A solitary 18km

I had a late night, and after sleeping barely 2 hours, I woke up to do some reading...yikes...Ate some peanuts and was feeling quite stuffed when I went back to try to catch a short nap. Tossed and turned for an hour, before deciding to wake up at 5am to get an early morning run in...haha. Then I won't have to do the MF run in the evening, which I might not get time to do anyway.

Took a banana and off I went, already having decided to revisit this long, straight to/fro road from my place all the way up along Upper Serangoon Road, to the end of Ponggol Road. The last time I did this route must have been more than a year. The morning breeze was quite cold, and it took me a while to get warmed up. I could do a reasonable 5min pace in that cool morning setting. As I passed the many eateries and coffee-shops along Serangoon Road, it struck me that there were people taking their late supper or early breakfast...haha. The smell of food couldn't invoke my senses, as I was feeling rather sleepy then.. I tried to stay alert, and imagined myself running on actual race day with very little sleep. Otherwise, my legs felt good, and I just maintained at that comfortable pace, taking care not to over-stride and tiring myself.

As I passed Serangoon River, it reminded of the start point just ahead where I gathered with Ultra, Alvo, Mika and a few more for the NTU 168km Run, waiting for our eventuak winner Lim Nghee Huat, whom we were supposed to pace...nice memories. I continued on, and soon went over the Sengkang Bridge and all the way to Pongool MRT. That stretch reminded me of the time when I ran alone at about the same time into that quiet road leading to the Ponggol Jetty, where I was chased by a pack of stray dogs...Brrr! I finished up the first bottle of Gatorade mix in my fuel-belt, before proceeding to do a loop around the EdgePlains area. My time showed 50min...hmm, should have covered about 9.5km.

As I ran back on the return, lots more runners and early exercisers were out along the roads and bridge. The air was still cool. I decided to increase pace after I have covered about 12km so I could get back home before the sun is up. It was nice weather to run in, and though the traffic had started to build up, I was lucky enough to be able to run through most of the traffic junctions. Took 40min to finish the approximately 8.5km return journey, completing the whole 18km flat road run in 1.5hrs.

Distance: 18km__Time: 1hr30min__Pace: 5min/km