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Race Day
Woke-up quite early this time, around 5 am. My wife, Ina & my kids (except my daughter) followed me to Dataran Merdeka. My wife was responsible to look after her school’s Police Cadet, who were also participated in the race.
After getting ready myself & all my kids, we had a light breakfast. I took 2 bananas, power bar & endurance drink. Then, headed to Dataran Merdeka around 6.20 am.
Reached Dataran around 6.50 am & parked my car behind the HSBC building. Getting ready (put on my shoes, apply chafe protection on my legs, took the power gel & the registration card) & then, headed to the starting point.
What a crowd! So many people already filled-up the starting point area. I heard that the total participants for this event were about 10,000 people & for the men’s open category were about 2,000 people. This must be a tough competition for everybody & to get the medal (up to 100th position), the time was estimated to be less than 50 minutes for the distance of almost 11 km. So, since I had no chance to get the medal, my only goal for the day was to renew my PR.
I was started to warming-up at the nearby area for about 10 minutes. Once completed, headed to the starting point & handed the registration card to the officer in-charged. I managed to get through the crowd & be ready to run infront of others at the starting line.
At 7.30 am sharp. Bang!! The race started & I ran quite fast at the beginning for the purpose of breaking away from the rest of the runners. However, they all ran even faster than me & I couldn’t keep up the pace with them. Then, after a few hundred meters, I started to slow down & maintained my pace within the range of 5.00 to 5.30.
During the uphill, I started to slow down further, but then during the downhill, I picked-up the pace & performed the long striding ran. This type of ran was quite new to me & hopefully, I could improve the run & speed over time.
At the water station, I took my power gel with the power bar endurance drink. Then, continued running at a comfortable/ manageble pace, which I still followed the same pattern, slow down during uphill and picked up pace with long striding during flat/downhill. At that time, my breathing was good & my leg was fined.
Then, the challenge came, the very hot morning. The heat really pulled my pace down. I was really struggling to maintain my pace. The distance remaining to complete the race was about 1 km plus.
Approaching the finishing line, I saw my kids raising their hands & shouted at me, while my wife was taking picture from her handphone. However, she only managed to snap a photo of my back.
At last, crossed the finishing line & the officer in-charged handed over the finisher’s certificate. My time was 60 minutes 45 seconds.
Conclusion
I thought, I could renew my Dataran’s PR by at least 2/3 minutes, but the result was upsetting. The time was not improved since the last two races, i.e. Siemens & Power Run.
I need to improve my speed, endurance & strength. Hopefully, I can get an advice from experienced runners on how to improve my performance.
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