Top of the World

Well not quite since the highest point in Singapore is only just slightly over 160 metres. But that is Bukit Timah Hill and Bukit Timah hill is now close so the next highest point is Mt Faber at 105m and that where are the trail runners looking to race overseas are flocking to now that they are deprived of good old Bukit Timah.

I followed 1 group last week and did just 1 loop of the hill. One can get a pretty nice view of the Telok Blangah Estate from the top of the hill. The view stretches all the way to Orchard Rd. On the other side of the road, one can see Sentosa, the cable cars and on a clear day, some islands of Indonesia. Instead of using my own lousy camera to show the view from the top, here is a VR taken by Singapore top VR photographer, Aram Pan. Guess what? I am mentioned inside the post! Cheap thrill!

The beauty of running around these areas is that there are several high ground where you can have that top of the world feeling and look out far far away.

From Mt Faber, I went on to Telok Blangah Hill crossing the beautiful Henderson Waves Bridge. And right smack in the middle of the bridge which is 36 metres high you get these awesome view.

Looking southward towards the sea

The Telok Blangah and Bukit Merah estates

After the Henderson Waves Bridge is the Telok Blangah Hill. There are some mean slopes here including a very short and steep one up to Terrace Garden where you can another panoramic view.

Standing between Telok Blangah Hill and Kent Ridge is a patch of forest and over this is a series of metal bridge called the Forest Walk hovering over the forest. And beside being able to see the flora and fauna close up, one can get another great view of the far beyond.

After crossing the bridge, its up to Kent Ridge Park and here there is a series of zig zag path which leads to what is known as the Canopy Walk which comes with a view of the Hort Park below it.

From here it is a straight run down Kent Ridge Park. That is the easy part. But coming back up, there is either the long and steep Pepys Road or the other long and steep Vigilante Drive. By now after conquering the up and down from Mt Faber to Kent Ridge, I was well and truly beaten and could only managed to walk up Vigilante Drive. At the top of course the reward is another top of the world view.

All in, depending on how one runs, one can do up to 20 km covering Mt Faber, Telok Blangah Hill, Hort Park, Kent Ridge Park with total elevation of more than 500 metres. Not a lot by any other measures but certainly a good enough workout for those who want to do some serious hill runs and get many great view at the same time.

Here is the elevation for the run last week

Run Safe

Recently there was a press report of a case in 2013 when a lady jogger was attacked and raped by a man while out on a night run. I think a lot of people were shocked. Surely Singapore is the safest of all place? But like the police slogan, low crime doesn't mean no crime and this is not the first time a lady has been attacked while out running. In 2000, a lady was attacked and rape while running in Bukit Batok Park. She died a few days later from her injury. And for those who thought MacRitchie Reservoir is safe, in 2003, a lady was sexually assaulted while running there.

Singapore is generally a safe place to move around but like in any other countries, there will be sickos around. Here are some unsolicited advices:

1) Don't run at night. The best time to run is early in the morning but I know it is easier to sleep late than wake up early. And with everybody's busy schedule, sometimes the only time available to run is in the night. So if you must run at run, try to run earlier and end by 8 pm rather than start after 9. But if you really cannot avoid running later in the night:

2) Get someone to run with you. The hubby, the boyfriend or girl friend, neighbour or even a child. There safety in number. But if there is really nobody to run with you:

3) Avoid running in dark places. For some reasons known best to Nparks, our parks are not well lit at night. Even places like East Coast Park is poorly lit and the park lights are switched off after a certain time. So if you must run, run along the roads or in brightly lit areas. Or if there is no other option, run only in the brighter areas within the park. Do loops around the brightly lit area rather than run the full distance along the park trail. Some parks with poor lighting to avoid:
 - Area A and area G of East Coast Park
- Pasir Ris Beach Park especially the middle section between Sungei Tampines and Sungei Api Api
- Fort Canning Park. The lighting here is atrocious. Many stretches have no light or they are switched off at random
- Bukit Batok Nature Park - the place with the most incidents
- The Green Corridor. Avoid running alone at all cost and this applies to the guy too!
- West Coast Park
- Garden by the Bay East. The lights here are generally ok but it is too quiet. Keep to the waterfront and not run into the park ground.

4) Wear bright clothing. I am always amazed at the number of people who wear dark apparel to run. Not only does it absorb heat it also attract mosquitoes. And in an incident, it is easier to see something bright moving/struggling than something dark. Beside, other road and park users can see you if you wear brighter clothings and minimize the chance of a collision or being scared out of their wits!

5) Carry a small panic button, the phone and identification. The panic button is useful in situation where you need to attract attention. The phone? To call for help not just for attacks but in case of accidents. And ID - for identification purpose.

This is a rather useful panic button. Can double as a key chain too. You can get this from Sim Lim and other electronic stores or buy online. A panic button is more useful than a whistle as in an emergency, chances are you have no opportunity to blow the whistle

This ID band can be purchased online but you can also make your own ID band like what I did

6) Let someone know. Where you running and what time you be home. This will help if you go missing and people need to search for you. Or if you fail to reach home in the expected time, help can come earlier.

So that about it. Run happy and run safe.

Running 101 for Newbies Part 1

Came across this article in the press recently. And saw this little bit.

I must admit I do get a little bit peeved when people use the wrong words but most them if they are not runners and get the terminology all wrong, I just shrug it off but when people who are doing it gets it all wrong, I go grrrr...........

So I guess it time for a little refresher in layman terms:

JOG - This is my pet peeve. I absolutely hate it when people asked me whether I am going for  a jog. Yeah its an ego thing but I don't jog. I run. A jog is when you put on a pair of running shoe, go downstairs or walk to the neighbourhood park and do a slow slow run of not more 20 minutes. It is done at an easy pace where you don't break into a sweat, you can talk and laugh and noticed all the little things like the chio bu doing her stretches. And some people can walk faster than your jog. And after you finish the jog, you can just sit at the park bench and chill or hop straight into the car and drive home. No need to change or cool down because you never break a sweat.

RUN - I run. I don't jog. At least not yet. Maybe when I hit 60 and the joints and bones start protesting louder. Meantime, when I put on a pair of running shoes, it is to run. A run is when you break into a sweat. You try to run faster than the previous time and you wish the traffic lights will be in your favour every time you need to cross a ppedestrianised crossing. And when you see a runner in front of you, your thought automatically turns into whether you can outrun that fella. You don't notice the kingfisher in the trees, heck when you in the mood to run, you don't even notice your friend on the other side waving to you. When you finished, you all sweaty and smelly and you need to cool down. Not hop straight into the car and drive home. 

And running can be more complicated than science. Ha ha ha. There are easy run, tempo run, fartleks (no its not something you do silently in the elevator although most runners are prone to it), intervals, long distance run. An if you don't know what these are, it simply means you are not yet a hardcore runners. No worries. You will learn soon enough. And then we have pace. We measure how hard we run by the pace we ran which can get pretty complicated. Your hard pace can be the easy pace of someone else, your long distance run can be a short run for another person and a climb for you is just a gentle incline for somebody else. For a totally non-scientific analysis of pace read here. And all these don't apply if you just jogging.

That is the difference between a jog and a run.

Of course, once you get hooked into running, you will want to join events. And nowadays, events are a dime a dozen. And there are so many events of different distances and themes that you go all blur blur. Here are a run down of some of the main characteristics of each event and what it is meant for.

FUN RUN - This is usually a short distance "running event" of not more than 5 km although there are some which are longer at 10 km. Generally, participants are welcome to walk, jog or run. There are no prizes to the top few finishers and no completion timing will be given. There are also no "Finisher Tee" although some events may give event tee, certificate of participation and a medal. Fun Run are usually organised to raise funds for charities, promote a cause or as a side attraction to a main run to attract more participation. Fun runs are suitable for everybody from children to senior citizen of all shape, sizes and fitness.

COMPETITIVE RUN - As the word implies, this is a competitive run. Prizes are given to the top finishers (usually top 3 or in some cases up to top 10). Runner's timing are captured through timing devices attached to shoes or bibs and read by sensors at strategic points along the route. Serious runners who takes part in these runs to i) win prizes ii) get a good time and ranking iii) get a personal best (PB). Not so serious runners join to measure how they fare against other runners or mostly to assess their own standard of fitness. Most organiser will give an event tee or singlet, a medal, a certificate with the timing printed on it and for some events, a finisher tee. Competitive run are suitable for people who have put in efforts to train for it. Of course, there is nothing to stop fun runners and those who never train to take part in competitive run but the experience for them will be much better if they train for it.

Competitive run comes in various distance though and runners should learn to sign up for the appropriate distances according to their ability.

To be cont'd

The Journey to Mt Kinabalu

The plan to scale Mt Kinabalu was hatched when I failed to complete the gruelling TMBT last year. If I cannot conquer the grand old dame through a trail race, I know I have to do it another way and so begins the journey to scale the mountain. I was fortunate that in January this year, a mutual friend introduce a group of us to this super friendly nice guy who has conquered Mt Kinabalu many times and he was kind enough to offer to bring us up. And so the journey begins.

The initial plan was to gather about 20 like minded person to go during the June school holidays. But upon the advice of our Malaysian friend, Tony we moved the date to the last week of June to coincide with the end of the school holidays and the start of Ramadan. This was so that it will not be so crowded up in the mountain. And when we finally reached the mountain, I could see the wisdom of that advice.

So we gathered a group of running friends. But because of the new dates, many people who had previously indicated interest would not make it as it clash with month year closing, school re-opening' and of course the fasting month. I had to scamper to get enough numbers to justify Tony's time. Eventually we managed to get a total of 13 person. Among us were ultra-marathoner, ironman finisher, average runners and young adults barely out of their teens and finally people with totally no experience in trekking, hiking or running. What a motley crew indeed! With such a mix, having a proper cohesive training program was going to be super difficult.

We started the first session with just 4 of us going for a 6 hours hike in the Central Catchment area. Subsequent training were held mainly at the Bukit Timah Hill doing climbs up and down the stairs and weekly evening run at Mount Faber. But due to everybody busy schedule, getting everybody to turn up for training was difficult and I was worried especially for the newbies and the non runners - how they were going to cope.

Hiking in the Central Catchment Area

As it was, I realised that what to us was strenuous climbs up and down the Jungle Fall path at Bukit Timah were really insufficient to prepare us for Mt Kinabalu. Maybe if we climb up and down Jungle Fall Path 100 times each session - that would be enough but of course we didn't have the luxury of time. 

Stairs training at Bukit Timah Hill

And so it was with a slight worry when we finally flew to Kota Kinabalu to begin our assault on the mountain.

Photo credit Sarah

 Cont'd here

Marathon Bad for You?

There is article written by a lady in Malaysia that is getting all the wrong attention.  Coming from somebody who is in the sports industry, I am rather surprise at the issues that she has raised concerning marathon running. Read the full article here.

Here are the 4 main issues she raised:

1. It wreck your knees
2. You could drop dead
3. It could ruin your sex drive
4. Its not the most effective weight loss method

I going to attempt to tackle these 4 points.

1. It wreck your knees. So does doing any other sports and having a sedentary life style. Like in my small workplace of about 100 staff, there are a number of people with bad knee problems. One of them is of course me. Another colleague had it so bad she had to for for knee anthroscopy. She has never run or do any sports in her life. Another colleague did the same on both knees. He only cycles. Another colleague takes the lift up and down even though we are on the 2nd floor because of her bad knees. She is in the late thirties and don't do any sports. My big boss walks with a limp because he refuses to go under the knife. He only play golf and nothing else. 2 of my running friend had ACL injury. They got it while playing football and not during running. The point I trying to make is, almost anything can cause knees problem. The main cause of bad knees is osteoarthritis and not running. So don't just push every thing to running.

2. You could drop dead. Fair enough. One can also drop dead anytime from doing anything and even nothing. A friend's mother dropped dead in her living room. There was no apparent cause. Another friend's brother got up to pee one morning and then went back to bed. He never woke up again. And he was only 45 years old then. People die from any reasons. More people die from riding motorcycles, aeroplanes, cycling than people die from running. That doesn't stop these people from continuing with these activities. Running actually keeps the heart and body healthier reducing the risk of sudden death. The only reason people get all worked up when somebody dies after running is that it is so rare that it gets reported in the media and draw all the attention. People dropping dead in normal situation is just not news anymore.

3. It could ruin your sex drive. The writer cited a study by the University of British Columbia. Let me cite these articles: 

http://therunningbug.co.uk/training/training-for-beginners/b/weblog/archive/2012/08/01/6-reasons-why-running-is-great-for-your-sex-life.aspx

http://www.canada.com/lifestyle/relationships/story.html?id=2dc6f60b-11a7-421f-9ab2-1ac1c6629599

Need I say more?

4.Its not the most effective weight loss method. I don't know what is. Those weird diet plan? Running is, in my humble opinion, the cheapest and easiest weight loss method. That and of course a sensible diet. I should know. I am one of those who lost many kilos after taking up running. And so does many of my running acquaintances like Nel, Anthony, Kartono and the list goes on. If running is not, what is?

And finally to conclude, if you are reading this and preparing for your marathon tomorrow, don't despair. Let me assure you that unless you have an existing heart disease, you are not likely to drop dead from running the race. In fact, you have a higher chance of dying in a car accident on the way to the race! Happy racing!

Gearing Up - The Heavies

The list of mandatory items are scary. There are so many items and to make it worse, my little North Face hydration bag is not able to contain all of them. It was either get a new bag or borrow from someone else. But in the end I settled for using an additional waist pouch to contain the other stuff.

Top of the list is my 3 years old North Face Enduro Boa. Into it goes the Geigerrig Hydration Engine which in plain speak is water bag. The  bag is rather small especially after putting in the 2liter bladder bag, there is not much space for anything else so the add on is the small little Mizuno waist pouch (foreground). The hiking pole gets strapped onto the Enduro bag.

(1) North Face Enduro Boa Hydration Bag (2) Black Diamond Hiking Poke (3) Mizuno Waist Pouch

The rest of the stuff that goes into the bag and pouch.

(1) Strobe Light (2) Wet Wipes (3) Home-made first aid kit comprising spray plaster, heat rub, bandages, plaster, anti-bacterial wipes (4) Luminous vest (5) Money (6) Sunblock (7)Jacket (8) Camera (9) Torch (10) Black Diamond Headlamp (11) Poncho (12) Emergency blanket (13) Gels (14) Bak Kwa (dried preserved meat) Not in picture: phone

Together with the water and the hiking pole, the whole freaking lot of stuff weight 5kg. And even after going through the water, it did not seem lighter. In fact, it got like even heavier after 4 hours of carrying it.  And I haven't even added in the full component of food.

Unfortunately there is no drop bag for the 50km so we will have to carry the whole load throughout the race. Packing the items in is a big hassle. And I will have to take them all out just to top out the water and then pack them all back in again. 

Sighed......... Its going to be a long long day.

Gearing Up - Apparel

Another 2 more weekends to go. Time for a full dress rehearsal and so like the NDP, we did the rehearsal over 2 weekends.

First up was the attire. I am normally a singlet and short guy but this time round after taking the recommendation of the race director and looking at the photos of the past 2 editions posted by Cornelius, I have opted to go for long sleeve and tights. 

And this is me modelling the attire that I will be wearing on race day. 

On the head is my trusty North Face cap given to me when I was volunteering with the North Face Singapore in the 2011 Trail Run series. I have contemplated getting one of those caps with a neck flap but I think I just have to apply a lot of sun block to protect the neck.

Run Walk Pray

The past Saturdays has been reserved for long "run". The previous week, the plan was to run 40km. Started from Ngee Ann poly and went the usual way to Bukit Timah to Dairy Farm before we decided to do a different route and went to Butterfly. Butterfly Trail is a small forested area fringing the Peirce Reservoir. The trail is a narrow little thing loves by mountain bikers. There are roots aplenty waiting to trip unsuspecting runners. Being typical Singaporean and not waiting to risk a fall, we walked the entire stretch. Our reward was the gorgeous view of the reservoir as we skirted around it.

We came out of the area after a long walk and the plan was to go on to Gangsa Trail. Unfortunately, we took a wrong turn and ended up in mysterious forbidden Woodcutters Trail. Too lazy to retract so we decided to risk a fine and continue on. Since Nparks decided to enforce the ban there, the forest has moved swiftly to reclaim the trails. The overhanging branches are now closer, the ground muddier and plant more dense. My hydration bag got hooked on the branches twice. Luckily it was the branches and not something from the current 7th month!

We ended up at Upp Peirce reservoir from where we jog slowly to MacRitchie Reservoir where we had a long pit stop. All was still fine and dandy until we resume our run. Five minutes into the run, I started to get breathless. It was like I was doing an interval sprint. The sidekick blamed it on the can of coke which I gulped down at MacRitchie. Whatever it is, that was it. I was down and out. We walked the next 15km back to Ngee Ann.

One week later, we are back. This time we started at 6am when it was still dark in the forest. This being the 7th month, we were startled out of our skin when right smack in the middle of MacRitchie and in pitch darkness, we heard a horrifying Chinese song. Fortunately for us, it turned out to be one of those idiotic uncle singing at the top of his voice in the stillness of the morning!

From MacRitchie we made our way to Bukit Timah. It was the first time we were running in the dark. We did not bring our headlamp but luckily the sidekick had a torch. We made our way slowly until the Ranger Station when it became bright enough  to see without the torch. From Bukit Timah, we went to the top of the hill before going down to Dairy Farm and going to Mandai Road. 

By then the Sun was out in its full glory  and I was feeling tired. At Mandai, we were already 3.5 hours into our  run but had barely covered 20km. Another 20km to go! By then I was feeling tired. Took a gel and we turned back. But it was too hot and we were soon reduced to walking the  entire length of Gangsa. We consoled ourselves that we have to practice our walking so there was no rush.

At Chestnut, I ran into trouble again and developed a coughing fit. The sidekick decided then to walk all the way back. Sighed... another long long walk. But at least we now know it is not the coke.

This is me, too tired to walk up the hill at Rifle Range.

Picture by the sidekick

We walked and crawled all the way back to MacRitchie. It has been more than 7 hours since we started. Is this good enough training for TMBT? Back to prayer!

Run Climb Pray

2 weeks ago, I achieved my  highest climb ever. Not to mention the highest weekly mileage in my whole entire running life.

I climbed up to a maximum altitude of 404 metres and if I add them all together, I hit a total of 1898 metres.  The joy was short-lived though! The elevation map for TMBT was released and gulped - the total elevation gain is 2910 metres. And that is over 50km in one go whilst my 1898 metres was done over 4 runs + walk spread out over 7 days! 

That was also the week when I hit my highest mileage in my entire running life of 7 years. And it was a grand total of 72km! This was with a run/walk on Saturday of 38km and another hike of 10km on Sunday plus the two weekdays evening run.

I guess all the climbing and running that I have been doing are not really going to help much. I so gonna suffer big time over there but may be, just may be, there will be a miracle and by the time I go over there next month, somebody will have build a cable car up to the peak! So the next phase of the training will be? Pray of course!

Walking is hard to do

If there one thing that I sucks at that is worse than running, its walking! My colleagues are always asking me why I walk so slow when I can run so long distance. And its true. On my walk to/from work, I am often overtaken by ladies in heels and sometimes aunties and uncles! I remembered when I did my first marathon, I managed to do a mean 6 minutes pace for the first 30km or so and then cramped badly after that and walked the balance 12km back to the finish line. That 12km walk took me more than 2 hours 15 minutes. Ditto the next marathon when I walked 10km in 2 hours 40 minutes!

So anyway I know for the TMBT, there going to be a fair bit of walking so I figure I better get my walking in order. And since the sidekick was complaining of knee pain, decided that for the week, we will skip the hills and trails and just do road run. 

On Saturday together with another couple, we went for a long road run. The plan was to run 35km but as usual after 25km, the lazy mind gave up and I almost wanted to quit. My friend who was pacing me throughout was encouraging enough to nudge me gently to carry on. So I got a brainwave! I can use the opportunity to train my walking!  My friend who incidentally was last year Singapore's TNF 100 first pure Singaporean finisher, informed me that the average walking pace should be around 10 minutes. 

And so I started walking. About 1.5km into it, my left calf started to tingle. I can feel a cramp coming! WTF! Stopped, stretch and hang loose a bit and continued. As the sun continue to rise and the temperature rises, the walking became more and more labored. My mind started telling me to run and just finish off the darned thing and go for a nice brunch. But I already given up running the full 35km so I was determined to at least complete something that I started. So I forced myself to walk. And seriously, it has to be the longest 10km I ever did. It was hard work trying to maintain a pace of 10 minutes. But somehow I did it and completed the 10km walk in 1 hour 41 minutes.

And boy was I glad I did this because now I know I gonna have a lot of work to do - to brush up on my walking judging from what my 2 time TMBT 100km finisher got to say:

Never Stop Exploring - Beyond the Pipelines

By now most frequent trail runners in Singapore will know of the "3 pipelines" trail along Rifle Range Road. For those who don't understand what I trying to say, this is the place:

After our short new trail route, our craze ultra trail runner guide bought us to a new trail. This promises to be the mother of all trail because in as far as I can remember, other than the Green Corridor, this new trail is the longest single stretch trail that one can possibly run without making an u-turn or a loop.

The adventure started when fellow trail runners started posting pictures of pipelines. The common one that most of us recognise was the 3 pipelines along Rifle Range Road but 5 or 6 pipelines together?

Naturally, my curiosity was piqued. Where was this place and most important of all, how to get there? Then one morning while at Dairy Farm, I met a fellow runner who told me that it was a "short" run from Dairy Farm to Woodlands via these pipeline trails. And most important of all, he let in on the "secret" marking that entrance to this trail. Still I wasn't that confident of finding my way and so I enlisted the help of my craze ultra trail runner friend and volia, we killed 2 birds with 1 stone or rather ran 2 "new" trails on one run!

So from where we ended off, we cut across Rifle Range Road to the aforesaid 3 Pipelines trail and we went along Belukar Trail to Zhenghua before we ran along the stretch of Gangsa Trail leading to Mandai. The entrance to the new Pipelines Trail is somewhere along the Gangsa Trail.

Many of us travel along the various expressway almost every day and especially along the PIE, SLE and BKE, we often marvel at in land scare Singapore, there are still plenty of greenery alongside the expressway. Many times, I wonder what lies behind and where it can lead to and this morning we finally got the answer.

That is the BKE at the back of the  picture.

We even had to go under the expressway!

Never Stop Exploring - Hill and more Hills

A wise friend from KK sent me this great pearl of wisdom. 

And just nice, a trail and ultra crazy friend who is also doing the TMBT, showed a few of us a new trail with a "good" upslope to run.

I certainly wouldn’t use “shiok” to describe the new route but suffice to say, I walked all the up slopes and all the down slopes and all the uneven ground which comes out to 100% of the entire route!

Here are some pictures of this hitherto unknown trail, known only to hardcore trail runners like my friend.

This is the entrance to the trail. Haha, we have to run into the horizon. The sun is kinda obscuring the route so this trail shall continue to remain a secret known only to the hardcore few and me!

And then we came to the "upslope". Only it wasn't a real hill. Just a series of terrace cut into the forest.

While my friend went bouncing away up the slope like a goat, the rest of us more sanely peeps choosed to walk up. The grass here were rather long and the ground was uneven and cannot be seen. And I have this phobia of twisting my ankle so it was walk walk walk all the way up.

And this was the view from the top. Looking backward to where we just climbed up.

But instead of continuing, we had to go back down! (#*^%#$@. I should have stayed at the bottom cause if there anything I hate more than climbing up slope, its going down slopes where I always feel that I can just roll down.

But I made it down safely and then we had to "run along the drain". I had no idea what he referred to earlier when he said that but when I saw the drain, it finally sunk in. We were literally going to run along the drain.

Which couldn't be such a bad thing if not for the fact that the "drain" was 30 metres on top of the expressway! One wrong move and like Jack and Jill, we will go tumbling down the hill and become road kill!. I think the drivers must be wondering what those crazy guys were doing running right in the middle of the slope bordering the expressway.

That the PIE on the right of the picture

Thankfully we survived that but that not the end, we still have another new trail, again courtesy of my friend to explore and which would turn out to be the mother of all trails! But that is another story for another day.

Weak Mind, Weak body and Weak Legs

"2013 is significantly tougher than the 2011 and 2012 course in my opinion..which explains the jump in accumulated altitude gain as compared to the 2012 course.."  These words from the Race Director sends chill down my spine and that of my running kaki.

When I signed up for this, I knew it wasn't going to be a walk in the park, unlike a friend who thought so and  promptly went to sign up for the 100km in its inaugural edition in 2011 and nearly paid a heavy penalty for it. Learning from his experience, I have decided to be a bit kiasu and sign up only for the 50km. But that is still 50km too long I think.

Anyway with the haze gone I hope for good, training resume, abit a little on the slack side.

Since Sunday was a rest day, thought I could do an easy run on Monday after work. The sidekick said she didn't feel ok so I also decided to skip the run. Instead, I did a short series of training with the weights and the gym ball. Haven’t really been doing my strength training regularly since moving to Pasir Ris. Somehow the soft lighting at home does not inspire me to lift weights. More like for sleeping. Anyway, concentrated on the legs and core and did some stretches of the legs.

On Tuesday, it was back to Mount Faber and this time a good friend came along. We had wanted to do 3 loops up and down but she was a slave driver and we ended up doing 3½ loops. Worse thing she insisted on going all the way down to the foot of the hill and back up again and did not allow us to stop about 400 metres from the bottom. Shall not ask her along the next time. Hahahha. But seriously this was the hardest session for the week. See I said it was slack!

Wednesday got slacked again. Took out the Foam Roller and did more stretches of the legs and went through the motion of doing some crunches.

Thursday night, the sidekick got an early start to her run and I was left alone to do my own. Poor me

Decided a short hard (hard by my standard anyway) run was in order. Actually that just the excuse to get out, do it and get it over with in double quick time. Started ambitiously. Try to break the PB for this particular 5.6km route. Started well but lost steam rapidly. After 1 km, decided this wasn't working out. Too strenuous for my old body. Got a brainwave. Will do a "fartlek". See, I also know how to use big technical terms. Run like hell up to a distance target, do a recovery run and then start all over again. Plan went well until somewhere towards the end. The park was pretty dim. I kicked into an uneven part of the ground and went flying or rather scrambling. With hands and legs flailing all over, I desperately tried to catch back my balance as I was going down but it was all in vain and I ended up eating dirt. I must have looked a comical sight to the other park users. Maybe they thought I was practising the long jump?

My poor arm

That put paid to any training on Friday. Saturday was super busy day with me involved in 2 races as a volunteer in the morning and as a photographer in the evening which means no running. Sunday morning there was another race to shoot and I was stoned by afternoon. A short nap didn’t help much as I dragged myself up and out. Decided that I die die must do my long run. Together with the sidekick who had wisely did her own run in the morning, we went to the Tampines Eco Park and then crossed over to the Tampines Mountain Bike Trail. This is my favourite run route in the East. 

The Tampines Mountain Bike Trail

The Tampines Mountain Bike Trail

Too bad, the Tampines Mountain Bike Trail is slated for redevelopment and soon there will be no more trails to run in the East. Completed 12km before the sidekick went home to cook dinner and I dragged myself to complete another 8 km in a super slow time.

So I didn’t managed to hit 40km for this week. With 10 more weeks to go, it seems likely I won’t have enough time to bring myself to a sufficient level to complete the 50 km comfortably. Time to start thinking of Plan B maybe?

Week 1 Training

The haze took a breather this week and so I managed to do a full week of training. 

Started the training on Monday with an easy 8 km run round the Pasir Ris Park. No haze and the runners were out in full force. Air was pretty fresh next to the sea.

On Tuesday, as planned, we went to Safra Mt Faber. Singapore got no mountain but still got to try doing hills. Started from Safra and ran via Henderson Road to Morse Road and made our way up to the summit and then down to Kampong Bahru side. Along the way saw many speedy runners from Safra. Think they were on the way back. How in the world do they manage to start so early? We made a u-turn and ran back up to the top before going back down to Morse Rd and back to Safra. Total distance was slightly over 8 km. Not as tough as I had thought but then again its only about 100 metres high. The up part was about 1.1 km with a gradual rise of probably 30 degrees. Think probably good for another loop but its okay,  start slow and progress slowly.

Did a short interval on Thursday. The idea is to do all sort of training runs to cover all base. Haha. Maybe a bit unscientific but I think good for getting the lungs to work hard. May need that later.

Wrapped up the week with a run at Bukit Timah. The original plan was to do at least 20 km but got a bit lazy and ended up just slightly over 17 km. Did the usual route from Ngee Ann Poly to Diary Farm via the KTM track and the Dairy Farm Quarry. Went into the Wallace Trail but got stuck behind a group of uncle and aunties hikers and who refused to give way on the narrow trail. One of them was blasting Air Supply on his phone or MP3 player for everybody to hear! What an inconsiderate bunch of fellas! Made our way up to the  Bukit Timah summit via the Regas(?) Path. Again got stuck behind another group of mainly lady walkers and again these people did not observe proper trail etiquette and blocked us from moving forward. First time Molly went up this way and she found it very tiring like what I experience when I went up this place the first time. 

That it for week 1. Hopefully the haze will continue to stay away and we can go into week 2 smoothly.

Kancheong Time

K. So I am a wee bit kancheong now. It is just slightly under 3 months to the longest race I going to do so far. And I have barely  started training for it. The haze  of course didn't help. 

It all started last year when I decided to run a 50km race to celebrate my 50th birthday. But I left things a bit late and somehow the year slipped by and I didn't sign up for anything. So I did the next best thing. Sign up for one this year. Nevermind that I have not run a full marathon for the longest time. To make it worse,  this is a trail race not merely a road run and the cut off time for it is a whooping 15 hours which means it is probably going to be tough as hell.

To kick off the training, I went and did a 25km trail race in Thailand in January. That turns out to be relatively easy but after that, the momentum was not maintained and the weekly mileage continued to stay at 30 km, definitely not something that is adequate for the purpose. But last week decided to use the Muar Cross Country Run, which was a half marathon semi-trail race to relaunch the training. But the haze kicked in and I lost 1 more week. And with lots of races and photoshoot assignment coming up in the next few weeks, plus the haze, I really don't think I can prepare sufficiently for it.

And how do one train for a trail race of 50km when Singapore is all so built up and the only trail we have is MacRitchie and Bukit Timah which while we called the latter a hill is just a small little mound in comparison.. There  going to be a climb of at least 1.5km with total ascent of 3.5km. Where to find such altitude to train in here?

Anyway, the next few weekends, haze permitting, will see me traversing Bukit Timah and MacRitchie and at least once every week I will be at Mt Faber trying to make the best of whatever we  have, for what it is worth. Anybody care to join me?

Running in the Haze

Past week with the PSI shooting way past the safety limit,  runners in Singapore and some part of Malaysia have been left without their weekly fix. 

Of course a little bit of haze couldn't put off people like me though. Me and the sidekick, we did a run on Tuesday evening when the PSI was about 130 in the unhealthy zone. How does it feel like running in the haze? We started from our usual place at the foot of the block next to the park connector. We then ran the usual route to Pasir Ris Beach Park. By  the time I hit 3km, my throat felt so dry and irritated. So this was how it feel like to run in the haze. I had to stop  for a drink at the toilet something that I don't usually do for such short distance. By then the eyes was also watering and the air smell bad. 

On Thursday, the PSI crossed the 200 mark.Still we decided to go out for a run but at the gym. But to get to the gym, we have to walk 900 metres from our place. This time the air was really bad and I don't think I even want to try running in the open. We covered our mouths with our towels and went direct to the gym. I think we would look like a clown if we wear a mask and run.

So the conclusion is - if the haze is real bad as in the naked eyes can see it, then it is not good to run in it.  Go do some cross training - swimming is not recommended though. Better to use this period as a recovery period and rest the legs.

Growing old and slow

My long runs have been going down hills. Maybe it is a sign of old age or maybe I have really been super lazy. All along I thought my fitness level was still fairly decent and can run at a decent speed.

Then I did a long run in March from the office back home. Distance was about 23 km. It took me and the sidekick nearly 3 hours to complete. I was surprised that we took so long. I thought we ran at quite  a hard effort and the pace felt more like 6.30 than the 7.25 that it turned out to be. I  attributed it to running at night

As the sidekick has signed up for the full marathon for the Sundown, she had to train and I tagged along. The next long run above 20 km was a 25km run at the East Coast Park. We started at 11.30 pm and crossed into midnight. We were supposed to join the Punggol/Newton Runners but were late and ran at a furious pace to catch up. Or rather we thought it was a furious pace. It turned out to be 7.05 pace and I was struggling towards the last quarter. Previously for my longer road runs, I have still been able to at least manage a sub 7 mins pace and so I was really surprise that I was now doing above 7. Again I blame it on the night run.

To prove my theory right, I did a 16km run in the late afternoon and the pace was exactly 6.30. Yes it has to be the night running. So for the next long run of 25km, we started at 6am. And guess what, this time we took 3 hours 22 mins! There goes my night running theory!

So we switched back to night run and decided to start the next one at 4am. Target was 30km never mind the timing. I bombed at 15km! For I think the first time in my running life, I hit the wall at an premature 15km! It was so totally unexpected! I knew I didn't start off well. It was one of those run where you struggle to start and every little step seems to be such a bit effort. But I thought I could shrugged it off once I warm up. The warm up never came though. I ran out of steam and couldn't run at all. My whole body just felt like collapsing. The sidekick who was by then way in front ran back when she saw I was staggering. Lack of water? Couldn't be. I was carrying a hydration bag with 1 ltr of water and was drinking at about every 2km.  Hyponatremia? Nah I didn't think I was drinking that much. My waterbag was still more than half full. In the end, I walked another 5km and took a bus home.

So the night theory didn't work. The truth is probably I am getting slower and slower. Sign of old age or whatever. But the next run at 11 pm I went below 7min pace. 6.50min to be precise. Distance 20km. Still got hope?

Long Slow Run

Did a long slow run on Saturday night. It has been a long time since I ran a 25km run. So long that I don't remember when. Of course, in recent months, I have done races of up to 38km and a few trail races. But those don't count since they were mostly run/walk affairs. So I didn't realise how unfit I was. I mean I have run up to 20km on some weekends so another 5km more? Should be piece of cake. Right? Wrong. 

It all started when the sidekick decided she wanted to do another full marathon and since she hasn't done one at night, she promptly went to sign up for the Sundown Marathon even though I told her I wasn't going to accompany her. But of course me being the nice guy, and despite myself not signing up, I found myself on Saturday night at the East Coast Park fighting sleep and tiredness and running side by side with her. 

Weather was great after an earlier downpour and we ran at what I thought was a fairly fast pace trying to catch up with the group of Newton/Punggol runners that we were supposed to join. We of course as usual were late. But out "fast pace" actually turns out to be more like easy pace (at least to most other runners) and before too long I found myself panting hard. At least I completed the first half in one piece and slightly ahead of the sidekick. But it was a different thing after that as she decided to pick up the pace and soon I found myself lagging behind. The sidekick has in fact become the hero. 

Thankfully, I managed to survive 25km run although now my legs are shot. Luckily we had decided to do just 25km while the group ran up to 30km. Any longer and I think I would have started walking. As it is, it took me close to 3 hours to do the, 25km definitely not fast pace by any standard. Sighed. That really show how unfit I am now. Maybe this is a good opportunity for me to catch up on my runs. But then again, I think I rather enjoy my run/walk in the trails.

Running Hills

Some tips from one of the top trail runners in the world

Recovery

The marathon is almost a week old. Maybe this comes a bit late but still it's worth a read I hope since there always a race round the corner.

Here are my secret weapons for a quick recovery:

1. Stretch immediately after the race

2. Take a cold shower as soon as possible after the race

3. Eat a good meal. For a good cheap local recovery drink - go for teh halia yes ginger tea

4. I like to put an ice pack on my knees and lie down with my legs raised up against the wall

45 Have a nap in the afternoon after the race

These are the standard prescribed advices from the pro:

Active.com Chow Chug Chill

Running Times Hydration, Powernap, hydrotherapy, Instead of forcing out potentially helpful inflammation, aid your body in flushing out superfluous inflammation. Drink plenty of water, elevate your legs above your heart for a few minutes whenever you get a chance, take an ice bath and consume more anti-inflammatory foods. Whole grains, healthy fats from avocados and nuts, beans, leafy greens, and wild-caught fish promote an anti-inflammatory response in the body, but don't prevent local, potentially beneficial, reactionary inflammation.

Yahoo Sports Food, liquid, dry clothes, swimming, light exercise, light stretch, recovery run, sleep, cold bath

Quite similar right? And at minimum cost