Runaholics @ MacRitchie

I was still nursing a cold on Saturday; I decided to do the Nike Runaholics 25km, instead of the orginally planned MR25 35km Progressive Run. My blocked nose have been giving me sleeping problems for the past few days, and with a late night wedding reception on Saturday night, I would not be in a good position to finish the very challenging 35km MR route.

I tossed about in bed till about 4am...gotta be the excitement and the effects of the wine from the 'fun' wedding dinner on Saturday night. There were 6 tables of SAFRA MF Runners at the Sheraton Towers for Jaime and Ong's wedding. The food was great, the red wine good, and the company was fun. Got up at 6.30am, with only about 2 hours of sleep, and a 'quite stuffy' nose. Went to MR to do the 5th Nike Runaholics Run. Met lots of folks...SgRunners, the K2 team, MR25 Runners, SAFRA MF Runners, and of course, many new runners for the Nike Run...wow..seemed like half of Singapore's Runners were at MR this morning...haha....had difficulty getting a car-park.

After exchanging pleasantries with many runnning kakis (apologies to those I did not verbally acknowledge during the run, cos I was just too shagged...I probably gave you a half wave of acknowledgement yah? :), getting a brief from Stephen, off we went towards the zig-zag bridge to do the first 5km, comprising mainly of the 4.8km x-country route. I did quite a steady pace, possibly a little too fast at times. I slowed down a little, and just before hitting Lornie Road, overtook Fahmy and gave him some words of encouragement..this is the first time he is trying the route, and he was doing very well. Since I started off at the front, I did not get to see Brokie, Vincent, Stacy, Sotong, Cokiee, Superboy, Cosmic, loneshark, Andy, acleong, Charmaine and the rest of the SgRunners during the Nike Run, save at the start and after completion. At the end of 5km, I was back at the MR carpark, and Colleen came from behind. We chatted a little, before I moved on to do the 10km MR route from the Northern Trails. As I climbed the slopes at the front part of Northern Route, it struck me that my breathing was not too regulated, and my nose was still stuffy. I was more of my mouth to breathe, and that made me even more thirsty. I was trying to maintain a slower pace, since there was another loop of this 10km ahead. Ronnie started to pace me in the first 10km loop, as he was not too familiar with the route.

There were only a few water points for the Nike Run, and one of them was at the Golf Course area as we came out from Nothern Trails. I was glad I brought my fuel belt along, although I had only 2 bottles of Gatorade mix with me. As we proceeded through Sime Trail, Jelutong Tower, and the open Gold Course area, we could feel the heat trapped by the haze, although the rays of the sun weren't really that strong. I chatted with Ronnie a little, and asked him to walk through the 'tree-roots' area, to conserve energy. After the short walk, we proceeded to run along the trail to the left of the exercise area, all the way back to Lornie Trail and then reaching the carpark in 1hr28min. I took a PowerGel just before reaching this water point, and was happy to flush down the gel with water. Ronnie moved ahead of me for the final 10km loop, and I trailed him from about 50m throughout. My legs stll felt ok for this final 10km, but the initial slopes at the Northern Trail were making my breathing heavy, especially with my stuffy nose.

The journey for the remaining 6km or so as we came out from the Northern Trails a second time was shared with 1-2 more Nike Runners, one of which was a tall lanky Indian with good strides. Ronnie went further ahead as we hit Sime Trail, and I caught up with the Indian Runner at Jelutong Tower. All the way to the tree roots area, I was running alongside him. I took my final walk at the tree-roots area, where the Indian runner went ahead. I saw him exiting Lornie Road...hmm, I didn't think that is part of the 10km route. I chose to run back along the trails, and after some struggle (glycogen levels were low, and breathing was heavy), I finished in 2hr33min. Saw Bug, RealRunner, Ultra, TLR, sci, DO all having finished their 35km Progressive Run...all of them did very well! Ronnie was already done. I took a long walk to catch my breath, and took in lots of fluids. I was glad to have completed, especially in such trying conditions. Teelee was having fever and flu, and he went on to complete 35km...waah! All the SgRunners and SAFRA MF Runners who went for the Ruaholics Run and Progressive 35km did very well, hitting their training targets, and really depleted all their glycogen stores from any carbo-loading they have done for the past few days...hehe :)

Stacy and leh-lio came back shortly, and they went for an additional 5km...not enough mileage...*faint*. Fahmy and his friend came back and was famished from their 'birth giving' experience..haha. We had a quick wash-up, before proceeding to Adam Food Centre for the famous Prawn Noodle, Nasi Lemak and drinks. We were already planning for an additional portion to be added on to next week's Runaolics 25km at Marina Promenade. That should be the final LSD for me, and tapering for SCSM 42.195km to follow.

Distance: 25km__Time: 2hr33min__Pace: 6:08min/km