This was the first year I had no idea where the route was taking me. The key advantage I had however was that no one else knew much as well, since it was a new organizer this year. It was definitely a tour KL de-force despite all the organizers shortcomings. The first 10 kms went to Sentral, Loke Yew, Cheras... (I had no idea I was even somewhere in cheras - just saw lots of flats)...
11-20km
At some point in a race, I lost count - the km markers were not very clear. The route I was looking forward to was inevitably Jln Tun Razak. Today when I was in my office in KLCC and I stared down to Jln Tun Razak - it scared me that I had actually run the WHOLE Jln Tun Razak... wow....
So somewhere along here, after Cheras and somewhere, we ran the entire Jln Tun Razak (the lower portion) and went somewhere to turn at the end, and inevitably end up headed back towards Jln Sultan Ismail via Jln Raja Abdullah. Again familiar roads, and I was thinking of work. This is where it got dodgy, as somewhere in 17km when I took my gel, the drinks station started getting dry and disorganized. The 17km station had bananas and 100plus but the 100plus was in large bottles - the organizer asked us to take and pour into our mouth directly (uuurggghh - i did not remind them i came back from h1n1 country... philippines).
21-30km
At 20km, I realised the drinks station became an aid station, and people were packing up - something was not right. At 22km, almost near KLCC, I saw the damning evidence finally - strewn cups empty and no more water and a poor St John guy trying to honestly answer my question "I dont think there is any more water anywhere up ahead"... after about 5km no water. I started getting worried...
So, I popped into 7-11 (life saver) in Wisma Central to buy a drink 100plus and grabbed another-tropicana orange as afterthought on exit (IN THE MIDDLE OF A RACE!!!) - I saw some singaporeans having a chat outside, casually - and how to run with a drink in hand, so I walked a bit. After turning back around KLCC - I saw Philip - he was spent, and I think injured maybe. He tried to jog a few m's with me and then gave up.
This part of the race I started to walk jog - and what disturbed me was the lack of drinks and my distraction and excuse of buying something and running with a orange juice in my hand. I wished I had done better this part, as it was clearly "my territory" and also rat race territory.... but a lot of turns and changes really did not like this type of race...
31-42km
Last 10km.... was an absolute haze. It went somewhere through the middle of town in Petaling Street Area, guess what, when I passed - I hallucinated about air mata kuching... damn!!!! My orange juice could only ration that far, and somewhere at the end of the stretch, I found another kedai and decided to grab my last orange tropicana. In this center of town stretch, I also almost ran the wrong path a few times as lack of marshalls.
I had followed this malay lady for a while - she had a steady slow pace, and at the free gel part, she slowed, she was quite upset there was no water, so when I exited the shop, I saw her and gave her my change.
After that we ended up somewhere near stadium, jln pudu, and finally on the highway, mahameru or jln damansara somewhere. I only remembered crossing a lot of roads with a lot of cars.... this is very bad...
On the highway, I turned back on my ipod and listened to a long road to eden by Eagles admist the blaring horns of the highway, and continued to walk jog, wondering what on earth motivated me to be on a highway, next to blazing cars, damn hot, no water and trying to walk some part of it....
Caught up with Adrian from my office at around 35km, and paced walked with him - I did not have enough energy to push, and unfortunately he gave me an excuse of walking without being last.
We finished the last 1km together in a jog - I was ecstatic that I was pacing a guy who was doing his first marathon... and flashed great smiles for Tey and Jason near the finishing line.
I got to do better next time.
Nike's motto - there is no finishing line....
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