A 30km+ LSD, finally...

It started to drizzle as I was getting out the door for my 30km lsd with SAFRA MF. This will be the second last 30km+ run I will have before the SCSM05 Marathon. Strong winds were blowing, as I put on my pre-mixed powergel canister onto my fuel belt. I reached the Clubhouse at 6.45am, and saw Renohtaram, Cheow12 from SgRunners, as well as Eng Hwa and Goola. cosmic_wind was there as well. The rain got heavier and we waited for it to stop. Derrick, Kumaran, Yuen, Wong, Ong and Jaime all waited as well. A few other runners were with us too; Hock Soon, Lee Huat, Yean.

Finally the rains trickled down to a light one at 8am. We ran after a quick brief, and this morning, we will run from Telok Blangah, down to Keppel Road, then to Marina South all the way to the Superbowl Centre, making a loop and then going back up Keppel Road, before entering Sentosa for a 10km Real Run route, before making our way back along Telok Blangah Rd back to ClubHouse. That would have been a distance of 32km, as measured by trainer Ong's Polar r200sd. The weather was good for running, and we ran a good 6min/km pace interspersed with some faster dashes as and when the route allowed. We made a stop at Marina South after 11km for a water break. Along the way, bumped into a few SAFRA TP runners doing their 35km. After the break, we resumed at good speed all the way before making a quick toilet break along Keppel Road. From there, it was no nonsense running to the entrance of Sentosa. Another group decided to cut their run short, and headed back to Clubhouse.

As we entered Sentosa, I picked up pace and by the time we reached the visitor centre area, we had run 18km already. As we covered some slopes along the Real Run route, my knees started to ache a little, and I pushed on. By the time we hit tanjong beach, my ITB had flared up. I did not stop but slowed down drastically. I continued to run slowly until the 6km mark of the route has been covered and we made a final toilet stop. We waited for quite a bit here for Cheow and renohtaram to come in. After checking that they were familiar with the way back, our first group decided to push on. I started slowly again, after resting for a while. My ITB still hurt, and I ran slowly all the way up to the jungle trail. Ong had caught up by then with us, and from there, they pushed for the remaining 6km back to the ClubHouse. I felt ok, and by the time I was back at the sentosa entrance, my legs were tired. We had covered something like 29km by then. With 3km more to go, I chugged along, with the distance of Derrick, Kumaran and Ong drawing further away from me. I continued at a slower pace for the final stretch, before finally completing the run in 3hr12min. A check with Ong showed that we ran 32km. At least I have finished a 30km+ run these 2 weeks.

Looking forward to do another next Sunday. My legs felt sore from both PF & ITB. I did some stretches, and reverse draining of the legs (hmm...this feels good). After a quick bath, we met up at the nearby hawker centre for some simple fare.

Distance Ran:32km ___Time:3hr12min____Pace:5:59min/km
Average HR:154bpm___Max HR:170bpm____KCal: 2,472