Newton Challenge 2012

One thing I have never understand is why people will pay good money to run loops at East Coast Park when one can run for free there everyday. So it never fail to amaze me that thousand of people signs up for the multi loops Newton Challenge Race every year. What was the attraction? So this year since I was free, I decided to drag myself down to witness this spectacle for myself.

The race had already started when I go there at about 6 am. I parked at Carpark F2 and walked up to the Bougainvillea Terrace to take some pictures. But it was too dark and I had to wait until it became brighter before I can start taking photos. My wait was rewarded with a beautiful sunrise and I managed to get a few shots of the sunrise with runners in the foreground. 

Too bad the trees were blocking the full view of the sun unlike this photographer who managed to take a beautiful shot.

The race comprised of 2 categories 18km and 30km. Because of this and probably also because of the high registration fees, only "hardcore" runners turned up. I think there were not more than 5000 runners in total. I guess quite a number of runners are using this race as a final warm up for the SCMS in December like this group of official SCMS pacers from Team BMW.

The race was also well supported by runners from Punggol Runners and the Newton Running Club who were pacing the runners.

I finally understand the reasons for the runners choosing this race over the more highly marketed Adidas King of the Road when at the end point, runners were given a cold towel on top of the finisher medal. What a nice touch! And there were free food galore. Bananas, watermelon, biscuits, ice cream and even soya bean curd! Something that I have not seen except at the North Face 100 Challenge.

The Mok siblings Mok Yin Ren and Mok Yin Rong won the Men 30km and Women 18km races respectively and walked away with $300.00 cash and $300 worth of product vouchers each. But the best was the lucky draw winners who walked away with Ipad and Ipod.

From the feedbacks from runners, distance markers were on the dot, there were ample cold Pocari Sweat isotonic drinks and it was almost a perfect race for everybody - except for the heat. But I guess that is something the organsier cannot do anything more other than providing the cold water and the cold towel.

New Balance Real Run 2012

Haven't take part in this event for the past 3 years and wasn't going to this year as well although this has traditionally been one of my favourite race. But ever since they moved the race from Sentosa to Changi, it has lost its glamour and uniqueness. The 3-in-1, road, trail, sand still attracts a lot of interest but the long boring stretch along Changi Coastal Road and the long run in the finish is a real put down.

Nevertheless, I dragged my butt out of bed on Sunday to go down to take some photos. As per the norm in Singapore, races are super unfriendly to supporters. The roads are closed to vehicles from an ugodly hour, there are no place to park cars, and the race catered buses are for runners only. Even when I thought I tried to park further away, the carpark at the next nearest place at the Coconut Grove is closed to all but the ambulance. Sighed.........

Anyway, I managed to walk to the beach and positioned myself there. There was no way I was going to walk another 4km to the race site. Had some time to kill. Ate my breakfast and waited for the runners to appear.

The first lot was the increasingly common sighted Kenyans. Seriously I wonder why these people bother to travel all the way here to take part in these small events when the prize money is so small. And I heard the money is pooled and shared among the whole squad!

Then the bulk of the 10km came. There were too many of them and I soon gave up trying to snap individuals, choosing to just mechanically snap away. Not much of a challenge but hopefully participants who see their faces in the Running Shots facebook album or here will appreciate it.

Although the 10km runners were flagged off later, the timing of the flagged off resulted in the main body of the 21km running right smack into the slower 10km runners. Poor them. Having to struggle on the sand was bad enough but having to weave through the runners as well. Also because of this, I was not able to take many pictures of the faster 21km runners as they well sandwiched between all the 10km runners.

Here are the photos.

Photos can also be found on Running Shots Facebook page where there are more photos taken by friend, Marcus Lim.

The North Face Run with Kami Semick

The week before the Singapore TNF 100 flag off, TNF Singapore had a special visitor from out of town. Kami Semick, ultra marathoner and TNF sponsored athlete. She came to give a talk to the runners and wind up her visit with a run at the MacRitchie Reservoir.

Runners were invited to run with her and about 50 or so turned up on Saturday.  Most of the runners ran 1 round whilst she and a few others went 2 rounds.

A few of us from last year TNF trail run series and Running Lab were roped in to help marshal the runners. Of course, most of us could only smell her dust but that did not stop us from having a nice time.

TNF 100 Singapore 2012

Jinx? Fated? 3 times bad luck? How do I ever start to describe this? How could I once again mess up a simple 25km run?

Ever since 2010 when I first did this event and although I finished it, I wasn't satisfied with the way I ran it and vowed to do it properly. So the following year, I trained hard, even formed a team to prepare for it but at the last minute, had to sit it out with a injury that forced me to halt running for a long time. So this year, although the long runs wasn't adequate, I felt fit and confident enough to finally be able to close this chapter of my running in good stead. Instead, just barely halfway into the race, I broke the year's injury free record and busted my ankle on a part of the trail that I had ran countless time and eventually had to DNF!

The day had started well enough. We reached MR bright and early to secure a car lot. Walked around, meet up with friends, took some pictures before we were flagged off at 8am. The earlier start compared to past years were warmly welcomed. We could at the very least avoid the hot noon sun.