ok, let me start with my epic Sat briefly first.
morng 2 touch games.
evening 1.25 contact games.
was a good saturday. the blazing hot in the morning and a sudden massive downpour later in the evening. the touch games went well; won the Womens, lost the Mixed (against our stronger team) but well played for both! (:
evening played for my club in the last 10mins. was able to do one good pass to juan coming in at the wing but didn't have enough time to finish it off. then helped another club play 10s, coz they didn't have numbers. full out. didn't want to give my 100%, not because it wasn't my club, but because i didn't want to be that sore for the next day nor risk any injury. hahas
but because everyone gave their best, did their best and i felt it, hence, i gave my best as well. could have been harder in my tackles; missed a few. but assisted a few tries. (: was quite a good game i must say. 2nd round last yr, the team against the same opposition was 89-0. hahahahs. yea, and this time, it was 50-28 if i'm not wrong. maybe coz it's 10s instead of 15s.. but i really enjoyed myself.
that's the thing about team sport.
when everyone starts giving their best and not only playing for the club but for each other, it just makes things a whole more special and meaningful. words can't really describe the distance covered. (:
and so, whole day, i was stretching it out. and secretly worried for next day.
coz, i finished my saturday by 9.30pm and got home by 10pm. wah. ate bath and add some carbs for dinner before 11pm and forced myself to be in bed before 12am, and abit anxious coz i know i've got less than 8hours for my sore legs to recover.
and so. woke up at an unearthly time of 5.30am.
the moment i woke up, i felt the weight of the world on my legs, shoulders and neck. ahahas.
sore to the core, despite wearing my trusty recovery Skins to slp.
ate the microwaveable AuntyJenna's waffles for some energy food.
ahahha. still early. so played candycrush.
soon. found myself parking illegaly beside the army market food court to go nicholl highway. many ppl parked there as well. i guess there were better places to park, but that was ok for me.
walked to open field beside nicholl highway and i realize i was just 30mins before flag off time.
and even before anything, my legs were sooree alrdy. tsk tsk.
to sum up the race first, i've never felt so proud about completing any runs before.
this by far gg to be the most memorable one, being my first.
and my journey was completed with Zara. (: pacing each other, encouraging each other and just making the loong 14km seemed so bearable and awalkinthepark (ok. this is an understatement).
ok. the 2 most memorable long runs in my life were 1) the 10k Salomon trail run at tampines bike parks. lotsa steep climbs i tell you. and i completed it in 1h 10mins. not a fast timing, but its not my kind of timing. hahas. idk how i got that kind of timing. i hate long d, but i'm doing it to keep up my cardio work. but it was good. maybe coz of the nature of the run and some more at my old homie trail where i used to go.
2) the energizer night trail run. did quite well there coz though it was just 7km, the climbs were steep. and steep meaning, there were ropes to assist you in ur 'run' up. hahhahs. everyone was climbing. and its at lorong asrana, in the night, pitch back, with headlights. and i guess i did quite a good timing because i didn't want to be alone in the dark so i'm always pushing myself to run further to the next group of runners. ahhahahas.
anway, those are just runs with climbs.
but this run was just different.
more challenging in an interesting way.
this urbanathlon, 9 obstacles. 14 km.
here's a vid from FB.
here's the obstacles and route.
and its the first time they're finally opening up to the ladies.
never done anything more than 12km before.
ok, it was easier that i thought. not because it was easy or i'm damn fit or what, but because, prior to the run, i was really psyching up myself to tell myself that the obstacles were tough and so on. my top 2 fears were the parallel bars and the inclined monkey bars. ahhas. in the end, the monkey bars were so easy. i guess coz they're spaced not so far out. but the parallel bars were just... grrrr.
failure of any of the obstacles meant an addition 5mins to ur timing.
ok, i shall do this systematically.
(shall insert photos soon when they're up on the web. photos are from Men's Health FB and Running Shots on FB as well. regret not running with my cam)
the run was flagged off in waves to prevent congestion.
we set off in the last wave. takin' it chill. and the emcee was super funny. he was like.. "and now... we present to you.. The. Last wave. for. Men Health' Urbanathalon 2013....*inserts digital crowd clapping sound*. even though u are in the last wave, it does not mean that u'll be the last..." and he went on to make it that it was a grand thing to be in The Last Wave. ahhhaahahas
and beeeepppp... off we go.
after running about 2km down the F1 track part along with nice sun..
obstacle 1: Wall Street.
basically its to climb up this container (those bigass cargo metal ones) 2.6m high with a 1m step up. ok, been long since i've scaled a wall. last time was when i was damn young (like 10 yrs old kind. light and fit from all the 'Catching'). and...i couldnt do it! so disappointing but there was this japanese-looking guy runner who helped me up after helping my friend up as well. (: and he continued to help others. hahas. so nice. (: so considered it as obstacle-cleared. hahas.
and less than 1km..
obstacle 2: the Corporate Ladder.
8 flights of stairs of the viewing platform for the Floating field at marina bay. knn. 800 steps in all. felt like an incorporation of the swissotel vertical marathon. hahas. lotsa ppl walking up. 90%.
wanted to jog up 2 step-up at a time. coz vertical is my forte la and to end that pain up is to do it fast. all that lower power trng we do for rugby comes handy. so both of us jogged up if we had the opportunity.
once we're done and down the last flight, u can feel ur thighs burning. had to stretch my hammies to prevent my back from stiffening up. and by then i couldn't decipher if the ache was from ytd's game or the run so far. it doesn't matter though. ahhahas
next, abt 2 km down MBS to...
obstacle 3: the Quantum Leap.
5 sets of horizontal beams 1.3m high. was easy. did this before in trng with the garden wall at CCAB. hahhas. but they had sand paper so it cuts ur hands and knees if u're not careful.
enjoyed this station much. felt likka pro.
like those robbers in hk dramas where they had to jump over fences on the run to get away from police. ahhahs
and then less than a km to..
obstacle 4: the Network.
by then, it was a bottle neck. had to queue. been long since i've climbed the nets. hahas i grew up with such nets ok. father poon used to bring me to the playground to play. so this was homeground for me. AHHAS. but it was muddy. and since everyone was on it, it was shaky and moving slow. means, it required more energy to keep balance and remain on the net while the front guy is waiting for the front front guy and so on. hahas.
ok and this was a loooongggg run up to Fort Canning through Clarke Quay and all.
basket. after up the overhead bridges, we faced hills and more hills. the hills felt like an obstacle itself. there was one particular hill that was for abt 150m with an inclination that looked like 30 deg or even 45 if its possible. zara and i sprinted up just for fun coz we wanted to end it fast. wha. when we reached the top and slowed down, u can feel a gush of lactic acid. and soon enough, u're facing with stairs and more stairs. and so... after duno how long....
obstacle 5: Workload
carry 20kg of wet sandbag and run 100m.
no problem. again, we did this before in rugby trngs when we had to run round the field or workout with the more atas sand bags (red or blue coloured ones, back in the days at SA) anyways, not all the bags were 20kg. some were i think less than 15kg. maybe 12kg. of course, i picked up the light one. no one ran la. everyone walked through it. hahas. halfway through, there was this girl struggling, with her boyfriend. u can't go back coz we're given one attempt for this, and failure would mean the 5mins penalty (if we cared la) hahas. her boyfriend took the heavier one. and when she dropped her bag, she couldn't lift it up; and it also didn't make sense to swop with her bf or what. she just had to do it. but idk y her bf didn't want to drop his sandbag to help her bring the sandbag up to her shoulders la. anyway, my partner and i tried to help her but i think she like shagged out alrdy coz she couldn't even get it up her shoulders with both of us helping. so i heroically passed her my lighter one and took hers. (secretly achieving my dream of being a fireman- helping others in distress. wahhahs). her bag was probaby abt 17kg. the problem was not about walking with it but trying to get it up ur shoulders. had do a power-clean-like move to bring it up and being careful not to twist my goingtobestiff back.
(: felt so proud of myself. hahahhahas. but the mud water made sweaty shirt more gross with mud water, having more than half the journey to go still.
water points here and there, still up at Fortcanning park where i saw a couple drinking their isotonic drink with a 交杯酒 fashion. hahahhahha oookkkk.
obstacle 6: Monkey Business
5m monkey-bar. inclined. mentioned about it earlier. they ran out of chalk. so the bars were abit slippery. but just keep the momentum and it was fun. e bars were quite high off the ground too, so it was another motivation for me to not drop and swing through it well.
happy that i was done with it w/o much effort struggle. (:
finally down the hill, suppoting the saying of "what goes up must come down".
not so friendly on the knees. and by then, my k-tape on my knees were coming off from all the abrasion, water and movement. and by then, most of the runners were walking. quite surprised and zara and i could still go on. we took some walks, but managed to paced up again. hahas. we're trained with intervals and recovery, so our pattern of run are always like sprint-jog-sprint-jog and not jog full out. but of course, with 14k, no sprints la just faster jogs to compensate for the fast walks.
obstacle 7: Mind Map
roughly back near Clarkquay. this one just some obstacle with tyres and boxes. they weren't really strict with the girls coz the obstacles were really too far out. can't jump safely enough. so touching the ground was ok la, just show that u put in effort can liao. HAHAHS. quite a forgetful obstacle though.
about 2km down was the next obstacle...
obstacle 8: Lateral Move.
BAH. failed this one.
2 sets of 6-m parallel bars.
must bring urself across by pure brutal strength of ur arms for the first set and using ur core for the 2nd set. the arms one was mad, i think i travelled like 1m and like drop down. ahhahas. 2nd set was easy. coz again, did it before during trng. our trng was much tougher. coz our for our trng, every step we took with our hands (using the agility ladder) we had go down for one push up before moving to the next square... for about 12-16 times. anyway. since i dropped on the first set, i have failed the obstacle. ): hAHHS. but its ok! at least i tried.
and another longer run back to under the fly over of ECP....
passing through the F1 tracks again.
obstacle 9: Down and Dirty.
hahahs. probably my most fav coz its the most useful one. run through the container filled with mud and ice (those containers at the back of trucks to fill up with sand).. abt 1m deep. and surprise to know that there's still so much ice despite all the heat and runners. everyone was shouting "milo peng" "teh peng here!" ahhahs. coz the water of the diff containers were of diff colour. shades of brown or grey (possibly from the un-filtered concrete)
took out our shoes first after choosing the best container (which didnt make a diff). super cold. should have slowered my pace and stayed in it longer. it was really a good and probably the best solution for recovery. but it was gross. hahahhas
and while putting on my shoes, aaallmosttt crammped up my left calf. felt it and immediately release the pressure off. HEING. hahas.
and soon, it was the last stretch of 750m to the end point!!!!
i was damn happy k.
both of us sprinted our last stride back. i tried to give my all but my legs were heavyy.
and ta-dah!!! we made it. hahahs.
what.a.journey.
first time running with a friend in an event like this, and it was really fun. dont really know her very well, only trained with her a few times during our combined trngs. got to know a friend better and made the journey even more memorable. hahas
to sum it up, i'm proud of myself coz i was able to give my best and look forward.
and it was more bearable than i expected it to be. though it was 14km, we took about 2hr 20mins with all the obstacles, waiting time and so on. but I must say that up the fortcanning park was The One la. hahas. and imagine they put the stairs obstacle (obstacle 2) at last. ahhas. i think i'll just roll down. and honestly, i thought that we would be the most cuii one around. coz most of the guys looked so fit and buff to a certain extent. but i'm quite proud to say that we overtook some of the guys and had the same pace as some of the other guys.
i like this kind of event that its not just purely on a long run. coz it really evens out the race actually.
glad to meet some other friends at the run too! saw about 10 of them.. and somemore familiar faces i always see in my respective schs/ sporting scenes. some were fellow participants marshalls, some tending the stalls. and of course, my awesome church friends ! its always with these 2 guys. (: been through quite alot tgt, not just in church but the thailand mission buddies as well. (:
homed. rested. totally nua-tiao on the sofa after a loong bath.
supposed to have trng at 10am. but of course i've totally exhausted all my energy.
and dinner with the nonsense gang. (:
i love this wkend.
and i just wanna thank God for keeping me safe and allowing me to have so much good memories.
