I'll Du it again!

from http://www.powerman.com.my/owerman.com.my/n.com.my/

Super-overdue report: time to put up a race report, a kind of self-fulfilling endeavour to capture the mood of the race and my thoughts.

6 Nov 2009 Fri
It was a super hectic day, last day of school calendar, prep for the farewell, coupled by last minute incidents made me tired and missed part of the farewell, but then, at least I got to see the performances and P's speech. Anyway, worked till 2 pm before I dashed back to pack, on the way drop by at Cyclecrafts to get some tubings and an additional pouch to mount on my top tube to put stuff, degreased my bike parts, and do housework, get guagua to eat at dad's place. drove to lavendar bus terminal at 1030pm. after some delay set off to lumut perak at 1115pm.


7 Nov 2009 Sat
The bus journey was superlong and tiring. did manage to get some sleep but it wasnt enough. hit the hotel finally at 8am. The registration of rooms and went smoothly and finally, moved everything up to my room, i hv asked for a single room to avoid disturbing others. 8-)


room was super spacious, though with bare minimal furnishing. but i am fine with that. after that went for a light breakfast, made some new friends and went for a short nap.





Thanks to the organiser (with our group's sheer size of close to 90), the briefing and collection of bibs and race packs was held at our hotel. after that headed down to this famous seafood restaurant arranged by our tour leader. The food was good, but i didn't wanna take too much seafood, just to be on the safe side. then, headed down to the race expo to visit the booths, to the supermart to get food and stuff.

Headed back to the hotel. I did a quick run of about 4 km and some speed intervals. spoke to some NUS undergrads (think they are from the NUS Biathlon team)who came on the same entourage (there were 4 coach buses). headed back to hotel, and decided to eat my instant noodles and bread and lights-off early.

8 Nov 2009 Sun RACE DAY!!
woke up early at about 4:30 am. ate loads of bread, prepared everything from drinks to gear to pumping air into my tyres and packed my luggage to check out. guessed what? my front wheel suddenly punctured! so, I have to change the inner tubing. Luckily I had time.

At the lobby, waited for quite a while to load our luggage, since we are departing from the stadium (start/finish points) after the race. Then, we cycled 8 km to the starting point. It was quite a sight to see 80 over bikes cycling on the Malaysian roads. but the ride was good, and I enjoyed that vast sense of space as we cycled along.

my bike, 301

at the start point, finally met up with WK and Alex (they followed another group). mounted our bikes at the racks, and did a few laps of run to warm up. the weather was cloudless, the sun was coming up and the few of us were commenting that it would be worse later on. stayed at mid pack and suddenly we heard the starting gun went off.

11 km run (felt more like 10.5km)
we took the first lap of 5.5km conservatively. WK and I kept it at around sub-5.30min/km. but weather is getting hotter. by the time we reached the stadium for the second loop, the sun was hanging in the sky with no clouds. we did the 2nd loop at a faster pace and completed the first run, 55 mins 12 sec. pace: 5:01

Transition 1 was 2 mins 8 sec. My leg muscles were already abit tight.

64 km cycle
And off we went on the bike. once we exited the stadium and hit the roads, I was on my own. WK was off to the front. I started quite fast hitting around 36km/h, but looking at the long roads ahead, I began to slow to 31 km/h. By now, the sun is already out and with no clouds, the scorching feeling on the skin was intense. by the time i hit the first bridge, i could feel my quads, hamstrings, calf muscles and foot arches getting spasms and becoming tight. so, I have to stretch my legs periodically while allowing the wheels to spin, at the same time down my electrolytes, and water.

Before the turning point, what came to view was this huge steep bridge with the angle and length like the sheares bridge. it was a hard climb, but the downhill was shiok, just allowing the bike to roll down the slope after the hard pedalling up, at the turning point, managed to grab a bottle of water and down it. so the back leg started with the hard climb up the opposite side of the bridge and then all the way back to the stadium turning point and back. the heat was getting unbearable and the cramps on my legs were getting worse. at one time, my speed went down to below 27 km/h. on my 2nd return leg, decided to took a pic of that bridge.

by the time I reached the stadium, i was spent, legs were super tired and tight, could barely run to the transition point and my skin was bbq-ed.



Time: 2hr 12 mins 15 sec (pace: 29km/h)

reached the transition point, changed into my visor, running shoes and rested a bit before walking out to the last 10km.


transition 2: 3 mins 11 sec

last 10 km run

I could barely run at first becos of cramps. walked under the shades for abt 1.5 km before started running, target 1st water station, the heat was unbearable and now is really abt mind over body, somehow i managed to continue my run after the water station, stopped for a short walk under the shades and continued to the 2nd water station and to the stadium for the 2nd loop. I was able to sustain the pace and actually picked up at the last 2 km and once I entered the stadium, and down the finishing chute, high-fived some kids and crossed the line in

4 hrs 25 mins 39 sec (below the 5 hrs cut-off).

last 10 km: 1 hr 12 mins 40 sec (pace: 7:01)

stood at the finishing point stunned for a while, I experienced a complete melt-down, the heat insurmountable, the outdoor temperature was 37-38 degrees celsius. WK came over with a cold wet towel and drink and I woke up from this stunned state.

Wash up and the rest of the time was prep to return home.


Overall feel: I enjoyed this race alot, despite the harsh heat and distance. somehow or rather, the sense of satisfaction, the feeling of cycling in a vast space with long uninterrupted roads lingers in me.

Reflections: I had a lot of time to reflect during the race (it kindaf put my mind off the agonising cramps and heat). In terms of training, it was in the right direction, 1-km intervals, track workouts, long runs, long distance rides thru undulating terrains. but there were gaps, in terms of intensity, frequency. We (WK and I) didn't do enuff long rides and long runs as well as mid-afternoon runs in the sun.

nevertheless, it was a good venture and I'll du(athlon) it again!

I am crazy. ha.