THREE O FIVE

Wow, it's been 5 whole years!

2023-05-07T22:52:00.004+08:00

Wow, my blog is still kickin! Wah lao, it's been 5 whole years since my last post! Time flies when you're building a business, which is why I haven't been racing as actively since 2017. But fear not, my running shoes are still laced up and I'm hitting the pavement 3-4 days a week. If you're one of my Garmin or Strava buddies, you'll know that I'm still more committed to running than most people. And I've never missed my bread and butter race - Kuala Lumpur Standard Chartered Marathon.

In the past few years, I haven't been training much for races due to the pandemic and all the hiccups. However, I'm excited to be back in action again. I just signed up for the Standard Charted half marathon, and this time, I'm committed to training seriously. Let's hope my dedication lasts longer than a few weeks, hahahahaha... But don't worry, I opted for the half marathon instead of the full as I want to build up slowly so I don't burn out too quickly. Once I start, I know I'll go all out, so I want to make sure I'm in it for the long haul.

And, to top it off, I've decided to resume my once-a-year overseas race routine. But, let's not get too crazy here, I'm not signing up for 20 races a year like I used to.

So there you have it, folks - a long overdue update on my running journey. If you're still reading this, drop a comment or whatsapp me and let me know you're here!

What happened in 2017?

2018-05-15T23:51:00.001+08:00

Hand itchy want to write something here. It's been a while since I last came here, exactly 1 year since my last update and coincidently it was also the SCKLM! I just ran the same SCKLM last month! I didn't run much last year. Only total of 6 races. So what exactly happened after the SCKLM last year?

PAR 13

I joined PAR relay. Teamed with Charmayne, Lucas, Cola and Eddy. They jio-ed me last minute to replace a friend. I ran 2nd leg and fuck, I did all out but only managed to do 4:18 pace. So slow! I can easily do sub-4 pace few years back! Haha, ok, things changed in few years! I grew older!

Wind Runner team!

PJ HM

Then I joined the KL iconic race PJ HM and bonked half way. I planned to do 4:30 pace but end up 4:45. What a joker! Went home with empty hands.

PJ HM - Trying hard to smile with puncit face

GE Relay

Then I joined Qiao Yun, Khairul, Teck Wai and Voon Leong for a relay in Klang. It was my only podium race in 2017, haha! Thanks to all my teammate. We got 2nd runner up! Luckily I was not the slowest. Teck Wai was few seconds slower than me! Hahahahahaha! Pffttt. I'm so bad. LOL! We could win 1st runner up if I pushed a bit more. We were just few seconds behind the 1st runner up!

Tumpang Podium in GE Relay. Haha!

Seremban

Not sure why my hand itchy and I signed up for Seremban HM. I actually did quite well but still not up to the podium standard yet. I did 4:31 pace in the HM! The best effort of the year! I got the almost amkan position which is 22nd. Luckily not the most amkan position 21st (as if it made any difference). LOL! Went home with empty hands again.

Firefighter

No kidding, I bonked after 10km end up almost couldn't make it to sub-2 HM. It was 500m under distance and I did 1:56:30. I had never run this slow. It was my 2nd slowest HM in the history. The slowest was the first HM I joined in 2009. LOL. Wend home with empty hands again.

So total of 6 runs in 2017! All screwed up. I was supposed to join the Melbourne Marathon in October, but it clashed with my daughter graduation! No choice, it's my daughter, I couldn't miss it.

SCKLM

Then this year, the first race I ran was SCKLM which just happened last month. It was the 10th anniversary and I'm the loyal supporter of the race since the first year so I didn't want to miss this year too. I set my target to sub-4 and I did just nice, 3:58:24! As usual, SCKLM is the race that I can't miss and luckily I made it this time.

Ngam ngam sub-4 in SCKLM

Well, I just started some sort of “serious” training again, that's why I started to write. Hopefully I can maintain it this time. No slack! LOL! I signed up a lot of races too! See you guys on the road!

SCKLM 2017 - A Warm Up Race

2017-05-23T06:38:00.000+08:00

Returning from the 5 months of hibernation and this SCKLM was my first race of the year. I haven't been doing much FM specific training recently so I didn't do quite well in the race. I didn't set any target and was hoping to run with following my HR which is to start with about 150 (80%) and end with 170 (90%) but half way into the race, at about km-4, I caught up with Ewe Bee Hong. Not quite sure why somehow we just ran together. I'd never met her in person but she is no stranger to me. She is one of the famous runners in Malaysia, always one of the top 3 winners! I ran with her from km-5 to km-31. I threw away my HR theory and just followed her all the way. We hold on to about 5:20 pace until km-31 which I bonked and slow down. I told her to go on and eventually she made it to the champion in her category! I was so glad that she won and managed to crack sub-3:45! She sped up after I dropped off, looks like I was holding her up. Haha!

KM-34, almost wanted to cry :P

Gathering before the race!

My HR went up very quickly when following her. It raised to about 5 beats higher than planned. At about km-20, it reached about 165 which I wished it could stay below 160 so I knew I would fuck up soon and no miracle happened, at about km-30, I had that sensation feeling in my both legs especially the left thigh and I knew it would come soon so I had to slow down. The last 11km was just dreadful. It took me more than 80 minutes to complete! Haha! Thanks to all the bro and sis who cheered me up and offered help during the run.

I finished the race in 4hr 10min. 2 mins faster than my personal worst in SCKLM. LOL! LUCKILY! But it's ok, this is kinda like my "warm up" race which marked the end of the base phase. Picked the wrong distance though. Should have picked the shorter one like HM or 10k but no fun if not running the full marathon in one of our biggest local running events. At least I got to meet a lot of old friends and made some new friends. And people, this is an AIMS certified route, the distance is 42.195km regardless what your GPS device tells you. There is this thing called "GPS-inaccuracy" terminology. Trust your gut and the distance marker set up by Dirigo. You should doubt when it's the distance marker from other organizer but not this one! In other words, you do not need to convert your pace/time to 42.195km, the net time is your real official time for the 42.195km! :D Congrats to all the finishers and winners!

四大爆神 - 4 Pecah King

I'm sure I will run this every year, I don't want to miss it, it's the BEST running event in Malaysia. I can see that the organizer spent a lot of efforts to improve and promote it. That's how you should organize a race. You listen, you learn and you rectify! This time it looks flawless to me! Hats off to Rainer and the team!

Taipei Marathon - My 100th Race

2016-12-28T17:45:00.004+08:00

I joined this same race in 2014 and ran a PB so I decided to be back again this year because it was one of the best Marathon that I had ever run. I kept it relatively low profile this time, no one knew I was racing but it was quite obvious as my mileage in the past few weeks was very high. I won't be training so much for nothing right? LOL. I was actually undecided between Shanghai and Taipei. I almost wanted to register for Shanghai but too bad they changed the date to 1 month earlier which I wasn't fit enough during that time. I wanted to join Karen, Angel, TW and Wil for the Shenzhen marathon too but unfortunately, they jio-ed too last minute and I had all my Taiwan trip paid.

Expo

Route

Taipei (previously called Fubon) Marathon is a fast course. The route changed a bit this year but it was still flat and there were only 3 climbs which one was at about 15.7km where we had to run over a flyover to cross the Keelung River, another one was at about 38.8km where we climbed up from the Tayou Road to the Zhengqi Bridge and the last one was where we came out from the 800m long tunnel at about 41.5km. But for us who have been running in KL like Double Triple hills, Puchong, DPC hills, Alam Damai, Shah Alam, etc., these 3 climbs are like kindergarten level. LOL. That's why I love this route so much.

Start/Finish line

Start/Finish Line

Weather

Unfortunately, this year the weather wasn't good enough, it was indeed quite hot, perhaps one of the hottest winters in the history. The temperature in the morning was about 16c but it rose very quickly when the sun came out, it hit 24c when I reached 30km. The last 10km felt like running in KL so it gave no advantage at all. I was expecting it to be like 12~18c!

Pre race selfie. LOL!

Flag off

I was given the bib to enter the pen B (3:30 and faster) which was very near to the start line but too bad the pen B was very small. It couldn't fit all the runners so we all got stuck outside the side entrance. People pushing and cursing around, the queue was quite long, it might be better if I just joined the slower pen. No choice, pen C was full as well so I had to go all the way down to pen D! Pen D was quite far away from the start line, like 80m behind! I spent quite long squeezing through the crowd to get as front as possible. I wish it could be just a few seconds behind but too bad it took me about 1 minute to cross the arch so the first few km were quite hard to run.

Plan

My plan was quite simple which was to BQ! LOL! Simple but not easy! Quite an ambitious and unrealistic goal for me I know. Based on the training, I estimated my recent fitness was about 3:20 level. To BQ, I need to run 3:07 and to be even safer it better be 3:05~3:06. It's "only" 10 minutes faster than my PB 3:17 so most people think it's easy but seriously, shaving 10 minutes off a marathon PB when a runner has been running for years which perhaps already reaching his genetic cap is no joke. To me, this is even harder than any of the Kenyan or Ethiopian breaking the sub-2 hour marathon! They only have to shave 3 minutes off, mine is 10 minutes! Even if we look at the percentage, mine is still a lot harder! LOL! :P

Race

It was either "go hard or go home", "BQ or failed" there was no in between. So I started with suicide pace which was about 4:10~4:20 and some KM was like 4 min pace, LOL. No surprise, it taxed me after 26km, I had to slow down. I was still on BQ time until 32km things started to fall apart. Muscles all cramped up and couldn't even hold on to 6 min pace for the last 5km and I didn't bother whether to sub-3:30 or not. It didn't matter anymore. I was thinking which FM I should join for next BQ attempt and how I should train for it. Should I go for Gold Coast? Melbourne? Should I wait until December? Etc. My mind wasn't in the race anymore. Not too excited about my result too. It was OK but still far from what I wanted to achieve. It's still a long way to go. I need to be patient!

The End

Our Malaysia elite runner Tan Huong Leong 陈洪龙 ran his PB. He got overall 13th and 4th fastest Taiwanese. No.1 in Malaysia category (if there was one) and of course I was the no.2 (I think so :P). Our timing was just 1 digit different which mine was 3:3x, his was 2:3x. :P

Actually it was not too bad for 2016! Also my fastest HM this year!

There went my 100th race - The Taipei Marathon. Good route, good baggage service, sufficient water and sponge station like every 3~4km, separated 42km runners from other categories, good traffic control, runners basically own the whole highway. Plenty of freebies including finisher tee, running vest, towel, medal, cert and foods. Many professional photographers and supporters along the route too. I might come back again in the future!

What's next? Hibernation aka hang shoes mode! Woohoo! Don't poison me for any running events! See you next year! :D

Garmin log: https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1487078393
Strava log: https://www.strava.com/activities/805002830

Compressport Half Marathon - The Day When All The Stars Aligned

2016-09-22T12:33:00.000+08:00

In My Dream

I was leading the race the whole way until the 15km mark when my shoelace got loose, so I stopped at the road side and tied it. At this time, 2 Kenyans had caught up and overtook me. Muhaizar and Jironi were about 50m behind so I waited for them and ran with them. They looked quite exhausted so I asked them if they were OK. They couldn't speak much because it's too tiring. I looked at my watch, we were at about 3:30 pace, no wonder they were tired. I paced with them for about 3km and sped off because I wanted to chase the 2 Kenyans. At the last 1km to go I caught up with them and tried to close the gap. They saw me approaching and started to sprint too. We sprinted side by side until the last 100m to go when I actually overtook them but there were so many people and cameras at the finish line, so I had to slow down a bit to pose for the photo. They took this chance and overtook me so I got 3rd ranking. After like 5 minutes, Muhaizar and Jironi reach too. They got 4th and 5th. This is how I won the 3rd in this race.

Holy moly, the biggest prize in my running life. Should I be proud of?

Can I just stop here and don't have to tell this is a joke? LOL. Trust me, it's lame but definitely much better than what really happened!

Reality

Instead, I got 3rd because 6 faster runners got DQed due to the negligence of the organizer. There were no Kenyans, no Muhaizar, no Jironi. They are all in my dream. LOL. I felt very bad when I went to the stage to claim the prize. A bunch of them including 6 from Men Open got disqualified because of running the wrong route. They were undeniable much faster than I am. I was 9th in Men Open before they missed the junction. There was no single marshal or any signboard at the junction at about 4.5km where we supposed to turn left. Another guy and I also almost missed it too, luckily one volunteer reach in time and shouted to us then we quickly u-turn back to the correct route. Those that ahead of us was almost nowhere in sight already. The closest to me was about 3-400m in front, he was about to turn right at the junction further up. I immediately shouted asking him to come back but I think it was too far already so he missed it.

After the u-turn I became Men Open champion, Vadiveelu and Chin Han in veteran were in front of me. At about 14km mark, Alif Naquiddin and Wai Lee caught up and overtook me. I tried to follow for like 1km and slow down. The form wasn't good. The route was flat and the weather was so nice, I couldn't find any excuse but I ran slower than my Seremban HM. Form hasn't been up since then I think one of the reasons is lacking of quality training. My mileage was actually quite high but mostly junk miles and a lot of 6~7:00 ish pace which actually do more harm. That's the consequence of training aimlessly.

From 9th to 3rd

So, I was given 9th when I reach the finish line. Chin Keong, Cheong Lee, Khairul and a few who took the wrong turn and ran only 18km tried to negotiated with the organizer but no luck, so my ranking moved up to 3rd and it's so embarrassing to get the prize in front of them! Not sure it's my lucky or unlucky day.

Men Open winners. All the lucky people (or unlucky?) LOL

With all the famous runners

Podium hunting season. LOL

Woot, Charmayne got 10km 8th too!

Thought

I wonder if this is the new trend, there were few races in the last few weeks disqualified runners due to mistakes caused by the organiser. How can you have no marshal or signboard at the junction where we supposed to turn? Some might argue it's runners responsibilities to study the map, yes, even if it is there are still chances that accident will happen and not everyone understand the map. Even if understand no way we can fully memorize it! Come on, it's common sense. There will be ambiguities and confusions when you try to convert your map image from your vision into reality. Especially when we are racing our brain can't process due to lack of oxygen. How can you expect runners to know which road they should turn or how far they should run before making the right turn? Not to say runners might fuck up or even cheat, how can you not prevent that?

We are still so far behind when comes to the sports system and the lacking of the sense of making it better doesn't improve this situation. We can't just satisfy with delivering a "so-so" event, we have to try to improve in every aspect, try to make it a perfect one. How can you expect Malaysia to excel in running when we can't even organize a local running event nicely? Every small things count. This is not the only event that screws up, there are plenty of them! Like the Bagang Lalang race the day before too, some of the 10km runners if not all of them got disqualified due to taking the wrong turn because of the negligence of the organiser. How much more this needs to be happened? I've a feeling that the next few races that I'm joining will have the same fate too, I can sense their dodginess already. God bless runners.

Seremban HM - The Revenge

2016-09-04T22:47:00.001+08:00

Form wasn't very good recently. Indeed it was quite bad (it's like never good before! LOL!), I thought last year when I couldn't make it to the top 20 in Seremban HM was bad enough but this year I was even slower. Last year I did 1:30; this year I pushed so hard only 1:34. But last year was more competitive, last year even though 1:30 but I couldn't make it to the top 20. This year was slow but I got 19th! Successfully revenge for myself! Haha.

The slow time was expected though the podium wasn't. I was quite dilemma these few days even in the race day morning I still couldn't decide if I should DNS. Seremban is not that near, it took me about 50 mins drive. My form wasn't great and I didn't want to wake up so early, waste time going so far to race and came back empty hand. But I felt guilty if I DNS and if I didn't race I still had to do my long run alone so why not just race it! Luckily I won something. Enough to cover my registration fees, petrol and tolls. More importantly, it's some sort of motivation. Winning is always good. Haha. I hope I will be more motivated to train after this.

The run itself was just blah, nothing much to brag about it as I couldn't run fast. Just ran without any target and without thinking too much. I was basically alone the whole route after the first 5k. This is the first race after my last shitty SCKLM race. Hopefully the no form streak ended here and I can have my winning streak back soon enough!

With Women Champion on my left and 4th on my right!

Choi fern, Lili and Peter, we all got the Pewter!

The limited edition pewter for top 50 runners! I got 19th!

SCKLM 2016 - Mission Failed

2016-08-08T15:27:00.001+08:00

I did badly in the SCKLM yesterday. It was my bread and butter race and we didn't get to run last year due to the haze. This is also one of the very few well organized and high quality local marathons that I would join every year so no matter how much I didn't prepare I would still run it. This time I came unprepared again. I was down with dengue one month ago and suffered from flu a few days ago. I didn't train enough too. The longest run I did was the TM Fan 21km and others were merely a few 10~14km runs. However I felt that I was OK to run. My plan was to pace Michelle and hope I could keep up with her. Not sure if I overestimated myself or I wasn't really aware that I wasn't fit enough to handle this, I didn't expect it to be easy but I also didn't think that it would be so tough. The whole situation just didn't cross my mind.

At the starting line, haha!

Our plan was to run the first half faster. 5:00 pace for the first half and 5:15 for the second half so that even slow down to 6:00 for the last 10km we could still achieve 3:45 "easily". Yea, I thought it would be "easily". I was so wrong! Not long into the run I felt not quite right already, my HR reach 170 so quickly. No way I could handle this so I adjusted my expectation and prepared to puncit anytime soon. I told Michelle I would cramp this time. At about 28~29km, my body couldn't take it anymore, I told her to go on without me and everything went downhill so quickly. From 5-ish pace to couldn't even handle 6:00 pace, had to walk at almost every water stations. I hadn't cramped yet, it just the body refused to work harder.

The real cramp happened at about 30-ish km started with my left quad then every other muscles followed like a symphony. There were so well coordinated, every muscle took their chances to cramp, so harmony. Damn it! Not only the legs, the upper body, neck, shoulder, back, waist and the stomach too! So funny when I asked for the 100 plus, my stomach cramped and I couldn't complete the sentence! So embarrassing! Everything happened after that was quite the same as the typical cramping cases. Stop, walk, limp, chase time, motivated, demotivated, etc and repeat. LOL!

Surviving mode at 34km point

I was very close to giving up but as usual, the crowd and the cheers at the last few km always make me to run faster. If I could maintain 6:00 pace, I could have made it to sub-4 but yea, my mind just wasn't there anymore so I followed the 4:00 pacers and finished with 4:00:27. LOL, so close to sub-4 but at that moment, sub-4 or not didn't really matter already. They were the same, just bad!

In whatever way, we nailed it! Congrats all!

Many people wonder who this cool girl is!
Go ask her yourself, she comes to puma too. :P

They are one of the reasons why I often join SCKLM.
It's a runner anniversary gathering! You get to meet almost everyone here!

Luckily Michelle made it to the top 10 but a bit wasted that she didn't achieve her sub-3:45. It was so close! I felt so bad, she could have done it if I could keep up. Shame on me! I hope she is alright and able to achieve it soon!

I didn't do well but still it was so fun. Runners' gathering is one of the reasons why I must sign up this run every year. Most Malaysians are running on this day, we get to meet and keep in touch with a lot of our long lost running friends. The race was well organized. I heard some complaints about the traffic and the baggage area but they didn't really affect me so overall I enjoy it very much.

What now? Time to think of what to do next and to kill my post race emptiness. :D

Newton 15km - Time To Taper

2016-07-24T23:57:00.001+08:00

Almost DNS the race due to oversleeping. I set my alarm for 4am but it was raining and the weather was so nice to sleep so the 2nd time I woke up it was almost 5am! My 15km actually started at 6:30am but Alan was holding my bib and he ran 30km which started at 5:30am so I had to reach before that. The race was in Puchong, no way I could make it so I decided to DNS. Then he told me his gf was running 15km so she could wait for me! Luckily and thank both of them so much! But still, it was raining heavily, such a nice cozy weather, I have no idea why I wanted to torture myself to wake up so early for this. Damn!

Newton 2016

Rain stopped when I left home but then it rained again when I reach Puchong. The race was still carried on though. Took my bib and warm up a little then the race started. Knowing that my form wasn't great and the route was hilly, I set my target pace to 4:40. It should be moderate hard effort but I think I over estimated myself, the last 4km wasn't as "easy" as what I expected. I just wanted to maintain the even pace but it wasn't as easy. I had to run close to my max. HR spiked up to 92~94% of my max! Finally I reach the finish line with the time of 1:06:06, GPS was 14.38km, under distance a little bit. But not too bad, I'm quite satisfied.

Bud, hope I can keep up with him in the SCKLM!

Vincent, long time no see! Welcome back to the running community!

Wind Runnres, we have quite a number of podium runners today!

It was a smart decision that the organizer changed the race to 2 weeks before the SCKLM, it used to be held in December. So this time many runners took this as the last chance for the long run training. Most of the runners was in superb form and did very well! OK, that's it, last race for me before the SCKLM, see you guys again 2 week later!

TM Fan Run - First Race Post-Dengue

2016-07-23T02:22:00.000+08:00

Fitness went down the drain after dengue and had to run this race 2 weeks after discharging from the hospital. Despite knowing that I wasn't fit enough to run any good result, I still planned to run my best effort.

My plan was to hold on to 4:30~4:35 pace but 3km into the run, I knew this was going to be very tough. The HR was still on point but my body was contradicting itself. It was getting heavier and heavier so I decided to slow down. William and Masaaki slowly left Michelle, Aiden and I for dust. Aiden started to speed off too after 8km. It was fun running with Michelle, the women first runner up of the race, so proud of her! It was the first time running with her actually. We had a long 21km gossip session and she still decided to run another 9km after the race to complete her 30km LSD! What?! It looked so easy for her! We were running at quite a fast pace, she talked and made fun all the way and she continued to run another 9k. After all this, she could still win 2nd place! OMG, so imba! I'm jealous! LOL!

Before the finish line, couldn't remember what we were talking about,
looked so happy!

Made some new friends in this race too!

Many friends did very well too in this race! Everyone was improving! I felt very sore on my legs as the route was quite hilly, the aerobic was OK though. I think I just need more strength and core training. Not ready for SCKLM again this time. 3 more weeks to the race and I was supposed to taper after this race but now I'm just running aimlessly. Newton 15km race this Sunday, good luck to me!

Par XII Series 1 and 2 - Race Report

2016-07-16T03:58:00.002+08:00

I'm not sure why I joined this relay again and moreover I joined both series. I actually told everyone I was not going to run this relay after participating the 2014 one. That was also why I skipped it last year. 3km kinda race is not my cup of tea. I regretted immediately after I promised Teck Wai to join. At first I actually just promised to run series 1 but not sure why after running series 1, I asked the team if they still wanted me to run series 2. I regretted immediately after I asked! LOL. WTF was I thinking?

As usual, I planned to take these relays easy. They were just part of the training for my SCKLM which was my goal race. But again, I knew I was lying to myself. I would never take them easy, in the end I would still run my 100%. My kinda take it easy was just merely I won't specifically train for them. Haha!

Let's start with our series 1 podium photo

Series 1

This time I teamed up with Angel, Guo Shen, William and Teck Wai. Wil, TW and I were kinda similar standard while GS had improved a lot since last year. He was already few leagues above us as our ace runner. Our strategy was fairly simple: Angel and GS to pull the gap for us while 3 of us just hold as much as possible not to be overtaken by others too much. As simple as ABC, also the most brilliant strategy! LOL! Our goal was to podium and of course to get a better ranking, as better as possible!

I ran 2nd leg in Series 1 as I had to rush home for my son's sports day. Race started. Angel was not well during that day. She kept saying she didn't perform well but I thought that was good enough as she finished 9th which was better than our overall ranking. We were still well within podium position. She then passed me the baton. Audrey, Suit Mei and Bee Hoon were just few secs ahead or behind Angel so that means a few of us actually exchanged the batons at almost the same time. In particular, Shu Wei, Hoo Yeen and Lionel! Lionel as a faster runner sped off and slowly disappeared from our sight. This left 3 of us fighting each others.

1 sec behind Audrey and Lionel! So intense!

GSW had overtook me and HYH grabbing the baton

I was the first to run. GSW was 1 sec behind and HYH 7 secs behind. I always started slow as I afraid of going out too fast and puncture. GSW cut me right after grabbing the baton. HYH cut me too after few hundred meters. LOL! After the flat road at the uphill, I overtook both of them and leading. I was slightly ahead, like few meters ahead. LOL, this was the only time I ahead of them so please let me syok sendiri! It's actually more appropriate to say we were running neck and neck. LOL! It didn't last long as expected. After the stairs at the downhill, HYH overtook me. WTF! My heart, lung and legs were already at the max! LOL! HYH led until the last 300m then GSW suddenly sprinted, cut both of us and finished first! What a race! That's his strategy as usual. They both had so much left! I was actually sprinting too but that was the max I could give. HYH finished 2 secs behind and I was 8 secs behind! I passed the baton to GS and stood aside to pant.

Last 500m to go, I was still leading!

Last 400m to go, overtook by HYH! GSW was chasing!

Such a close fight and so intense! LOL! HYH clocked 12:59, GSW 13:03 and me as the slowest clocked 13:12! KNS! Lost to both of them but it was expected as I was not as good as these 2 fellows, my ex-teammates! Haha!

As what we expected, GS didn't let us down. He overtook 5 runners and came back as 7th! Wah lao! Then Wil turn to run, he was overtaken by 2 runners and finished 9th. Then TW as our last runner overtaken by 3 runners and finished 12th! LOL! As what we planned, 3 of us tried to hold as much as possible and we did it! What a hard earn podium!

Pacing TW to the finish line!

Unfortunately I had to rush home immediately after the run and didn't get to receive the prize. After my son's sports day only I went to Runners Café to have lunch and take the group photo with them! Haha!

Team: 12th, 1:07:04
Angel: 14:43
Zi Shen: 13:12
Guo Shen: 12:17
William: 13:20
Teck Wai: 13:29

Series 2

Now come to this series 2. It was 2 weeks after the series 1. I was still having the phobia! LOL! Kevin Chu was supposed to replace me but he gave his spot to me! Thanks for that and sorry for all the hassle! We also let go GS for him to join a faster team, he deserved a better team! It was quite wasted for him to stay with us. We had Chris to join us though!

This time Angel wasn't sick! She finished 6th and this gave me a little bit of pressure! LOL! The faster she finished, the higher the chances of me being overtaken by other runners! KNS! And some said series 2 route was easier but to me it was as tough as series 1! It was just 50 to 100m shorter than series 1. This didn't make it the easier! The stairs, the roller coaster hills and a lot of sharp turning made it almost as tough as series 1.

Angel pulled a very large gap for me! After 1km which was after the stairs only I saw Lionel and Wen Shan trailing behind. They two overtook me and disappeared from my sight. Sigh, too imba! After they cut me, I ran alone and couldn't see anyone in front or behind! Because of that, I slow down a little and reserved quite a bit! At the last 300m only I let go what I had, sprinted and finished. William took the baton and continued. I thought I finished 8th until I saw Lionel finished behind me, only I realized he ran wrongly! So unfortunate for them!

Passing baton

Still fresh at the beginning

WTF, what a face! Last 50m to go, giving it all! LOL!

William came back as 8th and TW 9th then our last leg the secret weapon Chris overtook 1 guy and ended with 8th! We got much better ranking in this series 2 as some of the faster teams didn't join this time! Everyone fought well!

This time I didn't have to rush home so I could stay till the end to receive the prize myself and took a lot of photos. I meant a lot! LOL! I was glad that 4 of us finished sub-13 together. We won the PJ half marathon podium last year together (read here) then we made the same team and podium again this year in this relay! So freaking awesome!

The fate since PJ Half Marathon!

We won 8th position! Better than expected!

Team: 8th, 1:05:04
Angel: 13:59
Zi Shen: 12:47
William: 12:59
Teck Wai: 12:58
Chris: 12:20

Cari and Puma group photo

Men in black

The winners

ROFL, we were supposed to pose like Michelle
but I didn't know how so... cin cai la...

The best photobomb ever. :P

Girls power! Eh, wait!

Team work! Team spirit!

As usual, I'm telling you guys I'm not going to join this relay again next year! LOL! But I know it's probably going to be a lie again! Let's see what happen next year! :P Kudos to Ronnie and Pacemakers for holding such a wonderful relay! This is one of the most successful relay events in Malaysia. I still don't understand why this relay could attract so many elites to join, it didn't give cash prize! LOL! So this is why I think Ronnie and Pacemakers are so successful! I'm sure I will still be back again next year even if I'm not running I will still join as a volunteer if Ronnie wants me! Haha!

Race ended very well but I didn't end up well. Later that night I suddenly got a high fever and diagnosed with dengue few days later! So unfortunate! Luckily it happened after the race!

Dengue sucks! I will come back stronger! XD

How did dengue and 8 days of rest affect my body?

2016-07-14T13:45:00.001+08:00

This is what dengue plus 8 days of no running did to my running fitness. I keep a very comprehensive running logs and from time to time, I will analyze my performance to see how much I've improved/regressed. So this is what happened.

I have been absent from the running scene for the past 2 weeks due to dengue fever. The last run I did was the Par series 2. I was still OK during the race in the morning and I'd actually planned to run a LSD later that day. However, my body started to feel quite unwell. At first, I thought I'd pushed too hard during the race which led to the soreness in my body but later that night, I got a very high fever. No surprise, a few days later, I was diagnosed with dengue and got admitted to the hospital.

I was actually in the middle of preparation for the SCKLM. Par series 2 was actually already at week 14 and everything was going on pretty smoothly until dengue hit. Based on my past experience, 8 days of no running won't actually cause a drastic decline but instead, this dengue put me 10 weeks behind from where my fitness was.

How do I know it's 10 weeks behind? I've got a very simple way to judge my fitness level. This is how I keep track: Based on the HR value at a certain pace, I can figure out how hard I'm running and from there, I can compare the HRs and find out my fitness level. So from time to time, I will check my HR and find out my 10k predicted race time so I know how fast I can run.

So this is how my fitness level looks like over the 16 weeks of training.

Performance Improvement Line Graph

Date HR Pace 10kTime Note
21/03/16 156 6:02 0:52:30 1st training after 3 months of hibernation
22/03/16 149 5:51 0:48:20 1st week
25/03/16 161 5:27 0:49:15 1st week
29/03/16 151 5:35 0:47:00 2nd week
01/04/16 152 5:35 0:47:15 2nd week
22/04/16 143 5:42 0:44:50 5th week, after Nike
27/04/16 143 5:26 0:42:45 6th week, after BDB
02/05/16 140 5:42 0:43:50 7th week
12/05/16 154 4:54 0:42:10 8th week
13/05/16 138 5:44 0:43:15 8th week
15/05/16 141 5:35 0:43:15 8th week
21/05/16 151 5:07 0:43:00 9th week
26/05/16 147 5:05 0:41:30 10th week
29/05/16 22k Race Time: 1:39:09, 10k equivalent 0:42:20
08/06/16 146 4:59 0:40:10 12th week
15/06/16 145 4:59 0:40:00 13th week, after Par series 1
18/06/16 146 4:56 0:39:45 13th week
22/06/16 143 4:53 0:38:25 14th week
24/06/16 147 4:56 0:40:10 14th week, 2 days before Par series 2
10/07/16 160 4:56 0:44:10 16th week, 4th training after dengue
13/07/16 154 4:53 0:42:00 17th week

I measured my HR during my 4th training post-dengue and it reached 160 at 4:56 pace, which I could easily achieve 2 weeks before with just 147 HR. 13 beats higher in HR to me is equaled to about 4 minutes slower in 10km race time. It was just hard at the beginning. I still remember I could only sustain this pace for about 5km. Good news is that looking at my 2nd measurement 3 days later, I think I can regain my fitness pretty quickly this time around. Anyway, this has affected my SCKLM training quite badly. It's only less than 4 weeks now, and I will have to revise my goal. I will still aim for it but with a slightly slower finishing time. Let's see how it goes.

Bagan Lalang 21km Race Report

2016-05-31T16:20:00.003+08:00

I signed up this race last minute as there were like more than 30 races on that weekend so I thought I might stand a chance to win something. I also wanted to test how much I've improved since the Nike HM 7 weeks ago. I did 1:48 in Nike so I set my target to 1:35 for Bagan Lalang. 7 weeks of training it better be good!

We got 4th and 5th!

Not many people I know joining this, actually there was like none, only Alan Tan and Sharon. Alan form was superb recently. He just did like about 4min pace in a 15km race the week before so I wanted to see if I could pace with him.

Race flag off at about 6:30am, I followed the lead pack quite closely. Alan was in the lead pack. I stayed like 10m behind them. After like about 5mins, shit happened! We ran wrongly, not sure how we did, we ran back to the starting line again. LOL! We had to cross the starting line again and the 10k runners were already there waiting to flag off. We had to cut through them, so funny! Some of us cursed like hell! But luckily this happened at the beginning and all other runners actually ran wrongly together so the damage was not much, no changes in our positions! I readjusted my pace and mind, assume that it was just a reset and started again! LOL!

My position was 8th after crossing the starting line. Well within top 10! Hope to maintain 4:25/km pace but after about 4km, I felt like I couldn't hold this pace until finish so I'd to readjust the pace down to 4:30/km! 5 seconds difference was actually quite huge difference. I felt much comfortable with 4:30/km! This pace allowed me to actually follow Alan quite closely from the beginning until 7km then we paced together side by side until 11km. We overtook a few runners slowly, our position improved from 7th and 8th to 4th and 5th. At about 11km, I started to speed off. Then I punctured at about 19km. Not quite sure it was my mind or physically but I was already quite happy with what I wanted to achieve.

Crossed the line and got no.4th! Clocked 1:39:09 for 21.95km, about 4:31/km. Minus the 30 seconds wasted when we ran wrong route, so I actually achieved my sub-1:35 HM target! Well within plan! Congrats to Alan too, he got no.5! Sharon got Women champion! So awesome! :D

10m left!

Crossing the finish line!

Woohoo... with Y.B. Puan Lai Nyuk Lan

Top 5 Men Open 21km Finisher!

Sharon the women Champion!

BDB Langkawi Climb & Run Route Preview

2016-04-28T00:30:00.005+08:00

It was my honor to be invited by the organizer to join the BDB Langkawi Climb & Run Route Preview event. Flight, transport, accommodation and food were all sponsored! This was also my first time going to the Langkawi! The offer was just too good to resist so I joined without hesitating much.

The Discover Kedah 2016 BDB Series

The run was actually a 3 series runs which made up of BDB Langkawi Climb & Run, BDB Jitra Extreme and BDB Jitra Marathon. We can sign up all 3 of them in one combo package called "Triple Challenge" with a much cheaper price - RM200! This one that I joined was the route preview for BDB Climb & Run.

Ariff - The Race Director

Zi Shen - The handsome! :P

Below are the details and the links for these 3 runs:

1. BDB Langkawi Climb & Run: https://home.hooha.asia/BDBLangkawiClimbRun.aspx
- Total of 18km with 4287 steps of stairs and run 15km downhill on tarmac road at Gunung Raya which is the highest mountain in Langkawi!

2. BDB Jitra Extreme: https://home.hooha.asia/BDBExtremeJitra.aspx
- An obstacle run at the Darul Aman Park, Jitra Kedah.

3. BDB Jitra Marathon: https://home.hooha.asia/BDBMarathonJitra.aspx
- 4 categories of different distances will be held at the Darul Aman Park, Jitra Kedah, which are FM, HM, 10km and 5km fun run.

4. BDB Combo Package: https://home.hooha.asia/BDBTripleChallenge2016.aspx
- Which contains all 3 runs above with a much cheaper price!

Some info about the stairs.

Pre run group photo! Can't wait to run!

The most important stuff to do - pre run selfie. :D

I came this time is to recce the Climb & Run route so on Sunday morning, I joined the team for the killer climbs! The 4287 steps is definitely no kidding. If you are looking for something outside your comfort zone to challenge, this is the run that you must join! If you need some idea on how tough the 4287 steps is, this is something you can refer to:

- KL Tower stairs is 2058 steps, so this one is like running KL Tower twice ONLY!
- Batu Caves stairs is 272 steps, so this one is like running Batu Caves 16x ONLY!

Hehe! Not too hard right? I'm very weak at stairs and hills, so after the first 1000 steps I was nearly KO and had to walk extremely slow! There was no handrail at the middle part of the stairs so I had to rely on a stick I found to support myself and I had to stop and rest every few hundred steps. LOL! Deo, Jerome and others disappeared from my sight after like less than 1000 steps! So imba! They used only 50 minutes to reach the peak while I spent almost 1 hour and 5 mins. 15 minutes more, OMG! I felt like running a Marathon at the end of the stairs! I couldn't feel my legs and I am still suffering from DOMS today even it's already more than 3 days! The elevation gain was about 750m and distance was about 3km long.

The stairs are well maintained!

At the 3100th, half dying!

Chilling on top of the Gunung Raya!

After the climb we had to run a 15km downhill on tarmac road. Downhill was fun too but it was not as easy as I thought because downhill hurt my knee so I had to be very careful with my landing. The whole journey took me about 3 hours. We spent quite long time after the stairs taking photos because the view at the top of the mountain was just so awesome! If minus the time I spent on the sight seeing and photos, it would be about 2.5 hours for the whole run.

The last 1km going back to the finishing! Together with Deo!

This is my GPS record: https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1139500656

Please note that the actual route on the race day might be different from what I share here. Organiser is still fine tuning things to give runners the best experience they could offer!

I am helping to promote the event so please let me know if you need more information. I can find out more for you! There will be prizes for top 3 finishers too! Please check it out!

First time been to Subang Airport! LOL!

On the way to the hotel.

Schedule and program briefing

View from the hotel!

The beach!

Sunset

You can also find more sharing and experience from our running friends

Aizat Yanan
Deo Runner
Elana Khong
Marlina
Miera Nadhirah
Missyblurkit
Misz-ella
Razif Yahya
Razis Rahim
Run Hike Asia
Sam Mccomma

Marathon Training Schedule for SCKLM'16

2016-04-26T13:49:00.004+08:00

How to create a Marathon training schedule? I'm going to share how I came up with this training program for the SCKLM this year. Before that, I would like to clarify a few things:

i) This is not a guarantee program. There is no such thing called guarantee. I'm just sharing the idea. Not the exact distance, pace or workout. It might not work for everyone. Please try and error.

ii) There are plenty of training schedules made by world famous coaches and runners. The reason I don't really use their schedules is because most of them are customized for a final goal run. They usually start with a few weeks of base building phase and have a few micro cycles targeting different body systems which will make us peak right before the final goal run. For me, I prefer to start straight with some speed works and hope to perform well in other races throughout the whole training cycle. The fundamental training philosophy is still almost the same. The consequence of doing the speed works too early is we might get injured, over trained or peaking too early so we have to be extra careful not to burn out. But based on my experience, the load is manageable and the form can last.

iii) There is no golden rule here. We might need to bang the wall a few times to define our own rules.

iv) I think LSD and recovery run are overrated. :P

Let's start.

1. How many weeks we want to train for?

A typical Marathon training program can last for 12 weeks to 24 weeks. If I start from zero, I will feel more comfortable with at least 18 weeks. If I've been training or racing regularly with at least 30km per week for several weeks, I can go for a 12 weeks. I'm not confident with anything less than 12 weeks. Let's assume we start our SCKLM training next week, so we will have a 14 weeks program.

2. Taper weeks

Set the last 2 to 3 weeks as taper weeks. I prefer tapering for 3 weeks. My suggestion is if our peak weekly mileage is around 70km and above we should go for a 3 weeks tapering. My experience for a 2 weeks tapering is we won't get enough rest and we will have to suddenly reduce a lot of mileage during the last 2 weeks which perhaps will do more harm.

3. Micro cycles

Create 2 to 4 micro cycles with reduce mileage week in between each cycle. Each cycle contains 3 to 6 weeks. The purpose of the reduce mileage week is for our body to recover. We can divide our weeks evenly into each cycle. For example, 5-5 (reduce mileage on the 6th week). I usually like to join some shorter distance races at the end of these reduced weeks so I will work around with what I've already signed up. For example, a 3-3-3 cycles (reduce mileage on 4th and 8th week) will be just nice for me, I can taper a bit for Bukit Jalil and PAR relay.

This is now what it should look like

4. Weekend long run

i) How long to run?

Now fill in our weekend long run. Start from the distance we are comfortable with and increase 2km every week until it reaches 30km. I usually start from 14km to 16km. You can start straight from 20~25km if you are experience enough or you have been doing it regularly but this will make you reach 30km very soon. I don't like to run too much of 30~35km, with the speed that we are going to run I think they tax our body too much. I will run 2 to 3 times of 30km with 1 time up to 32~34km. I feel it's perfectly fine to stop at just 30km.

We can also measure it by hours. For the maximum long run distance, I would suggest not more than 3 hours regardless what pace we run. Actually for people who train for 4:00 to 3:00 FM, a maximum of 2.5 hours long run is sufficient. 1 or 2 times of 3 hours run are fine.

For reduced week, we can reduce our long run distance to something between 10k and 20k or 50% to 80% of the previous long run.

ii) Type of long run

As I mentioned earlier, I think long slow distance (LSD) is overrated so I like to add some speed elements into my long run. I like some of the runs recommended by Jeff Gaudette and Pete Pfitzinger. They are:

Surge long run: Long run with 4 to 10 sets of 60 sec to 90 secs surges (3k~5k race pace) with 3 to 5min slow jog in between each surges.

Fast finish long run: Long run with the last 4 to 15km at pace faster than marathon pace (25k~35k race pace).

Steady interval long run: Long run with pace slightly slower, around or faster than marathon pace and with a 10 mins long rest at the half way point.

Marathon pace long run: Long run with the last 5 to 20km at marathon pace.

After adding the weekend long runs

Note: How to read the workout?

For example one: 10k,4x(90s 3~5kp,5:00SJ),1k

10km easy pace, 4 sets of 90 secs at 3k to 5k race pace, slow jog 5 minutes after each surge, , end with 1km cool down.

For example two: 7k,6k 35-50kp,10:00RI,6k 35-50kp,1k

7km easy pace, 6km at 35k to 50k race pace, rest 10 minutes, again 6km at 35k to 50k race pace, end with 1km cool down.

5. Key workout

i) The arrangement and consideration

Now we need something that can get us up to speed – the speed work, aka "key run"/"hard workout". Some people like 2 speed works per week some prefer 1. I actually think, to train for a Marathon, 1 speed work per week or even biweekly is sufficient since 97~99% of a Marathon is using aerobic function so the speed part becomes not so crucial. However I plan to excel in shorter distance, I will sacrifice some of my weekly middle long run for another semi-hard speed work.

I prefer to run my key workout on Tue so that I can add the semi-hard workout on Thu or Fri. Semi-hard speed work is either reduce mileage or reduce intensity. I want to have an easy day or rest day in between 2 hard workouts. Also, I don't feel comfortable if I skipped the speed work. I tend to do it at the beginning of the week so that if let say raining or busy on Tue, I still can postpone it to Wed or Thu. If you do not like the idea of semi-hard workout or if you think it's too high intensity, we can change it to some other type of run eg. middle long run, steady run.

I feel it's very taxing to do 2 hard workouts without reducing the intensity in 1 week span. The Sunday fast long run and the races are considered very high intensity workouts already. With the mileage that we are going to run, I don't think our body can take it. I will even choose to skip the semi-hard workout if I'm running a race during that week.

During the reduced week, we can try to cut the mileage of the hard workouts but I usually don't cut them. I prefer to retain the intensity of the hard workout and reduce the mileage from the easy and long run.

ii) Type of speed works

A lot of them are the common one like tempo and intervals but I like some of the runs recommended by Jeff Gaudette, Pete Pfitzinger and Jack Daniels. Including the classic workouts, they are:

Tempo run: Run 20 to 40 minutes at 1 hour race pace.

Cruise interval: Break the tempo run into smaller chunk with 1 to 2 minutes of rest in between. For example: 3 sets of 2km at 1 hour race pace with 1 min rest.

Threshold interval: 4 to 10 sets of 600m~1.2k (4k~9km race pace) with 2:1 to 2:1.5 rest ratio. For example: run 5 minutes, rest 2.5~3.5 minutes

VO2max interval: 4 to 10 sets of 400m~1k (1.5k~4km race pace) with 1:1 to 1:1.25 rest ratio. For example: run 3 minutes, rest 3~3.5 minutes

Repetitions: 10 to 20 sets of 100m~400m sprints with 1:2 to 1:5 rest ratio. For example: run 200m in 40 seconds and slow jog/walk 200m in about 2~3 minutes.

Tempo and interval combo: Some mix, for example a 4km tempo and follow by 5x400m VO2Max interval.

Alternating run: Run with alternating the pace. For example: 1k at marathon pace and 1k at 15k race pace for a total of 8km.

Progressions run: A.k.a negative splits run or acceleration run, start the run with some easy run and run faster on each splits. For example: total of 6km with first km at 42k race pace, 2nd km at 30k pace, 21k pace, 15k pace, 10k pace and last km at 7k pace.

Others: Hill repeats, stairs, pyramid intervals, fartlek, etc. They are all different variation but fundamentally the same.

There are 3 micro cycles in the training program. The first cycle is to target the 12.5km Bukit Jalil race, the middle cycle is for the 3km PAR relay which has hills and stairs and the last cycle will be the Marathon specific weeks. We will train slightly differently for different races. For example, we don't really need repetitions and VO2Max interval in Marathon specific weeks; we don't really need alternating and long tempo run when training for short distance.

iii) Distance of speed works

Now fill in the distance for the key workouts. Same principles apply, start with something short and add 1 to 2k every few weeks for the same type of workout. Start each workout with 2 to 3k of warm up and end with 1 to 2k of cool down. Usually the tempo, cruise, combo, alternating, progression and hills cover longer distance. Threshold interval and VO2Max interval cover shorter distance. Stairs and repetitions are even shorter. For the rough comparison, 10k tempo (3k warm, 6k tempo, 1k cool) is as intense as a 9k threshold interval (3k warm, 5x800m with 200m slow jog, 1k cool) or a 7k stairs (3k warm, 20x100 steps, 1k cool).

My recommendation for the first longer speed work should be around 8~10km, shorter speed workout should be about 7~9km. Repetitions and stairs should be about 5~7km. Run the shorter distance if we are unfit or we run slower than 5 hour marathon, choose the longer distance if we are fit or we run faster than 4 hour marathon. Increase by 1k or 2k every 2 to 4 weeks. The total distance here including the warm up, cool down and the slow jog/walk distance in between the run. For example a 10km threshold interval can be something like 6x800m with 200m slow jog or 5x1k with 200m slow jog or 4x1.2k with 300m slow jog.

Example 1: 1 hard workout and 1 semi hard workout per week

Example 2: 1 hard workout and 1 middle long run/easy run per week

6. Weekly mileage

i) The Law Of Diminishing Returns

We have all the main stuffs filled in now, next is to think how much mileage we want to run per week. I don't go by mileage, I usually go by hours. I always think to get the same improvement rate, everyone has to train almost the same amount of hours regardless what our running pace is. This is a tricky part and some of the people don't agree. We can talk more about it in the future.

Base on this article, the new London Marathon champion Eliud Kipchoge trained only 200km per week. OK, 200km! How much time could he possibly spend in this 200km? He didn't state it but it's not hard to find out based on the article wrote "he runs 20-mile run at 5 minutes per mile". Give or take, he only needs 11~12 hours to complete the 200km. It's a lot to most of the amateur runners like me but it's not to some of the crazy and dedicated runners! How much mileage we normal human can cover in 11 to 12 hours? For me it will be about 110km which looks quite right. If I really want to get into that kind of improvement rate, for them is to shave 10 to 30 secs off from a 2:03 hour marathon, for me is like shaving 1 min off from 3 hour, then yes I need 11 to 12 hours of training. But I'm not professional and I haven't reach sub-3 level so do I really need to run 11 to 12 hours?

To make it simpler, this is what I think: if let say running 6 to 8 hours per week will make me run 5% faster, doubling the efforts to 12 to 16 hours will NOT let me improve 10%. It will be somewhere around 6 to 9%. The closer we reach our genetic capability the lesser improvement we will get, the diminishing returns become more significant. It's all mathematics and science. This is The Law of Diminishing Returns. The performance gain is not a linear growth.

ii) How much to run per week?

Based on the diminishing returns, my suggestion for how much weekly mileage we should train for should be: if we think we are almost hitting our genetic max capability (if we have run for many years already, you will know it yourself!) and we want to improve that few secs from our PB, then go for 10 hours and above. If not, just stick with about 5 to 8 hours per week. 5 to 8 hours per week should be about:

35~55km for a 6:00 marathoner,
45~65km for a 5:00 marathoner,
60~80km for a 4:00 marathoner,
80~100km for a 3:00 marathoner.

5 to 8 hours should be manageable for most of the casual runners. That's the minimum time we should spend to run a good marathon. Now fill in the other days with easy run and increase mileage slowly until we reach our maximum weekly mileage right before the taper weeks.

iii) Type of easy run

For the off days, we can choose to rest, do some core, strength or cross training. For easy runs, we can add some fun elements like 5x100m striding, 5x50m hills sprints, 5x100 steps stairs, etc.

My idea of recovery run is not for recovery. I don't really buy the idea of "recovery run is for recovery". I generally think recovery run add pressure and slow down the recovery process. I would rather completely rest or do stretching if I need to recover. So you won't see recovery run in my program. It is just part of the easy run. My philosophy of the easy run is just merely "I'm still fatigue, I can't run fast and I don't want to get injured but I still need my mileage so I run slowly". The purpose of easy run and recovery run is just for getting the mileage in so that we are able to benefit from the stimulation of the accumulated fatigue. We need to run more to run fast and long, so we take smaller pieces and put them together over a long time, build capacities slower. That's the point of doing the easy run.

Example 1: shorter weekly mileage approach

Example 2: longer weekly mileage approach

7. Taper weeks

i) Specific workouts

Tempo run on first taper week. Now we want to fill in the most crucial part - taper weeks. I prefer to do a stress test and super hard key workout during the first taper week. I will do a super long tempo run which is about 10km to 12km which close to or slightly slower than 1 hour race pace. But make sure it's not an all out run.

Cruise interval 10 days before. Based on Pfitzinger Advanced Marathoning book, the best time for a last speed work should be 10 days before the Marathon and he recommends 3x1.6km at tempo pace.

Marathon pace run 5 days before. Tuesday during the final week I will prep myself with a 5km pace run.

Weekend long run. For taper weeks, first taper week I will cut 20% and second week I will cut 50%. This makes it 24km and 15km respectively.

Other days will be easy runs. I will also slowly reduce and stop the core and strength training during the taper weeks.

ii) How much to reduce?

Typically, first taper week, I will cut the mileage down to the 80 to 85% of the highest weekly mileage. 50 to 60% for 2nd week and 30 to 40% for the final week.

Final 1: Shorter mileage, 1 hard workout and 1 semi hard workout per week

Final 2: Longer mileage, 1 hard workout per week

8. Pace!

The final crucial element is the training pace. Run too fast we will burn out, run too slow we can't get enough stimulation so we need to be particular. For simplicity, use McMillan Calculator or read the runnersconnect.net or google Pfitzinger or Jack Daniels. I also have a small guide here: How to find out your training pace if you are interested.

The pace that we should refer to should base on our current fitness but not the pace that we are targeting for. For example, if my current fitness for a 10k race is 1 hour and I'm targeting a sub-4 marathon, I will use 10k in 1 hour as the benchmark for training pace instead of 42k in sub-4. We will have to keep adjusting the training paces. I adjust them every week based on my training output.

9. Fine tuning and adjustment

The schedule so far should be almost ready but things can change from time to time and we should adjust accordingly. For example: if we are weak at hills and our race is a hilly course then we can add more hill elements. If we think back to back hard workout is important then we can modify some of them to b2b. If we think it's better to run long run on Sat then shift it. If we think hard workout after race is too tough then cancel it. We should fine tune the schedule from time to time. The schedule is merely a guide line and not a you-miss-something-you-are-screwed kinda thing. It should be F-L-E-X-I-B-L-E!

Now it's ready for the execution. Good luck!

Nike Half Marathon - The Sub-1:50 Squad

2016-04-14T12:59:00.000+08:00

The Sub-1:50 Squad

When I registered for the Nike Run I was actually thinking to break my personal best or at least running a sub-1:30 but after a series of procrastination only I started my training 3 weeks before the race which was quite impossible for me to run a decent time. I could barely run a 6km at 5:15/km pace on the first few days of my training. So I thought why not take this chance to run with friends and just to enjoy the run. I knew many of my running friends HM standards were around 1:40~1:50 and based on my training records, my HM standard was around 1:42~1:45 too (LOL, I'm not lying OK! I was and still am pretty out of shape so that's the best I could do!). I didn't want to push too hard so I think 1:50 should be a good pace for most of us. Not too hard and not too draggy so I started to jio people to run together. That's how I came up with the idea of forming a sub-1:50 squad.

Let's put a group phot first! We are a bunch of energetic runners!

The first person I asked was actually Charmayne as I knew she just did her sub-2 PB not too long ago and based on a few runs together I felt like she was almost if not already at 1:50 level. Perhaps a little better route, a little better weather or a little better pacing strategy she could definitely achieve it so I tried to con her to "up car" and run with me. LOL! 1 person was not fun enough, so I tried to ask more people to join and finally I managed to gather a bunch of about 10 people. I was quite motivated and very looking forward to it.

Race Day

First thing to do on the race day was to meet everyone and quite lucky that they spotted me right away when I reach there. I saw Kevin, Sabrina, Charmayne, CS, Pan, BJ, Adam and Aiden. These few guys were the potential sub-150 kaki on that day. Some had achieved before some hadn't but we decided to run together and some tried to follow as much as they could. The other main person was actually Audrey as 1:50 was exactly her PB and I promised to pace her too but couldn't see her before going in to the starting pen. I kept looking for her while warming up but couldn't and we saw the queue going in was getting longer and we kiasu that we would have to stand quite far behind so we didn't wait too long. Luckily the sub-2 pen was not so crowded.

I actually forgot to bring my sub-2 hr tag which Nike used to divide people into different starting zones based on the best time we had given when we registered so I tried to follow the gang and hope they won't check as they saw we were together but too bad the lady stopped me when I tried to sneak in. LOL! Good I actually liked that! This is how it should be. Rule is rule. You need a 5 stars event you need to do that. You have to be strict and stick on to your principles! But maybe because of my handsomeness after some persuading and begging she let me in. :P OK, I felt bad and guilty but I had a mission! LOL! Right after entering the zone we saw Audrey! Kee Siong, Lucas, Derrick and some others were there too!

Flag Off

At 5:30am sharp the race flagged off! I started off with my planned pace 5:10/km. It was quite hilly at the beggining but we were still fresh so the slopes became not so obvious. I have to apologize to Charmayne, Audrey, Adam and some others that couldn't keep up because of my inconsistent pace. I actually ran on quite an average pace for the first 10km. To be exact, it was actually:

5:13/km for the first 3km,
5:11/km for the first 5km,
5:09/km for the first 8km, and
5:09/km for the first 10km.

This is where the problem is, a good pacer, he shouldn't rush to make up for the time lost! He should chase it back slowly. For example, you can tell people that you run an average pace of 5:10/km but a more important thing is how you run this 5:10/km pace. An extreme example would be running the first 500m at 4:10/km and the second 500m at 6:10/km. You actually run 5:10 for this KM but the people who follow you would have already punctured in the first 500m.

A more real life example would be stopping at the water station for 10 seconds then make up the time by running the first 300m at 4:45/km and another 700m at 5:06/km. For a people who can run a 4 min pace easily, they can hardly tell the difference between 4:45/km and 5:06/km (perhaps they could but not as obvious) but for the people who is racing on the edge of their limit, 4:45/km could be their anaerobic zone and 5:06/km is right at their threshold. This makes a huge difference. So I learnt this time, I actually should be more picky and DDLY on the pace.

My actual splits and Elevation

Finish Line

At the half way mark, only Aiden, BJ and I were still together. Others were either ahead or behind already so I decided to speed up a bit as I knew Aiden and BJ were way better than just 1:50 and I saw Sue and Jason too so I decided to follow them. After a while, Aiden and BJ ditched me too. At about 16km I saw Angel and NK so I closed the gap slowly and followed them. Angel looked like she was going to faint anytime, LOL! I was surprise that she could hold it until finish line and we crossed the line together with the same gun time 1:47:58! That's the spirit of PIA, with the cost of being sent to the medic tent immediately in the wheelchair. This is how she treats all her races even though she knows that she can't win, she gives it all! That got her the top 10 position!

At about km-18 point, kudos to Victor and Elaine

Congrats Jiun Pan on his PB!

Shortly after, everyone came back. I was glad that most of them achieved their PB and goals! Some didn't achieve but given such conditions, humid and hazy weather and not very flat course, I thought they did it quite well!

Pacer Kartini in the house!

We do what the champion does - for JW. :P

Congrats Daniel and Benedict on getting 4th and 5th respectively!

I've a few targets to lock now, namely Guo Shen, Jing Jing, Karsten, Teck Wai, James and Lewis. :P They did sub-1:32 to 1:35 respectively which I doubt I could even I was at my peak, it was so humid and hot! Congrats to them!

Honestly, this is one of the best events I've joined so far. The best is to get the route AIMS/IAAF certified! Regardless what your watch told you, it was a 21.0975km race. The emcees were good, adequate water stations, marshals and volunteers at the right places, good pre-race programs, nice race village setup, good flow and crowd control. Kudos to the Nike, Rainer and the team. If really wanted to complain, there is actually 1 thing. Why the hell you wanted to use such stupid ankle timing band? It was so eco unfriendly and so inconvenient.

Since it's a certified course now, maybe I should make this my annual goal race.

My Garmin log: https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1119497259
My Strava log: https://www.strava.com/activities/540633716

Malaysia Women Marathon 2016

2016-03-14T01:24:00.001+08:00

I can't really remember how I promised to pace Fujii. I think we talked over it in a dinner. We were actually quite ambitious, aiming for sub-4 and even came out with a series of plans but ended up both injured and didn't get the chances to execute it. I got injured when I trained for Macau last year and after Macau I stopped training. I planned to pick up again few weeks before the MWM but somehow motivation was not there. Fujii too, she had a prolonged injury that she had to fix. Fortunately just right before the MWM, she recovered but same as me, you can't expect anything from a weekly mileage of less than 10km. So in the end, we didn't really take this MWM seriously. It was just like another typical LSD but wasn't a fun one! Alright, it's not true, it was actually quite fun as it was a whole new experience of "being tortured" for me! It was the kind that you can't get if you always run fast! :P

With the host Karen!

With all the "famous" people! :D

Early In The Morning

She told me in the car that we were going to run 6:30 pace but then I didn't quite believe the fact that we couldn't handle 6:00 pace. "What is 6:00 pace? My first marathon 6 years ago was already 5:35 pace and she did 5:30 pace for 30km before. Now it is merely 6:00 pace. Pfftt!" so I told her to try 6:00 pace first and if couldn't then we faded slowly. It was gonna be a fast LSD! Then you know what?

At 4am sharp, the race flagged off. I was trying to set the pace but I saw her running ahead of me so I ran faster to close the gap. After closing the gap, I tried to slow down a little but then whenever I slow down a little she would just run pass me and I had to run faster to stay ahead of her. That was the sign of "I don't care! I want sub-4" so 1st km 5:35 pace. I thought OK, let's slow down a bit after 1st km but then 2nd KM 5:21! Pfftt! "It's time to slow down" I thought but then 3rd KM 5:40! We ran neck and neck with the 4:00 pacer Karsten and Yew Khuay. I had a feeling of "up car jor". 6:30 pace my foot!

I tried very hard to follow her, I was quite confident with 6:00 pace but not 5:40 so the first few KM I was actually led by her. She has no sign of slowing down. After like 5km only she said "I think we should slow down". YAYYYYY! What a relief! I was worried that I would have to up ambulance at one point! LOL!

When Things Going Down Hill

We did super positive pace, from 5:30 pace, slowly faded to 6:00 pace. By the time we reach the toll at 10km, we were already at 6:15 pace. It was not about her, I couldn't believe it was not as easy as I thought, I had problem running 6:15 pace! WTF is this?! I felt like my calves were going to cramp at any time. I had to keep changing the gait for them to stretch a bit.

At about 15km, you know what, I was thinking to walk! LOL. I'm not exaggerating. I really really wanted to walk. Then Fujii asked me to run 100m in front so that she could follow. Surprisingly that worked! She had a target to aim and I had to keep leading her so I couldn't slow down. You would probably argue it was the same as running side by side but it wasn't! It was a bit of different from running side by side. Something simple that distracted my mind away from all the dullness. LOL! We kept a distance of about 50 to 100m. Whenever she closed the gap I sped up a little. I slow down at all the water stations to see if she was alright. Not bad, I could use this strategy again next time if I paced someone again.

At about 18km, we saw William and Voon Ying at the opposite road. They were on sub-4 pace! Not many in front, definitely podium for Voon Ying if she could keep up! After that Yew Khuay and Karsten passed by. No one was following them as expected! So easy job for them! Jealous! :P We also saw quite a lot of familiar faces like Khoo Kay Hao and his pacee, Crystal and her pacer, Sharon and Kevin, Kartini, etc.

When You Thought 6:30 Is Slow

Things became even worse after the 20km u-turn. The pace dropped to 6:30. My legs felt like going to cramp anytime soon. Luckily we gave ourselves some allowance to walk at every water stations. I was so hungry that I regretted that I only took 2 bananas at the 30km station, I should have returned to take more! The 30km pace itself was 8:22. LOL! Anyhow, that 2 bananas were the best bananas ever! I felt better after the banana feast! We were still holding on to the "100m in front" strategy. At this point, we had already merged with HM runners so sometime Fujii would just disappear from my sight because of blocking by other runners. We had a lot of walking break especially at water station we walked longer!

The only running photo that I could find.

The last 4km was the worst. At first we thought it was the signboard mistake then after a while only we realized we had to run 2 big loops. It was quite torture that we had to give ourselves some small target so that we won't walk too long. Last km seemed taking forever to finish and she decided to speed up a bit and whoa we did 5:23 pace for the last km!

Our result

Ofcourse, good thing must end with a selfie. :P

Conclusion

LOL! Very fun man! Very fun! I didn't know it can be so tough to run a sub-5 FM! I'm glad that we finished in one piece and we crossed the line together! Luckily that I didn't slow her down. I'm not kidding, you guys have to trust me. It wasn't her slowing me down, we both were the same. I couldn't run any faster if you asked me to, LOL! I think because of my unhealthy lifestyle my fitness has just dropped to the history low! Let's see how well (or how bad) I can perform in the SCKLM which is my next goal race. Good luck to me! :D

澳门香港6天5夜游 (香港篇)

2015-12-24T00:25:00.002+08:00

澳门篇请看这里：here

渡轮香港站

过关基本上还很顺利，人潮不多，很快就过了。而且幸好韵婷的烧退了，过关的时候关检比较严格，关检人员会特地检查儿童的体温，幸好没事。

兰芳园午餐

一踏出关卡，就看到兰芳园。这是一间蛮多人推荐的港式餐厅，食物种类蛮多，价钱不会太贵。午餐就在这里解决了。点了一份叉烧饭加奶茶及叉烧面加柠檬水，分量蛮大的，三个人刚刚好。味道还差不多，只是不习惯港式太紧凑的节奏，还没吃完老板就一直给压力在暗示有人在排队等位子了。叫女儿匆匆吃完离开。

兰芳园餐厅内

吃完午餐拖着两个大行李搭地铁回酒店。酒店距离不到600m可是带着女儿及拖着两个大行李感觉好像蛮远。

Butterfly On Prat Hotel

终于来到酒店了，以前来过香港几次，预算有限所以住的酒店都超级小间。这一次重游香港，预订了这间很多人推荐的酒店，果然没有选错。房间布置美观，而且蛮宽敞的，设备也都很齐全，还有提供一部手机免费上网及拨电。当然酒店也提供Wifi。女儿小睡过后我们就出门逛街吃晚餐！

Butterfly On Prat Hotel

厕所，雅致！

尖沙咀

酒店就在尖沙咀，一出酒店就很多餐厅及购物商场。走不远路就到星光大道，能看到对岸的中环。

Deli and Wine

我们就在香港文化中心内的一间餐厅吃晚餐。这间餐厅叫Deli and Wine，人山人海，幸好找到位子，过后来的人都等了蛮久的。西餐蛮好吃的，价格也不会太贵，可能是见识过了澳门的费用，所以比较起来，这个便宜多了，哈哈，值得推荐！

Deli and Wine门口，地点有点隐蔽

东西还不错！

尖沙咀购物街

香港文化中心

巧遇栩羽及家人！哈哈！

星光大道

吃完晚餐就去海边看夜景。这个是肯定要带女儿来见识下的。但只有夜景可看，星光大道的铜像及手印因为装修的关系所以被搬迁到另一个地方去了。本想看了铜像及手印在看音乐光影表演，可是因为找铜像而错过了时间。铜像是谁女儿也不认识，随便逛逛后我们就去逛街了。逛完街后回酒店休息结束在香港的第一天旅行。养足精力因为第二天才是重点！

与妈咪合照

再与爸爸合照

和爸爸后再和妈妈合照

又是妈妈

再来爸爸，LOL!

李小龙，韵婷还不知道是谁

手印已搬迁

从尖沙咀回酒店会经过这间咖喱鱼旦档
东西不错下，寒冷的天气吃最合适不过

第四天

洪利粥面店

早餐就在酒店外的这间餐店解决，很多种类的早餐，蛮合我胃口的，价钱蛮便宜。要了两个早餐，有一碗粥，一碟肠粉，煎鸡排面包鸡蛋火腿，一杯豆浆，一杯奶茶。赞！吃完早餐随便在附近逛逛就前往女儿的最爱 - 迪士尼乐园！

看完都要半个钟！

Disneyland

我是在klook网站订购的，便宜蛮多的。上一次来迪士尼乐园是2006年，差不多要10年了！这一次带女儿来。这里就是人山人海，现在也不是什么假日或周末，就是星期二，结果还是很多人。每样游戏都要排长达20分钟至半小时，所以很讲究策略，不稍为安排下，是玩不完的。幸好女儿能玩的游戏有限，所以基本上都看完了。在这里待了一整天直看烟花。上次来没看烟花，这次过足了瘾，最开心的就是女儿！我们最开心就是她开心。:) 玩完迪士尼乐园用了近一小时回到酒店，大概10点多。倒头就睡！

哈哈，韵婷的favorite pose!

See, favorite pose again!

10年后的今天，东西不同了。

很熟悉的背景

看游行吃Pop corn

这招在这么多人的时候最好用！

迪士尼乐园！

Yun Ting and her Dumbo!

Cinderella carousel

River jungle boat! She is scared!

Don't know where, LOL!

韵婷要吃的森林餐

Frozen show!

Disneyland night view

Finally, The only game and the only chance that 3 of us can play together! LOL

She has lot of pattern!

第五天

巴黎冰室

第五天就在酒店外的这间巴黎冰室吃早餐，要了两份套餐。有三丝通粉，面包火腿炒蛋，还有酸菜鸡丝汤米粉，面包餐肉炒蛋，加奶茶及热鲜奶！大概80块港币。还不错！

巴黎冰室的早餐

海洋公园

早餐后就去海洋公园！相比迪士尼乐园，他妈的，海洋公园真他妈多大陆人，为什么不会排队啊？而且都是上了年纪的叔叔阿姨，为什么层次要这么低？为什么？50岁的阿姨插我4岁女儿的队，给我刁完后还不会道歉，还能装没事情发生，我操！

Double decker bus

Ocean Park, too bad, it's raining!

She saw someone play and she wanted to play too, LOL

With err... sea lion?

Aquarium

Ocean Park Panda

Quite expensive lunch

Bought the rain coat here

Cable car

On the other side of the Ocean Park

She likes them

真不幸，当天下雨，所以很多游戏都没能玩。但这样走走逛逛都差不多要5~6个小时了，而且雨蛮大的太累，大概3点左右我们就离开了。

茶木餐厅

晚餐就在尖沙咀的台式茶木餐厅吃饭。这是唯一一餐韵婷吃得比较开胃的，大概是刚病好。我们点的全部都不错，尤其是蛋糕！过后就在尖沙咀附近逛街买手信结束最后一晚！

DDLY photo

Teawood Restaurant, the food is nice!

OMG, I like their cakes!

第六天

最后一天，checkout hotel回家！

澳门香港6天5夜游 (澳门篇)

2015-12-20T22:28:00.005+08:00

今年的出国顺便跑马拉松的目的地就是澳门和香港！计划是先在澳门逗留2晚然后香港3晚。这次也是第一次带女儿出国！最兴奋的就是她！但出国前三天全家人都生病，女儿还发高烧到40度，结果马上去看医生。可是吃了药连续几天也还是烧。上飞机前的早上还去看了第三次医生询问到底能不能出国，怕是急症或者骨痛热症。医生说应该是普通伤风咳嗽，结果我们带着忐忑心情上路。

第一天

出发

第二次来吉隆坡第二国际机场，一如往常机场还是这么烂。

韵婷第一次坐飞机！

根据以往经验，在马拉松前不打算走这么多路，又不想整天待在酒店浪费时间，所以选择星期六中午出发，到达澳门大概是7点左右。马拉松领取物品的时间是到晚上10点，所以时间充足。

抵达澳门

飞机4小时后抵达澳门，澳门机场不大，而且效率蛮快。下飞机到拿到行李不超过20分钟。但是等计程车方面就比较久，也许是换班时间吧，等了差不多有30分钟。从机场到酒店就大概10分钟路程。

温度14c！冷到~

Pousada Marina Infante Hotel

酒店蛮贵下，设备及环境就普通。选择这间是因为靠近起跑点，不用烦一大早的交通。Check in 酒店后我就马上到体育馆领取号码布。

酒店就在Galaxy赌场对面！

体育馆

体育馆距离差不多800米远，非常近。可能是非常晚了，所以没什么人潮，整个体育馆就只有几个人拿号码布，随便逛了逛就离开了。

体育馆入口处

宽广的内部！没有人！喜欢他们开放到晚上10点！

官也街

离开体育馆后，就到附近的官也街打包宵夜。那条街很多出名餐馆但是都不适合打包，所以就选择最方便的McDonald！哈哈。。。家人们没有吃过猪柳包，所以可以尝试下！吃完宵夜睡觉！

官也街夜景

第二天

跑马拉松

一大早4点起来去跑马拉松，详情不多说了，请看这篇。由于受伤所以没跑完。8点左右就回酒店和家人用早餐。

酒店早餐

这间酒店的早餐很差。熏肉、热狗、汉堡肉、面条等全部都冷冰冰。唯一能吃的就是煎鸡蛋及热粥。大扣分！吃早餐还巧遇Yuki! 哈哈，真巧！吃完早餐就出发去大三巴！

难吃的早餐，而且不允许在食物区拍照！LOL

巧遇Yuki :D

哈哈，好冷~

大三巴

大三巴在另一岸，必须坐计程车过桥。这里是澳门最著名的旅游景点，人潮多到！拍照要找对角度都要耗费一点时间！过后也顺道看了博物馆及炮台。我们是带了小孩，如果不是的话，大人走路快一点大概1个小时多也就看完了。我们大概2个小时多一点就逛完了。

大三巴附近的购物街道

有型到~ :P

随处可见钜记

闻名的大三巴牌坊

少了伟斌，弟弟没来，弟弟还不能出国。

父女照，像没有？:D

母女照！有没有很像！哈哈！

前往博物馆

给她吸收下人文古迹的气息

博物馆内

炮台

大利来记猪扒包

这里附近有很多著名小吃及购物礼品店。唯一认识的就是大利来记猪扒包，就点了一份。还不错。

大利来记猪扒包，38块一份

小飞象葡国餐

午餐我们就回到官也街找吃。韵婷喜欢Dumbo，所以就去了这间餐馆吃午餐。餐馆在二楼，楼下看不见人潮，而且不知道好不好吃，结果上了去二楼，里面非常宽广但几乎高朋满座。我们也不会点菜，价格也不便宜，随便一些套餐都是上千块澳币的所以随便点了一份炸猪排及海鲜烩饭！三个人份刚刚好。

炸猪排及海鲜绘饭

她的Dumbo Restaurant!

吃完午餐韵婷几乎累倒不行了，就抱着她走回酒店睡午觉。

很喜欢这张，前面的28公里处就是马拉松DNF的地方
蛮有意思的，抱着女儿再次经过，有点感触

威尼斯

晚上我们就去附近的威尼斯广场逛逛。这里是著名的赌场，也有非常多间的购物商场。广场内还有一个特别的人造河，可以乘船。乘完船就在里面的美食广场用餐，他妈的，澳门吃的真的超贵，去了这么多国家，最贵就是这里。随便一份卤肉饭套餐就85块澳币，我的这么小碗的云吞面也要48块！而且只是普通的美食广场就用掉我大概马币100块！

酒店大厅的圣诞树，Merry Christmas soon!

威尼斯购物广场

金沙赌场

威尼斯其中一个购物广场，里面超大

韵婷多多pattern

Gondola Rides

主要是给女儿高兴！:D

美食广场，大而且难找位子

烦恼要吃什么，选择太多，哈哈

很小碗的云吞面，马币差不多RM26块！

多多pattern

吃完逛逛就回酒店休息，结束第二天行程。

咀香园饼家蛋挞，OMG！超好吃！6粒54块，我自己啃掉了4粒。:P

第三天

澳门码头

一大早吃完早餐，就前往澳门码头搭渡轮去香港！一小时的旅程，渡轮还蛮舒服的。

澳门码头

三张票

和渡轮合影

渡轮内，蛮舒服。

接下来的香港篇请看这里：here

Macau Marathon - DNF is not easy as thought

2015-12-16T03:37:00.001+08:00

I was not sure if I wanted to write about this. I actually planned to just bury it and not to mention it at all but after talking to a few friends I changed my mind. They told me to write it out and then get over it. I was actually fine and got over it for some time already but I thought I should also write it to keep it as a memory.

Before that, let me put one selfie first. LOL

Whoa! Who is this handsome dude!

Alright, it was a DNF. If this was an usual DNF I won't be so upset but this wasn't. This DNF was quite unusual, it was a significant one. Yes, I DNF the Macau Marathon due to the injury.

Why was it so significant? It was a race that I had prepared for 25 weeks. Yes, it's not a typo, it's fucking 25 weeks! I can't tell you how I felt the moment I DNF! Although I had been half expecting it I still got hit pretty badly. No words to describe. I think I will just share my training log and it will explain.

My 25 weeks training logs!

You might argue if I really needed to run so much for a 3:10 FM goal (Yes, my goal was 3:10). The answer is relative but most people will tell you don't have to. I agree with them. This training volume to me was quite insane as well. It was a tested schedule that I'd been practising for years and I knew that I could handle it. I'm doing this just because I like to run! It's just part of my kiasu nature. Do I really need to train for 25 weeks? Definitely not too, the 25 weeks was actually for 2 goal runs but SCKLM got cancelled so this made it looked like a 25 weeks plan for Macau only.

Unfortunately, I got injured 3 weeks before the race. I'm inclined to deny that it was because of the high training volume or weak muscles. I know they were part of the reasons but they weren't the triggers.

It happened in one of the weekly #tracktuesday training. I was already on 3 weeks of high mileages training and I did a pretty intense tempo run on that day. Legs were alright after the run but they were very tired. I had always been careful about my post-race activities when my legs were tired. For example I will be super cautious when walking down the stairs. I will walk each step carefully just to make sure my knee can take it before I shift all my body weight on it.

But this time after the run, I was helping one friend to fix thing. I squatted for quite a while and the moment I stood up and turned my body I felt a sharp pain in my left knee. I still didn't realize I got injured until I reach home and stepped out of the car. The pain was serious even just walking. I tried to run a few steps immediately with my slippers on. No matter how I stretch and change the gait the pain didn't go away then I knew I fucked up.

The next day morning, first thing I did was to put my running shoes on and ran! I wanted to see how bad it was. The pain persisted and I couldn't run for more than a few steps! I didn't think much of it because I didn't have much time to waste. I'd only 2.5 weeks left. I went to see orthopedics. Doctor said I tore my ACL! I knew he couldn't do much about it but what I wanted were the pain killer and the anti-inflammation meds.

I did what I could but the pain didn't go away. It got slightly better the week before the race but still I could only bear the pain for about 15km max in the training.

It was a run that I had prepared for almost a year. 25 weeks was just the training part, I actually booked the flight in January and planned for it since then. It was also my annual family trip so I still came to Macau and ran it! I still put a little hope that I could bear the pain and completed it even though I had already adjusted the goal and be prepared for it. I ran until 21km and couldn't continue anymore. I slow jogged and half walked back to the hotel at 28km and took me quite a while to stop the watch. It was actually harder than I thought to press that stop button. I was battling for quite long. Finally I pressed it and yea, a DNF. :(

I was in pretty bad mood and worried about if I could still run the Penang Relay. I wanted to quit the relay very much not because I couldn't run it, I just wanted to keep myself away from any running activities and with this injury I didn't want to drag the team. But knowing Shu Wei was still struggling to find the 12th man, I didn't tell him my decision immediately.

It was a wise decision that I kept myself away from the social media. Just to cool my self down. I spent all my quality time together with my family in the trip. Family is the best medicine! I got over it and things back to normal after a while and I decided to run the relay. It was a very nice lesson to learn. Macau Marathon - I will be back!

Bib collection

Penang Round The Island Relay - The Cari Teams

2015-12-14T16:52:00.002+08:00

It was a trip that had been planned for very long. The 2012 event was awfully fun and syok that we decided that we would definitely come back again after a few years so earlier this year, Shu Wei and Victor started to plan for this event. We actually created the admin group last year if I'm not mistaken and started some leisure talk and brain storming sessions. We had the experience after participating in the 2012 event so this time it seemed much smoother but it was definitely not an easy job as most people had seen. To organize an event for a total of 36 people, it's quite unavoidable for the incidents to happen. People ffk last minute because of the injury, the commitment, etc and it's quite hard to please everyone. But luckily this time this bunch was not much of the DDLY people, everyone were quite easy going and gave us all the support and the utmost cooperation so in the end 3 teams were formed!

Cari Teams!

3 Teams

Cari Forever Faster and Cari Ignite were managed by Victor. Cari Fakers was managed by Shu Wei. Both of them searched for the runners and arranged things for us. Team members were mostly made up of Cari Runners, Puma Runners and our friends. Why named ourselves Cari Fakers? LOL, it's quite a stupid name I know. All 12 of us are a bunch of fakers, Karkarcooperation.com runners. They all can run 5km in 17~19 minutes, but everyone wanted to claim themselves as the slowest runner. Like Jun Wen and Shu Wei, always say no training and say run very slow but always champion in the race. Fuckers! Sorry… I mean fakers! LOL. And half of the team were injured runners like me or someone who had just recovered from the injury but they all can still run sub-4 pace easily and always win the race (not including me of course). LOL. A bunch of fakers!

Cari Fakers!

Pre-Race

3 teams 36 people plus 3 supporters, total of 39 people departed on Saturday morning from Kepong Tesco after the breakfast. The race started on Sunday morning 4am! We spent Saturday hunting for food and sightseeing around, killing the pre-race jitters! LOL... ok not much of the jitters, it was supposed a fun run!

Before departure near Kepong Tesco

Group photo at 姓周桥!

With Ray and May! AD runners rock Penang!

Race Day Morning

Victor ordered to gather at 2:30am so we had to wake up at 2am. Usually 2am only I go to bed and I have problem sleeping so early so I spent my time checking FB and chatting around. When I was about to sleep it was already 1:30am and yes, I napped for about 30 minutes only but I was not tired! The coffee I had in the day time helped a lot!

2:45am we set off to the starting point! After briefing and some DDLY photo taking session, we left with our bus to our own starting points! The bus dropped 3 of us, Bee Yin, Eddy and me at the station 6. Once again I came back to this familiar place. I ran the same leg in 2012. The problem with this place is there is no toilet around at this hour! We spent 30 minutes walking around looking for the toilet and luckily we managed to find one that was not-supposed-to-use toilet. LOL! Don't worry, we didn't break anything! After the big and small businesses, we still had to wait for another 1 hour for the 5th runner to reach but the pre-race jitters made the time passed so quickly.

KL Cari group photo!

Group photo with Penang Cari! So big group!

Cari Fakers group photo before flag off

Station 6 Cari runners - Qiyan, Bee Yin and Eddy!

First 5 Runners

We killed the time with exchanging info through Whatsapp. Thinnesh and Yong Zhi ran the first 2 batons. They both can run 5km under 18 min, 2 of the fastest among us so definitely they had to cover the longest distance. They didn't disappoint us; both came in overall 4th placing. Then the imba god speed Chris over took 1 runner and put us in a better placing which was 3rd. 4th leg Fabio got overtook by 1 fast runner but he didn't give up and still came in overall 4th. Then our captain Shu Wei ran his favorite route which covered for about 4km with a 3:35 insane pace. LOL! What an awesome performance! He maintained the overall 4th placing too.

At this time, Penang Forward men team was ahead of us by about 3 minutes. College Community Bayan Baru team also 1 minute ahead. Penang Forward veteran team was 30 seconds ahead. Then finally Shu Wei reached and passed me the baton. It was my turn to run.

My Turn To Run

My route was one of the easiest of all 12. It was all the way flat and straight. I started off with quite a conservative 4 min pace. Starting was alright, left knee was pain but bearable. Then pain slowly got more serious so my body involuntary switched to use more right foot and different running gait causing muscles overused and developed other minor pains at the bottom of the foot and knee. Then muscles got tired very quickly especially the calf and the thigh. Not enough speed work in the last few weeks also causing body refused to work harder. I couldn't speed up much. Started breathing heavily and right foot was so heavy even though it was all flat. At about 4km, runner from BM Leopard overtook me. Our position dropped to 5th. I tried to hold up but the gap became further and further. I was hoping to see Shu Wei, I knew he would come further from the changing zone to cheer me up. It was just bloody 6.45km but it seemed taking forever to finish! Finally I saw Shu Wei and he shouted at me! I sped up with all I had and passed the baton to Daniel. Done! All done! So tough!

Checked my time, not too bad, not the top form timing but still had 26:34, 4:07 pace and PBed by 50 secs! I ran the same route again as 2012 just wanted to beat my own record. Not too shabby considered how bad my current fitness was.

7th - Daniel

Daniel's route was the toughest among all. More than 2.5km of the route is as hilly as the Bukit Cinta hill or DPC hill. Some stretches are even tougher than the DPC water tank stretch and they are so much longer! That was the reason we put Daniel here. I think he broke the all time route record by 10 secs (have to wait for the official result to confirm). He overtook Penang Forward veteran and College team, put us in the better placing which was 3rd placing and shortened the gap with BM Leopard runner to about 200m.

8th - Ee Chuan

Ee Chuan ran the 8th leg. He received baton and sped off. It was a few km uphill then all the way downhill. I like his running form especially the high back kick, so steady and pro! It was so exciting seeing him closing the gap with the front runner! He shortened the gap even more to 100m.

9th - Shau KW

He then passed the baton to Shau. The BM Leopard runner was 100m ahead but when our bus overtook them, Shau was already in front of that runner, they ran neck and neck and by the time he passed the baton to Jun Wen, That runner was nowhere in sight already. He did the 5.7km in 21:50, 3:51 pace! Damn imba!

Leg 9 view, my favorite scene!

10th - Jun Wen

Jun Wen, our kar kar cooperation model runner. He was stationed here for some reason. We needed him to turn the tide if something happened. He was one of our core runners. He made the gap even further to 2 minutes, the runner behind was at least 500m away already when he passed the baton to our 11th runner Chee Wai.

11th - Chee Wai

Chee Wai had just recovered from the injury. This run was his first race after 9 months of rest. First race and already so strong! He maintained the lead and made the gap even further to 2.5 minutes! This run was the test for him to decide whether he could resume racing or not and I guess the answer was a positive one! Oh no, one more fast runner returned to the field now!

12th - Hoo Yeen

Our last runner was Hoo Yeen, our favorite Cari old timer! The most experience runner in the team. No doubt at all! It was quite a relax run for him. No one in front and behind him, he just maintained and steadily crossed the line.

Crossing The Line

Finally, we clocked 4:46:58 and got 1st runner up! As what we calculated! Wow! We shaved about 19 minutes off our 2012 record. Cari Ignite mixed team won 6th placing and Cari Forever Faster men team won 7th placing too! Well done everyone!

Group photo!

1st runner up!

It was so much fun and so exciting! Coincidentally, it was my birthday on the weekend so they bought a cake and celebrated for me. What a surprise! I was so touched! There were too many photos, chats and notifications until my battery gone in just a few hours. 1 power bank also not enough. Next time have to bring 2! Haha!

First time celebrate my birthday with so many people. :D

Thanks for the cake!

Thanks Victor, Shu Wei and all our supporters Voon Ying, Lucas and Elaine for the great help and support! It was fun but quite tiring so we can't do it every year. It took many efforts to organize and arrange! Some more they did it for free! What more to ask! Kudos to all of them! But I do hope we can do it again in the next couple of years! Maybe every 3 years?! I will definitely come back again!

OK, this marked my last event of the year! I will be temporary off from running for a couple of months! I need this off season just to get a life, giving myself some hibernate time for other non running stuffs and the body to recover! But please don't leave me out if there are gathering and events! I will still love to join if there is one! See you guys again next year!

Larian Gegar - The Endless Climb

2015-11-16T12:31:00.003+08:00

UM Bukit Cinta has become my usual training ground these days. With a lot of training being done there, I'm quite familiar with it. Judging from the recent fitness I thought I could run with an average 4:30 pace in the Larian Gegar race yesterday morning but I couldn't because of some extra route that they added were just too hilly which I didn't account for. It was a very hilly race. It's the 2nd hilliest in my list so far. The first in my opinion is still the Taman Botani Shah Alam!

The race started at the UM swimming pool. Not many fast runners joined this race as there were many races clashed yesterday so I could stick with the lead pack and count my position from the beginning. William and I ran neck and neck the whole race. We started with the slightly out of 10th positions and overtook people slowly. This route was damn crazy. We had to run the same route twice. At about 1 to 2km into the 2nd loop, we managed to climb up to 4th and 5th place and locked onto them. It sounds like I ran negative pace but I wasn't. My splits were slightly positive too. The first loop timing was 45:42 (4:30/km) and the second loop was 46:39 (4:35/km). Not too bad but it could be better.

The long and crazy uphill was the well known Bukit Cinta 900m uphill and they added a lot of new routes which we had to turn inside and make a u-turn to come out. Almost all the u-turn (I think all of them!) were the up and down hills! The endless hills were the real tortures, my body was actually alright but the mental wasn't! When you know there is a hill in front waiting for you, there will be noises in your head telling you to give up and slow down. The tiredness of running up a hill is very different from the tiredness of running all out on a flat. They are both torturing but to me even without all out, just by running up a hill with slightly hard effort it's enough torturing!

Friends who joined the run. Congrats to everyone!

After 1:32:21, I finished the race and got myself a 4th placing. The time wasn't great but with that much of hills, with close to 90km weekly mileage and the 20+12km runs the day before, I'm quite happy with it. This was the first and also my last race after the cancelation of the SCKLM and before my goal race. The goal race is 3 weeks from now, I'm not sure if I'm ready for it as I can't really tell my form yet but I will accept whatever the result is.

Woohoo, I'm grateful! :)

It's the great week for my running friends especially the Wind Runners, Pacemakers and also the #tracktuesday.

Team Track Tuesday!
2 Champions, 4th and 5th!

As usual, champion despite knee pain, sick and cough. :P

October - The Month of Race Cancellations

2015-11-09T02:30:00.003+08:00

I think if I said this October was the saddest month for our Malaysia running community, I think most of the people would agree. It was supposed to be my busiest racing month but end up I didn't get to run any races (only one 3km fun run in the end). All the races that I registered were either cancelled or postponed because of the stupid haze. One of the most important races for me, the SCKLM which was supposed to happen 2 weeks after my last race Cyberjaya Firefighter was cancelled too. Arggh... all my 16 weeks of hard work!

SCKLM

I'm not quite sure how I actually felt. I was actually not much affected by the cancellation compared to the others because I still have a goal race coming up in December so I don't think my effort and hard work are wasted but the sadness from the community spread like a disease. I was more or less affected by it. The SCKLM is one of the biggest running events in Malaysia. Many people deem it as their bread and butter race and some even set it as their only goal race of the year. Many of us trained very hard for it so it's not hard to understand why most of us would feel upset for this cancellation.

Couldn't run so we took photo!

Couldn't run so we took photo again!

Couldn't run so we took photo with a lot of people!

HRDF & MU

Not only the SCKLM. The stupid dodgy HRDF and MU runs were postponed too. It seemed like they were just not ready for the event and simply used the haze as an excuse to postpone it. This was the 3rd time MU run postponed their race. I don't buy it. The HRDF too, the race kit collection was a joke! When you thought you had seen the worst, a new one popped up! I couldn't brain it! I've asked for the refund and still waiting for it. We now have a new name for this kind of events. We called them the 3C events. First they CONVINCE you with their very high cash award advertisement, then they CONFUSE you with a lot of dodgy information and in the end they CON you! Convince -> Confuse -> Con -> Canasai!

Pacesetters 4x3km Relay

Fortunately, there was a small race Pacesetters 4x3km Relay took place on the same day of the MU run. I was lucky enough to be invited by Ronnie at the last minute to replace Nixson. Nixson couldn't make it to the race and since the MU run was postponed so I joined without hesitation. I replaced him and team up with Keith, Voon Leong and Real. But too bad we couldn't make it to the top 5 for the prize. We got 6th placing and it was like 1.5 minutes behind the 5th! Nevertheless, it was fun and I was able to team up with different people, which is a different experience and most importantly, the energy that I'd been storing for all the cancelled races could be released and I got the chance to refresh my racing memory which is crucial for my next few races! Actually I have not many races left. LOL!

Awesome team!

That moment!

BSN

The next big event after SCKLM was the Putrajaya BSN night run. It was a FM event too and I was supposed to run the HM. Many runners switched their focus to this run because it's the nearest FM to the SCKLM. People was hoping to run it after months of training! It suddenly became the big major race but unfortunately again, it was cancelled too due to the haze! Sigh! 4 in a row now! Record breaking!

Puma Night Run

Then it came to this Puma Night Run, my next biggest show after this streak of cancellations. I thought finally I could have something proper to run because the annoying haze had finally gone! They sky had cleared up for us. Same as last year, this year I joined as pacer together with Adele and Shu Wei, we were the 6km/min pacers. Everything went quite well from the beginning, the 3 months 10km program that the club put up, the preparation, the DDLY photo shooting, the training and even until the evening of the actual day, everything went on quite well. BUT ironically enough, right before the flag off, it rained!

We had no choice but to delay. Then the sky put a prank on us by stopping the rain for a while, the organizer thought the rain had stopped so they flagged off and we ran. Few minutes into the run, the rain turned from drizzle to thunderstorm! The race was then called off but we were not informed. We only got to know when we bumped into the other pacers. They told us the race was cancelled and they made a u-turn earlier that's why we bumped into each other. I was actually half expecting it already. It was a mess after that, the finishing line had gone, the arc fell down, no official time captured, no winner, funny comments and complaints being made in the FB. Pfftt!

DDLY photo is a must!

6min/km pacers! Awesome as usual. :P

It was supposed to be a fun fun race! Why you rain?!

Not sure what to say, what a stupid October!

What's next?

I didn't sign up many races for the rest of the year because it was quite close to my goal race already. 1 more week and I will be entering the tapering phase. 3 more races left! Next one will be the Larian Gegar HM which will take place in UM, the route is the Bukit Cinta hilly roller coaster route that I hate the most. LOL! Hopefully I can do it well!

Cyberjaya Firefighter Night Run - An Unexpected Win

2015-09-21T18:08:00.001+08:00

All happened when I didn't hope!

My this year best so far!

No sure what to prepare

It was a night run. First night run in this year. It's been so long until I kind of forgot how to run a night run and I remember I couldn't perform well in most of my night runs. Like the Shape Run and BSN Run every year, I had never raced them well. The most horrible one was the Energizer Run 4 years ago which I DNF; almost fainted and went into the ambulance so I kept having the impression that the night runs suck.

So this time it was the same, I was still not in the racing mode until like 1 hour before the race. The weather was so hot. I couldn't decide if I should take dinner and I forgot to carbo load. I forgot to buy 100 plus and gel. I didn't set any target and didn't know what pace to run with which was quite rare. Don't laugh man, I'm that DDLY and particular when come to running, I feel uncomfortable without doing them. They are like my running rituals. LOL! Luckily I still managed to grab a small piece of cake before the race and bought 2 gels at the GNC shop beside the cafe.

Starting line

The race was scheduled to start at 8pm. I warmed up a little and got ready at the starting line. There were many big races on that day so not many people joining this one. It was fun counting my odds at the starting line, not many people but still I spotted a few threats because the cash prize for this race was quite high. There was some hope for the top 10 and I have never thought of winning top 5 because the cash prize is just so not my thing some more only for 5 people. The chances were so slim!

At the starting line with Allan and the
Women 1st runner up Kah Mun

Flag off

Without a solid target I was still hoping to run my best so the best strategy for me was to listen to my heart. Based on the tempo run few days ago I was quite confident that I could do a sub-4:20 provided it was not a crazy hilly course. The race flagged off and I ran with keeping my HR below 170 which was well below 88% for the first 5km. I stick with Osman and Lewis for the first 3km and slowly overtook the other runners, started with Kean Wooi at km-4, then Teck Yong at km-6, Song Hua at km-7, Munintaran at km-9. The position was locked after this. Actually it was locked after Kean Wooi because Teck Yong, Song Hua and Munintaran were veterans and I counted my position was #7 overall and #6 in men open.

At about km-5 Mike who ran the 10km ran pass me. Glad that I was able to watch in live how 3 min pace looked like. It was so fast and so lonely that I thought he went wrong route. LOL! Nobody behind him even 3 minutes after he ran passed me. God speed!

Counting the odds

I was hoping to cut one more because I knew one of the 6 guys in front was the veteran elite Vadivelu and if I could cut one more I would be #5 in men open for the cash prize! But too bad no one within my sight in the entire second half until the u-turn at about km-19, I saw Chin Keong at about 400m in front and Mohammad Saiful 200m in front. I sped up a little and tried to close the gap but it was too late already. 200m in less than 2km left was quite impossible to chase down and I guess they sped up too like me so my acceleration didn't change the situation and the hills at the last few km were quite terrible so my mind was settled with #6.

Finishing

When approaching the finishing line, at about 50m left Shu Wei shouted and said I was holding #4 or #5 position! I didn't know I should believe him or not because I kept having the impression that I was #6. 50m more to find out! I crossed the line, organizer handed me the tag! OMG, #5! I couldn't believe it for a while! I made it and with a not so bad timing, GPS distance 20.7km, time 1:28:11! It's a 1:30:01 HM if I converted it to 21.1km sharp. LOL, I should have pushed a little more to make it a sub-1:30 but OK with this too! Didn't know where the #5 runner went, perhaps I missed count. LOL, ok, that was the good news! So happy because all this happened unexpectedly!

There were a few junctions without marshal and the direction was unclear. It was clearly a mistake from the organizer. It's so disappointed later we found out Suit Mei went wrong route because of this. She was definitely one of the top 3 if she didn't ran wrongly. So disappointed! This seriously needs to be improved!

10k heroes. The champion Mike and the 8th place JJ

She came for the support!
Too bad that she didn't join, she could win too if she did!

Prizing ceremony

There was an interlude at the prizing ceremony too. My position was dropped to #6. I was quite disappointed at first when they gave me the no.6 plaque because my tag was no.5! Then only we found out there was a mistake in the result. The first runner up didn't finish the course and he crossed the line earlier. After settling with the organizer, they corrected our prizes and I got my hard earn RM200 money back! If not I would be damn sad. #6 has no cash prize so the difference of 1 position actually meant a lot! LOL! It would be not so disappointing if I was given a #6 tag at first.

The "disappointing" moment! LOL!

Men Open - Top 20!

Confidence boosted

This was my last race before SCKLM and I'm happy about it. It boosted my confidence level. I know where I stand now. I hope the 2 tapering weeks starting from today will do me good in the SCKLM.

You can see my running stats and how Michael ran so lonely in this Strava link. :D

Side track, the #tracktuesday squad did quite well over the weekend. The Saturday morning started with Adele and SWC good news, they won #4 and #2 in Terengganu race in their category respectively. Then followed by William #3 in IMU 10km. Then this Firefighter night HM, Mike got champion in 10km and I got #5 in HM. The next day Angel won #6 in BHP race! Welldone mates!

Nike Find Your Fast: One Mile Race

2015-09-14T20:45:00.000+08:00

It was an honor and pleasure to be invited by Sabrina Puah on behalf of Run89 Crew to join this exclusive event Nike Find Your Fast: One Mile Race!

The Run89!

A week before the event, Sabrina offered a few of us to join. I actually had a lot to consider as I had a 10km race on the next day, a very high mileage to achieve for that week and also a 30km LSD scheduled on that day so I was not sure whether I could afford another race or not even though I was told that this would be a fun run. It was an exclusive event, by exclusive I mean by invitation only. Based on the experience shared by the runners and glancing through their last year event photos, unlike most other typical running event, they made it like a party, it's so happening, so much fun and you wouldn't want to miss it. Many people would hope to join but didn't get a chance to, and it's an event organized by the big brand Nike, so I joined without hesitating much!

They made everything kind of mysterious, nothing was revealed. We only knew that we had to gather on Saturday at the Nike store at Midvalley and we were going to race 1 mile. We didn't know about the race venue, didn't know about the format, who we were going to race against, etc. Everything was kept secret until then.

On Saturday, Teck Wai, Angel, William, Voon Ying, Sabrina and I dated to meet early for dinner. We collected our t-shirt and the bib. Ohya, there was a bib given. I thought it would be a "not so serious race" but the bib had just made everything serious. After a very rush dinner we gathered together with Run89 Crew and Kyserun Crew. I knew some of the crew members but not all, met Daniel, Hui Xin, Paco, Xiao Jin, Kartini and other guest runners like us Hui Siang, Khairul and few other familiar faces.

So Fast!

While waiting to depart

Nothing was revealed even we were on the bus already. The bus fetched us to the secret venue. At first we guessed Stadium Merdeka because of the direction it headed to but then it passed it and headed to Cheras. In the end the bus stopped at the Velodrome Cheras! It was the Velodrome used for the Commonwealth Games! OK, I didn't know this place can be used for running.

Heading to the secret venue!
Is she happy because sitting beside me? :P

Hahahahahahah! Sab!

The Velodrome was well setup by the organizer. The lighting, the high beat music, the decoration and the DJ created the event atmosphere bringing us a lot of excitement. In conjunction with this race, we were given to try out the new Nike Zoom Air Elite 8 shoes. The shoes are meant for forefoot runner and I'm a heel striker so didn't get much of the benefit from its bouncy springy cushion. I still prefer the Nike Free 5.0 that I'm wearing. Nevertheless, they are still very comfortable and pretty nice looking.

The Velodrome!

Nike Zoom Air Elite 8

After the welcoming from the DJ, the race began. My bib number was 002 so I was the first batch to run. 10 people in a batch. I didn't know what pace I should start with because I had never raced a distance this short after I graduated which was like more than 15 years ago. 1 mile is about 1.6km, I thought it was very short so I had an impression that I could sprint even not all the way all out also could possibly close to 90% effort and I was so wrong.

002 kiasu dao! :P
Ohya, the tshirt is so damn nice! Love it!

I need a lot of warm up for 1.6km

The Velodrome is not a 400m track, it's about 300m plus so we had to run close to 5 loops. We didn't get to wait too long, the DJ started counting down and the race started. As I said, it was a stupid mistake I started off with close to 90% effort. It taxed me right after my 3rd lap. I had to slow down and then my watch beeped saying that I had run my 1st km in 3:18 and I still had 2 laps to go. The lactic acid waste was like as its max. It was such a torture I couldn't really move my legs. I had to swing my arms heavily for my legs to move then I started feeling numb in my chest and shoulder muscles. My arms couldn't take it too! I slow down a little on the 4th lap and cruised through it until the end. It was so painful. That feeling was so awful. LOL. My watch told me I did 5:23, guess what, I broke my 1km, 1.5km and 1 mile records nonetheless. Haha!

After the first round

This was actually a Run89 vs Kyserun challenge. After the preliminary round, each team had to choose 3 fastest girls and 3 fastest guys to compete. I was so "unfortunate" to be one of the fastest guys in the Run89 team, together with Khairul and William. OMG, that meant I had to go through that pain again. I was not sure about them but I felt like shit. I was actually going to take it easy and did something close to 6 minute but then I heard the host saying that the total time of 6 runners would be used to determine the winner. This gave so much pressure. That meant I was representing Run89, I wasn't fighting for my own so I couldn't take it slow. OK, already at this point. Just do it!

Oh YEAHHHHHHH!!!

3 of the fastest girls!

The girls Angel, Sabrina and Voon Ying ran first. They did very well and no surprise Angel being the fastest girl there ran 1 second faster than her first round and took away the queen title. Then our guys turn. 3, 2, 1, off we go! We stick together for the first 2 laps and then Khairul and William started to speed off. Ohya, forgot to mention, our opponents from Kyserun were Azwan, Rauzan and Huzaifah. Right at the beginning of 4th lap, Azwan cut us. LOL! He lapped us exactly half lap at this point. He crossed the line when we still had about 0.75 laps to go. Then Rauzan lapped us half lap too! I was shocked when Rauzan cut me. OMG, too imba! Different league la. LOL! After a while, William crossed the line, I was 1 second behind him and clocked myself 5:22, somewhat comforting is I did 1 second faster than my first round! Can I say that I broke 4 PBs in a day? LOL.

You can see how Azwan and Rauzan lapped us in this Strava flyby:
http://labs.strava.com/flyby/viewer/#390914727,85hGF1NvSBdP0kgX

Got lucky!

Kyserun Champion!

Nike Queen - Angel Tang!

Nike King - Azwan Bunjing!

The 3D medals

The team!

Kyserun Crew! You guys are awesome!

Run89 Crew! Love you all!

The Run89! Thanks for having us!

I'm so happy to be given a chance to race with everyone. Especially the final round we raced against Azwan Bunjing, Rauzan Rafeeq and Huzaifah Johari. They are close to national athletes or at least close to the state level. The difference in level is like English Premier League vs Cheras Kepong Mix Team. They are just too fast too furious for us. LOL!

My own recorded time are as follows:
1st round: 5:23 (3:20/km)
2nd round: 5:22 (3:20/km)

But somehow the official time recorded by the Nike organizer for the first round is 5:16 (3:16/km). That would mean I can run a 1.5km in 4:54! LOL! I would be happy if this is true. I think something had gone wrong here. Not that I don't believe Nike, it's I don't believe in myself. LOL!

The race ended with a very proper and grand prizing ceremony. We took a lot of photos as well. Again, I was so honor to be invited to join this event and to be part of the Run89 team! We had so much fun and met a lot of new friends! I wish I could come again next time! Thanks Sab, Run89 and Nike!

Found Awzan sharing here:
http://www.awanrun.com/index.php/2015/09/20/nike-1-mile-challenge-kyserunkrew-vs-run89/

How to find out your training pace?

2015-09-10T03:05:00.000+08:00

There are tools and apps to help us to find out our training pace. For example: Mcmillan Running Calculator or Jack Daniels' VDOT Running Calculator. But I prefer to do my own calculation so that I can have the full control to customize it. This is how it can be done.

First, we will need 1 of our recent race time. Any race between 5km to 21.1km can be taken as the benchmark. Race shorter or longer than this range is not recommended as they will yield not so accurate result. If you do not have a race then it's recommended to do a time trial.

Say for example:

Your 10km race time is 50 minutes. What will be your training pace for Marathon?

Here are the steps:

1. Remember this formula

T₂ = T₁ x (D₂ ÷ D1)^1.07
P₂ = T₁ x (D₂ ÷ D1)^1.07 ÷ D₂

Where,
T₁ is the time achieved for D₁.
T₂ is the time predicted for D₂.
D₁ is the distance over which the initial time is achieved.
D₂ is the distance for which the time is to be predicted.
P₁ is the pace achieved for D₁.
P₂ is the pace predicted for D₂.

2. Find out your Marathon pace.

Marathon race pace
= 50 min x (42.2km ÷ 10km)^1.07 ÷ 42.2km
= 50 min x 4.6675 ÷ 42.2km
= 233.37 min ÷ 42.2km
= 5.53 min/km
= 5:32/km

Your Marathon race pace is 5:32/km, race time is 3:53:00

3. Find out your interval pace.

Jack Daniels said interval pace is between your 3km~5km race pace.

3km race pace
= 50 min x (3km ÷ 10km)^1.07 ÷ 3km
= 4:35/km

5km race pace
= 50 min x (5km ÷ 10km)^1.07 ÷ 5km
= 4:46/km

Your interval pace is between 4:35/km to 4:46/km

4. Find out your tempo pace.

Jack Daniels said tempo pace is between your 10km~21.1km race pace.

10km race pace = 5:00/km

21.1km race pace
= 50 min x (21.1km ÷ 10km)^1.07 ÷ 21.1km
= 5:16/km

Your tempo pace is between 5:00/km to 5:16/km

5. Find out your easy pace.

Easy pace
= Marathon pace x (1.07 ~ 1.145)
= 5:32/km x (1.07 ~ 1.145)
= 5:55 ~ 6:20/km

Your easy pace is between 5:55/km to 6:20/km

6. Find out your recovery pace.

Recovery pace
= Easy pace x 1.07
= 6:20/km x 1.07
= 6:46/km

Your recovery pace is below 6:46/km

Conclusion.

Putting everything together. If your 10km race time is 50 minutes then your training pace will be as follows:

Recovery pace: 6:46/km
Easy pace: 5:55/km ~ 6:20/km
Marathon pace: 5:32/km
Tempo pace: 5:00/km ~ 5:16/km
Interval pace: 4:35/km ~ 4:46/km

Advanced

WARNING: Enter this section with caution. You might feel dizzy, hate me or maybe hate running. :)

1. The value of 1.07 given for the exponent is different for everyone.

You will have to experience and adjust the exponent value yourself. If you are a sprinter type of runner, then it's maybe somewhere around 1.09~1.10. If you are a gifted endurance runner, then it's maybe 1.05~1.06. For more details, check Pete Riegel for details.

2. Tempo pace for different distance should be different.

Using 10km to 21.1km race pace for tempo pace is quite vague. Jack Daniels said elite should use pace close to 21.1km, for slower runner we should use 10km so what are the correct tempo run distance and pace? It also stated that the runner should be able to sustain this pace for up to 60 minutes during racing so we can say that tempo pace should be the pace that you can run for exactly 1 hour and we use this pace to run for 20 minutes.

i. find out your 60 min race pace.

P₂ = T₂ ÷ (T₂ ÷ T₁ x D₁^1.07)^{(1 ÷ 1.07)}

Where,
T₁ is the time achieved for D₁.
T₂ is the time to run which is 60 min.
D₁ is the distance over which the initial time is achieved.
P₂ is the pace predicted for T₂.

60 min race pace
= 60 min ÷ (60 min ÷ 50 min x 10km^1.07)^{(1 ÷ 1.07)}
= 60 min ÷ (1.2 x 11.749km)^0.9346
= 60 min ÷ 11.85km
= 5:03/km

Your optimal tempo pace is 5:03/km and you should use this pace to run 20 minutes which is about 4km

ii. find out your tempo pace that you can run for 20 to 40 minutes.

Based on 3.96km in 20 minutes, we find out the pace for the tempo distance that you can finish between 20 to 40 minutes. If you are a faster runner, you can do longer distance within 40 minutes.

P₂ = T₁ x (D₂ ÷ D1)^1.07 ÷ D₂

With the above formula we can find out your tempo pace for different distance:
4km at 5:03/km (20:13)
5km at 5:08/km (25:40)
6km at 5:12/km (31:12)
7km at 5:15/km (36:48)

3. Interval pace for different distance should be different.

To be more accurate, interval pace should be the pace that can be sustained for up to 12 minutes during racing.

i. find out your 12 min race pace.

12 min race pace
= 12 min ÷ (12 min ÷ 50 min x 10km^1.07)^{(1 ÷ 1.07)}
= 12 min ÷ (0.24 x 11.749km)^0.9346
= 12 min ÷ 2.6348km
= 4:33/km

ii. find out the run time of other interval distance.

Optimal intervals are 3 to 5 minutes long at this pace so the distance that you can cover with 4:33/km in 3 to 5 minutes should be around 660m to 1100m.

660m in 3:00
800m in 3:38
1000m in 4:33
1100m in 5:00

Conclusion.

If your 10km race time is 50 minutes, this will be your ideal training pace:

Recovery pace: 6:46/km
Easy pace: 5:55/km ~ 6:20/km
Marathon pace: 5:32/km

Tempo pace:
4km at 5:03/km (20:13)
5km at 5:08/km (25:40)
6km at 5:12/km (31:12)
7km at 5:15/km (36:48)

Interval time:
660m in 3:00
800m in 3:38
1000m in 4:33
1100m in 5:00