Running Sucks

"Bandit" a term that is frown upon by Race Directors and serious runners but where almost everybody else quietly endorse it. For those newbies and really innocence, bandit in running terms means taking part in a race without registering for it. There are many argument for and against it but most people I know bandit not because they cannot afford the registration fee but mainly because the race is sold out or they cannot qualify for it or they simply want to accompany their friend like what I observed at last year Great Eastern Women Race Most people who bandit just run and depending on their luck, they may get chase out by bandit catchers. It has always been fairly easy to identify bandit runner - anybody without a bib is deemed a bandit runner. Until now .. Last week at the Boston Marathon, 4 runners were "caught" running bandit. They were not booted off the course though. These people have elevated "banditing" to the highest level - with a fake b...

I was reading the papers when I came across this big advertisement. It caught my attention immediately. One because I always looking at airlines ads for special offer and two, because it has our national marathon runner photo in it.  Turned out it was an announcement by Air Asia that they are supporting Mok Yin Ren in his Olympic quest. I am happy for Mok that he now has one less worries and can concentrate fully on his training. But at the same time I could not help but note that the sponsor, Air Asia is a Malaysian company. And it makes me sad that none of our local companies are sponsoring him or for that matter, any other local sports athlete.  I posed this question on my Facebook and I got comments such as no budget, no synergy and already sponsoring other. In a way that is true. SIA has just announced a million dollar sponsorship deal for the F1, OCBC is already sponsoring cycling and even has a Team OCBC which ironically comprises riders of several nationalit...

Recently, Running Shots, the photography group that I shoot with got a message from an event organiser. That is nothing new considering that nowadays we get a lot of request from event organisers to take photos of their events. But this latest request was not a request to take photos. It was rather different. In fact, it was a request for Running Shots not to upload the photos of their events immediately after the event but to delay the upload for a month. The reason? Let me reproduce part of the message here: "We respectfully request that you do not post photos of our events on your site for at least one month following our events in order to allow these photographers time to receive the benefits for which they are employed. We fear that the posting of photos too soon will hurt the profession as a whole as we believe this talent and service should be provided first and foremost for a fee to ensure local photographers can continue to be paid for their work" We w...

I bought the Timex Run Trainer online in September 2012 after reading favourable review of the watch on web sites. It was to replace my slowly disintegrating into several pieces Garmin 110 . I was amazed at the features of the watch especially the flexibility of the interval program. One small bug bear that I faced was the erratic GPS lock on. According to web review, it was supposed to be fast and it even had the ability to remember the last site. However, in my usage, GPS lock on was really bad. Sometime it can be so fast and sometime it can take up to 10 minutes! And the thing about remembering the previous start site. It didn't work. I run at least once weekly from the park connector next to my place and that place has one of the worst lock on rate. Maybe it is because there is a Singtel sub station there and it interferes with the signal but I don't see the same problem with the sidekick Garmin 210. Anyway, I could live with the erratic GPS - just turn it on ear...

At the recently concluded 2XU Marathon, a runner collapsed during the race and despite efforts by fellow runners and subsequently medical personnel, he passed away at the hospital. After this, there was a lot of kpkb over the lack of medical aids from the event proper. According to press reports and postings  in social media, the runner collapse somewhere around the 11km distance along the Geylang Bahru PCN. Fellow runners were not able to locate the event medical personnel and there was no emergency contact number of the race organiser to call. In the end, other runners provided cpr and called the SCDF. Unfortunately, they were not able to provide the exact location and consequently the SCDF ambulance took longer than expected to reach. Meanwhile, the race director was none the wiser about the event. Runners told umbrage at the lack of medical personnel, the inability to contact the race organiser/director and the simply inertia of the race organiser. But to be fair to the ra...