7 km jer?

“Alaaa..7.7km jer..it’s like about 3km shorter than 10km? ok kot…”

WRONG.

It was very unfortunate for me as I did not have time for trainings. I was in peak period that went on for about 2 and half weeks. Once the peak was over it was about a week or so to the race day. Semangat berkobar-kobar untuk terus pergi lari lepas Subuh and terus pergi kerja lepas tu.

Tapi masa sentiasa mencemburui aku. [Atau mungkin kah semangat sudah tidak setia padaku?] hehe..

Meetings in the morning makes it difficult for me to do my training before work. Sedar-sedar dah Sabtu.

Yeahh.. Tak guna nak menyesal. It was time, I just had to do it.

We were there at 7.30am. Ali met few of his cycling mates, but no one that I know of. The place was quite disarrayed. The counters to collect water and snack pack for different categories were located at different places. Well, not that I am complaining, I mean it’s good in the sense that people won’t flock up at only one place just to collect the mineral water. But, maybe they could do a bigger signage to make it clearer. We had to ask around and I had difficulties to identify their volunteers as their official colors are black or white t-shirts. Couldn’t really differentiate the volunteers and the runners. I think volunteers should wear something bright like orange or red, so easy lah people to identify them.

The coupon looks SOMETHING like this. hehe.. where you are supposed to break the lines to be produced to the volunteers. Notice the coupon to collect water before the race is at the top rather than the most bottom? Bit difficult to tear it up dont u think? heeheh..

We met Dr Azman, Bach and girlfriend, Nana approaching to the flag off time. Nana is a runner, Bach had run 2-3 events before I think and last night was his first half marathon. Good job, man. You finished it. You got your medal. I am sure Nana is proud of you. On another note, Dr Azman is a real classic story. He didn’t register for the run, but Ayman who registered for half marathon, couldn’t make it as he had to work. So Azman decided to run for him. He did it. Semangat you kental la Man… congrats. Kalau i…i dah naik van blk ke finishing line dah kot..

The 7.7km category was flagged of at 9pm. I was at the entrance half an hour earlier. There were sooo many people in my category. But I didn’t seem to see any familiar faces. I saw a lot of school kiddos and small children running for the category. I felt maybe it was because of the shorter distance. Not like it’s a 10k run! [confident betul].

Semakin lama, kandang tu semakin penuh, semakin ramai. People are pushing here and there. We were standing soooo close to each other for half an hour. When it was about to start, the participants were hailing “wooohooooooo”, put their hands in the air.. maybe being over semangat, they produced their bau-bau yang harum dari ketiak while hailing to the FT minister, who officiated the event. Shit, too close, man…too close. And you’re tall and I am just at your arm’s length. So, knock it off, mate! Hehe.. JK.

The route was ok, at first. Flat. So I ran. I targeted to run at least 85% of the whole running thingy. But flat is bad. My legs were painful. At one point, it started to be hilly. There were sooo many people running. The air was just so still, that I could not breathe. I stopped running, that I thought I was gonna faint. “Please don’t make a scene, bitch. Please don’t. just keep on walking”. I went away from the crowd, found myself a space on the pavement. Then I wanted to run again, but it was too painful to run. My legs just wouldn’t co-operate. Adakah ini cramp? Tak tahu apa rasanya cramp. But I just kept on walking, walaupun sakit. Rasa kelakar bila budak-budak kecik (7-10 yrs old) berlari-lari dengan pantasnya memotong. Adoiiihhh..loser giler rasa. Budak-budak ni macam seronok jer main lari-lari. It’s like a game to them…while I suffer. Haha.. Bagus, budak-budak.. you start very early. Don’t wait until your bums are big like mine sampai dah berat nak lari. :)

Scenery was exquisite. I loved it. I loved the smell of the night air, and when I passed by some wooded area, the smell of pokok dalam hutan, oh so refreshing and rejuvenating. There were not many cars, and it was quiet, I just love it very much. I enjoyed the run. And the crowd, although I did not know anyone. However, because of the unfamiliarity of the race area, I felt that the run was taking me forever to finish. After half an hour of running, there was a signage saying “Congratualtions, you have achieved 3km. You have another 18km more to go”. I know it's not for me, but.... Baru 3km?????????? Haihh.. Oh, but the water station location was sufficiently good, I think. Quite happy for that.

Approaching the finishing line, I realized that the concourse was not as happening as the ones held in Dataran Merdeka. No loud music, no show, concerts, or demonstrations like they usually have while waiting for other runners to arrive. No cheering for the participants at the finishing line, at least not at the 7.7km area. No mascots. Macam so formal kinda thing? Maybe because its in Putrajaya, the governments’ area, so kene senyap n quiet, tak boleh havoc2 maybe? I don’t know. To be short, tak meriah sangat.

But I must say that the concourse area was sooo clean. No bottles/cups/food packets lying around on the floor. There were enough waste bins around and a lot of helpers to clean up too. So, that was good. All in all, I would say it was good experience altogether. I wouldn’t say it was badly organized, but I would think that there are more things that need to be improved.
I finished in 1.20 hrs for the 7.7k. Bad, yes. But I was still happy because it was my first run (literally) this year. So, I can say that it was my first exercise for the year. Hehe..






Congratulations to Ali that finished his half marathon in less than 3 hrs, better than what he targeted for.

Congratulations to every participants that completed the run. Especially the full marathoners. I know I will never be at your place.

AAhhh...I wish I had brought my camera along.

Current condition: bed-ridden. Sakit pinggang, sakit betis, sakit peha, sakit segala-galanya. Macam lari full marathon 2 round berturut-turut teruknya.