Thursday, May 27, 2010

A Date With 84...

By Frank

I will be leaving for Singapore tomorrow morning for my third ultra marathon and my second attempt at the 84KM distance at Sundown Marathon 2010. My travel mates will be Yip, Keat Seong and Jennifer before meeting up with Choi, Lawrence and Loke at Singapore. As usual, an entry before I leave for a big race.

As mentioned before in previous entries, my training leading up to this hasn't been on par. I told myself that I will continue on from where I left off at Macau Marathon 2009, but things didn't go too well after my fall at the Malakoff Interstate Fellowship Ride 2009/2010. Took me a while to return and although I did 2 full marathons, things didn't really shape up too well until the end of April 2010 when Keat Seong organised a few night runs where I put in some decent mileage. It was sufficient to bring a little back in me, but insufficient overall. A quick check on my training log revealed a mere 500KM running distance covered since 1 January 2010. The distance speaks for itself here.

Last year's attempt was to complete my first 84KM ultra marathon in the fastest time possible and to gain experience from it. I had a painful and yet memorable race but I was left disappointed at the finish line. I'm sure it will be more or less the same this year. Though there are more friends taking part in the ultra distance together with me with some running it their first time, things just won't be the same. Nevertheless, I look forward to be running with them from Haza, Cheang, Choi, Jeff, Richard, Tey and Yip. Not forgetting the ever inspiring Singapore Blade Runner and Adam One Arm Runner too. Lawrence, Loke, Keat Seong and Jennifer will be running the marathon distance instead.

I hope to participate in this year's The North Face Challenge running in the 100KM solo. But in order to qualify for that, I need to run an 84KM in a sub 10 hours time. Not an easy task and with my condition now, I believe it's near impossible. But I will still my give my best shot. This is a race where I will rely on experience rather than fitness and I do hope not to repeat the same mistake I did last year. Therefore, any time better than last year's timing of 12:08:16, I will be very happy. But if I can achieve that dream, it will be a bonus. After all, nothing is free in this world. I need to train for it and with the amount of training I had, I know my limits. In this area, I believe Yip stands a rather good chance though.

I survived Macau Marathon 2009 to be given another chance to run. I will give my all again at this race. There will be risk I'm taking but I'm sure Ngae will be looking after me at his "new home" for I dedicate this run for him. I will be wearing the special bib printed for the entire distance.

My race gear has been selected. And I thank my sponsors for giving me the best they carry. Not forgetting to my friends too for organising training runs and also your wishes. They were heard and I will remember it when I run. For now, I will rest myself for the assault on Changi and East Coast Park begins this 29 May 2010 at 6pm! To all running the Sundown Marathon 2010 regardless of distance, have an awesome one!

4 comments:

Yimster said...

You go Frank. Believe in yourself you can accomplish it ya! All the best and good luck.

Frank Chong said...

Thanks Yim. You have a good one too.

Kevin Siah said...

All the best! You can do it! Looking forward to your race report!

Frank Chong said...

Thanks Kevin. Give me some time eh. Need to reset my biological clock first. Hehe...