SCKLM on the 7th of August was the start of 4 races that I'ma do in 3 weeks, the 1st time I'm doing this kinda thing. Not that it was planned or I did it on purpose though. This week's NBOS Run & Ride 11K was sponsored by Persatuan Pegawai Tadbir dan Diplomatik (PPTD) for our group of runners. They paid for our fees & tshirts. I didn't plan to go, but since it was free & it was only 11K, what the heck!
I was still recovering from SCKLM, so on Monday after SCKLM I took a day's leave & went for a recovery run in the morning. Then the day after I did 30 mins tempo. I've decided to use my Newton Tri racer for all short distance races, so I trained in that shoes. On Thursday I was supposed to do short intervals, but I guess I was just too tired & decided to take the day off.
I was still recovering from SCKLM, so on Monday after SCKLM I took a day's leave & went for a recovery run in the morning. Then the day after I did 30 mins tempo. I've decided to use my Newton Tri racer for all short distance races, so I trained in that shoes. On Thursday I was supposed to do short intervals, but I guess I was just too tired & decided to take the day off.
Racepack collection
After collecting the racekit I went to PICC to have a look at the race venue. Quite a number of us was quite worried becoz if the race start is at the PICC, then there's gonna be quite a hill to climb! Well, when I got to PICC I saw some setting up work was being done just before the guard house leading up to the climb up PICC. Well then, we still had to climb to get to the finish (the start will be downhill), but it wasn't really that bad. I updated the PPTD Runners group & everybody was relieved.
The flag off was at 7:10, so I decided to leave home after my Subuh prayers. There was still not many people when I got there. I did my usual warm up & headed to the start line. As this event mixes run & ride, the runners will be flagged off first. There was only 2 categories, the 11K & the 5K fun run. There wasn't that many participants as it turned out to be, there was less than 1000 runners. They even had to rope in the PTD cadets from Intan to make up the numbers. Maybe becoz this event clashed with quite a number of other events as well.
The race
I made my way to the start line & managed to squeeze in quite close to the start line. The sun was already shining when we were flagged off. It was a downhill start so everybody started fast, obviously. I made my way to the front group. My target for this race was to get a sub-hour timing. I've raced through this course quite a number of times already this year, so I knew the spots where I can push & where to hold pace. We had to make a turn-around at about KM6 & stitches hit me hard again just before the turn-around. Again I had to stop awhile to make it go away. As this is a short event, I didn't bring any water with me.
After turning around I felt okay & began to push the pace up again. As we got to the final kilometers I saw my friend Jeff on the other side of the road, I was about 20 secs behind him. He was quite a fast runner so I thought I had a shot at top 10. The finish was of course up the hill we went down at the start earlier. A lot of people was walking up the hill & it was pretty crowded with the fun runners. I stopped the clock at 1:00:09, a PB for 11K actually. & later I learned that I got the 12th spot for the veteran category, missed the prize money by about 2 minutes and 22 secs.
Post race
After changing to dry clothes I went around looking for my friends. As this is a government-organized event, a lot of my friends took part, some were running for the 1st time. It was good atmosphere.
Lessons learned
Again I was hit with stitches. I don't really know how it happened, but I was running pretty fast. Stopping becoz of the stitches had probably caused my a few seconds.
Livestrong, run stronger.
I made my way to the start line & managed to squeeze in quite close to the start line. The sun was already shining when we were flagged off. It was a downhill start so everybody started fast, obviously. I made my way to the front group. My target for this race was to get a sub-hour timing. I've raced through this course quite a number of times already this year, so I knew the spots where I can push & where to hold pace. We had to make a turn-around at about KM6 & stitches hit me hard again just before the turn-around. Again I had to stop awhile to make it go away. As this is a short event, I didn't bring any water with me.
After turning around I felt okay & began to push the pace up again. As we got to the final kilometers I saw my friend Jeff on the other side of the road, I was about 20 secs behind him. He was quite a fast runner so I thought I had a shot at top 10. The finish was of course up the hill we went down at the start earlier. A lot of people was walking up the hill & it was pretty crowded with the fun runners. I stopped the clock at 1:00:09, a PB for 11K actually. & later I learned that I got the 12th spot for the veteran category, missed the prize money by about 2 minutes and 22 secs.
Post race
After changing to dry clothes I went around looking for my friends. As this is a government-organized event, a lot of my friends took part, some were running for the 1st time. It was good atmosphere.
Again I was hit with stitches. I don't really know how it happened, but I was running pretty fast. Stopping becoz of the stitches had probably caused my a few seconds.
Ratings
Route (Challenging, unique) : 3.5/5
Organizer (Overall organization of race) : 4/5
Runners welfare (Water station, pre & post race facilities) : 3.5/5
Goodie bag (Content) : 3.5/5
Race tee (Quality, aesthetics) : 4/5
Medal (Quality, aesthetics) : 4/5 (really, really big medal)
My performance (execution of race plan, finishing time) : 4/5 Livestrong, run stronger.
