Friday, March 06, 2009

Breaking The Barrier...

By Frank

The first long run will always be the toughest after returning from injury. But it's this barrier that everyone needs to break to make a come back. And this is what I just experienced this morning.

After laying off for a month plus, I finally had the chance to revisit the Hartamas route again this morning. I have done a few 10KM runs prior to this, but it's this morning's 21KM that will be tell me where I stand currently.

After having done a 10KM run yesterday evening with Lynn at the Lembah Kiara park, we both found ourselves at the Bukit Aman carpark 10 hours later. It's good to be back at this training route and at 5.30am sharp, we hit the streets. I started pretty well managing to run along side Lynn till Plaza Sri Hartamas when I started to struggle with the gradient. Slowly began to fall slightly back but still managing to keep a close distance to her. Arrived at our refueling station and had a quick drink before resuming.

The return trip was rather a difficult one. Just after resuming the run, I felt my stomach bloating up, probably due to the water intake. Was just glad it wasn't bad till I had to stop for a toilet break. Arriving at the Duta highway crossover, saw both of us took a pretty long wait to cross the busy road as the morning rush hour has begun. After successfully crossing it, I began to to slow down. Tiredness took over and my legs were sore. I was gasping for air and my stride length shorten. At this point, I was just trying to stay in touch with Lynn as she slowly widen the gap. At times, I do want to ask her to go ahead without me as I was slowing her down, but I did not. I kept myself going for one and the only reason, I didn't want her to run alone as I just don't feel anything particularly good about safety, especially when a friend is a female.

Further ahead going into Kenny Hills and back at the Bank Negara stretch, I continued to slow Lynn down as she waited for me. And just opposite the commuter station, I did not realise a car turning in from behind. It caught me by suprise and I stop instantly thus causing a jab on my left chest. Yes, that's where the heart lies. I slowed down even more as I slowly massage the area of pain before it went away as I near Padang Merbok. And so from here on, we made our way to the finish back at where we started as we completed our 21KM run in 01:56:42.

Though I was really tired and my legs were sore, I was just glad I made it back in the end. At the time of writing, my right leg where my knee injury was, was twitching a little and it felt weird. But there was no discomfort although I had to wear my knee guard for caution reasons. And most importantly, I successfully broke this barrier and thus will be looking forward to more of it as the Sundown Marathon quickly approaches!

Last but not least, I thank my friend and running mate Lynn for waiting up for me as she ran a blistering training run. Well done!

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