SAFRA Army Half Marathon 2013

I was still tired from my 24 hours journey the day earlier and still suffering from the jet lag that I only managed to go to bed past mid night, with a help of Ezee Sleep, a concoction like its name suggest, was supposed to make you drowsy and help you to sleep I found on a 7 Eleven counter. Yes it works, but I kept waking up and only had intermittent sleep.

Ezee Sleep

My plan to enter the pen early did not work as I dozed off when I hit the snooze button on the alarm clock. I only went into the pen 15 minutes before the flag off. I started the race from the back of some 16000 strong crowd. I was trapped and had to weave through the crowd fighting for space to run.  The course was so narrow after 7 km, no wider than 2 meters on garden paths. I had to run on the grass, concrete pavement and the road kerb. It was tiring and hard on my leg from all the lateral movements.I took my first gel at KM 8, and a capsule of Hammer Endurolyte at KM 10. There were so many sharp turns and few bottlenecks. The worst was at KM 7.  I was lucky to have overtaken majority of the runners at that point. Some slower runners were held to a standstill up to 25 minutes.

I only managed to run my race after we left the garden path at KM 11 and tried to make up for the lost ground but it was too late. I felt tired and seem to have lost my speed. I cant press on even though the road was wide open in front of me. Then there was a long incline at KM 15. I took another gel and took a brief walk at a water station around KM 16. My intention was to sprint the remaining 5 km, but I felt rather heavy and was happy to just finish it. I ended up crossing the finish line in 1:43:46 and ranked 589 from a total of 15 727 finishers (top 4%). It should have been my PB in an official race, but it was short by some 600 meters.

Though I was a little disappointed, knowing that I can do much better than that since my average heart rate was just above Zone 1. I have to look at it positively as advised by my coach:


a) you need to arrive early 
b) you can still run well on a poor build up ie long travel hour 
c) it's not an easy PB course 
d) it's possible to run pretty quick in lower HR

Though the organisation especially the water station was superb, I still think the course was terrible for a half marathon this big.


Race Statistics:
Nett Time: 1:43:46
Gun Time: 1:44:33
Rank Total: 589 / 15 727 Finisher
Rank Male: 556 /14 258 Finisher
Rank Malaysian: unknown
Shoe: Asics Gel Excell 33



Run details on Garmin Connect:
SAFRA Army Half Marathon by Syafei at Garmin Connect - Details

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Kamus Loghat Muar / Tangkak

Aku dilahirkan di Muar (Muo kata orang Muar) dan dibesarkan di Tangkak. Walaupun bahasa melayu diambil daripada bahasa Johor/Riau, tetapi orang-orang Muar dan Tangkak mempunyai gaya bahasa yang sedikit berbeza apabila bertutur. Arwah Tok Tan aku misalnya, mempunyai gaya loghat yang 'distinctively Tangkak'. Banyak perkataan-perkataan yang biasa dituturkan masyarakat Muar dan Tangkak yang aku telah lupa. Jadi sebagai tribute  untuk Arwah Tok Tan dan orang-orang Muar / Tangkak, aku akan cuba untuk menyenaraikan sebanyak mungkin perkataan dalam loghat Muar / Tangkak apabila aku teringat. Ampar (sebutan Am-po) = Hamparan, permaidani Anu = Si folan = Dia ke tangkak dengan si anu tu, anak Noh Itik. Basan = pakaian basahan , pakaian harian Berlengas = Badan melekit Bersendor = Berdengkur Berteromba (sebut beteghombe) = Bermain-main, berlari-lari dan bersuka ria (kebiasaan oleh anak-anak kecil dalam rumah), Centong = Senduk Endut = kekasih - Kau dah ada endut ...
Read more

Hujan Emas di Qatar

Image
Lately makin ramai pula kawan-kawan rapat aku di Doha ni yang pulang ke Malaysia for good. Kadang-kadang rasa macam dah tak best pula tinggal di sini bila satu demi satu teman-teman yang rapat pergi. Baru-baru ni Rizal dan Zakiah meninggalkan Doha for good. Rasa sedih sangat, kerana Rizal adalah kawan pertama aku di Doha ni. Dia yang mengenalkan aku pada kawan-kawan Doha yang lain. Aku datang Doha ini pun setelah membaca blognya, 1001 Kisah Melayu Perantau  , yang memberi inspirasi dan keinginan untuk mencuba nasib di Qatar Darul Land Cruiser ni. Good Luck Rizal and Zakiah Kontrak aku dengan Qatargas ni pun akan tamat bulan November ni. Tak pasti dapat sambung ke tidak, kerana aku ni 'project based'. Kalau tak dapat sambung, dan tak dapat peluang-peluang lain di Qatar ni, maknanya aku juga akan menurut jejak langkah teman-teman yang telah mengucapkan 'Maassalamah' pada negeri tumpangan kami ni. Honestly aku suka Qatar. Isteri aku, Hani pun suka tinggal di sini. Kedua-du...
Read more

Dad to be

Image
Hani was constantly nauseated and tired since we got back from our Eid holidays. I suspected that she’s pregnant but she was scared or maybe too nervous to try the home pregnancy test kit. We had a couple of false alarms before. It would frustrate her if it turns out negative. Suddenly I received an SMS from her saying ‘mom to be’. I called her and she did the test at work. I was overjoyed. I broke the news to some of my work colleagues and decided to come home early. I took Hani to Al-Ahli hospital for test and consultation, but the only available slot was in 10 days. We can’t wait that long. So we went to Gulf Laboratory and she had a blood test. We had dinner while waiting for the result. We went to Thai Snack as Hani suddenly had a crave for tom yum. But she threw it all up when we finish eating. We went back to the laboratory and the result came positive. We were elated. I shook hand with the doc. Hani was 6 weeks pregnant. So all this time during Eid she was already pregnant, but...
Read more