Yup.
I lied. Being the bad brother that i am, i ditched my initial plan to attend my
brother engagement do and went to penang to revisit the bridge. My
justification, the engagement will still take place with or without me around.
After all, it's only an engagement, not his wedding.. Hehe.. (saja sedapkan
hati)
I
went to penang not placing any hope to clock a good time, what more a personal
best. I dont even hope for a sub-5 timing. I've been slacking with training
with the last LSD being the newton race more than 2 months ago. The target was
to only to complete the race injury free and to have have an enjoyable time
running on the bridge.
I
swear i was salt overdosed prior to and during the race. And i think i was also
overhydrated. Not wanting to experience potential cramps, i bloated myself with
3 litres of water diluted with 10 sachets of ors. Feeling that alone was not
enough i brought along with myself nuun salt tablet to be consumed while running.
And not to forget the customary bananas walloping for instant energy.
I
started off steadily with my normal pace. Not too slow and not too fast for
sure. I was still good entering the bridge phase and scaling the incline at the
middle of the bridge. It was airry and breezy which was divine to me, just like
when i ran on the bridge for the first time last year. I was still okay after
the u-turn at the far end of the bridge with my pace still intact.
As
i strode to scale the incline at the middle of the bridge, it was drizzling
which was nice as it gave cooling effect sensation. I hope the drizzle would
last till the end of race. Boy, was i wrong. As the full marathoners converged
with half marathoners at the middle of the bridge, the drizzle transformed into
torrent and i had a whale of a time running cum showering..
It
was still raining hard when mr.cramps started saying hi to me. It was when i
passed the 26th km marker that i felt minor jolts at my shins muscles. It was
still ignorable when i slowed my pace. A few 100 metres away, the real muscle
cramps started rearing its ugly heads. Both shins and thigh muscles felt stiff
and i was statutorily unable to move. I was literally standing in the middle of
thousands of thronging runners waiting to be trampled by them. I managed to
make my way to the side of the road. Lucky that i brought a long deep heat
lotion tube and applied the lotion on my shins and thighs.
From
then on it was a 80% walking – 20% running affair. I was reduced to walking
most of the time. To top that, after the bridge phase ended, the full
marathoners needed to run a mentally torturing, neverending, stretch. It was so
frustrating that while i still had my energy fueling me, my running effort was
hampered by mr.cramps. Everytime i lifted my thighs and legs to run, the
muscles compacted drastically that it was unbearably painful . I lost track of
how many cramps-attack i had as it kept revisiting even when i was walking.
That was how bad the cramps attacks were to me. I swear by that time, i have
already popped into my mouth 5 nuun tablets but they were frustratingly futile.
I
have lost the sense of time, but i knew i would clock more than 5.30 hours as
the 5.30 hours pacers passed snail-pacing me. I was still walking when i
converged with eager 10km runners. Couldn’t care less, i decided to walk among
them as it was still painful to resume running. It was approximately at the
last 3 kilometers that pui san called my name to join her with the rest of the
runners pacing the 6 hours pacer, choi cc. Strangely, the cramps disappeared
and i could run a modest pace. I was pacing alongside zaki yui the last
kilometers. We crossed the finishing line together and clocked almost the same
timing.
I
am glad that i finished the race despite the timing was way off my personal
best time (1 hour and 19 minutes). I clocked my personal worst at pbim but
learned a very valuable lesson from it. To run a full marathon, one must be fit
physically and mentally. Even when one is mentally strong, it wont just jive if
one’s physical is unfit. I don’t blame anything else for my unflattering
timing, i don’t blame the futile NUUN tablets or the ORS or even the torrential
rain (which is believed to be the major cause for the cramps). I put the total
blame on myself for slacking off with training which resulted to my unfitness.
InsyaAllah,
I will put much effort on training on my next full marathon at Putrajaya Night
Marathon which is slated to be on January 2011.
Verdict
Full Marathon PBIM10
Timing
: 05:46:53 hours
Position:
743
p/s:
btw, I am pulling out from Stanchart Singapore. Therefore, interested,
yet to be registered runner may have my bib.
p/p/s:
congrats to those who finished PBIM irregardless of categories. Good job! Kudos
to those who emerged as finishers with PB.
p/p/p/s:
thanks kakjune for the kedai runcit. The sight of you and ijam’s friend alone
gave morale boost to RBUs especially the budding FMVs.
