A "Fool" Print

This year, the powerman race was held at Lumut again and it is the only official Asian qualifier race to the Duathlon World Championships Power Zofingen held in Switzerland. There were 3 race categories in which for individual, the distance covered was 11km Run -> 64 km Bike -> 10km Run with one had to complete within the cut-off time of 5hrs.

It was a hot and humid Sunday's morning to start off with the inaugural Raw Duathlon. The event was held at Changi Coastal Road with nearly 1000 participants joining the race. Apart from that, many familiar faces found at the scene, e.g. Melvin Senior, Melvin Junior, Chin KK, Sumiko, Henry Tan and Collen. :)

The flag-off time for 10-40-10 category started at 7.30am. Runners participating in 10km route would have to make 2 loops around the Aviation Park Road. The run course was relatively flat and i ran with a moderate pace which took me 55mins to reach the transition area.

Leisurely, I took my own sweet time to change for a new cycling jersey, wearing my oakley sunglasses and hydrating myself sufficiently (the weather was terribly hot) before pushing my bike out. For the bike course, we had to make 4 loops around the Costal Road. I had encountered little problem with the ride and enjoying the rushing wind whizzing through my body. However, on the fourth loop, i was nearly fall asleep and skipped. Luckily, managed to recover just in time. A lady rider beside me giving me a smile. I gave a shrug in return. Well, it was totally straight and flat road, couldn't blame me for dozing off.. It took me 1.5 hrs to complete the ride, average cruising speed 26km/hr.

Back to the tranistion area again, I changed to Sundown Marathon singlet. By this time, the sun was scorching hot. Not long before I made my run, i felt a sudden pain at both of my tights. Suspecting that i hurt my nerves, the thought of giving up occurred in my head. I walked for the first 2.5km for recovery. Feeling better, i did a walk and jog tactics for the remaining journey. Total time taken for completion, 4hrs.

Ok.. time to rush to Grand Plaza Hotel to attend Chairman's birthday party.

Damage done:
$40 dollars for taking a cab to and fro.
$20 for leg massge at Freddie's place.

Prize:
Nothing.. no medal, no finishing tee. . Just a pure sense of satisfaction to complete..

This year, the Bike Rally 2009 had 2 starting point; (1) East Coast Park (128km); (2) NUT (85km). There were 600 participants and over 200 volunteers spreading across the island serving as Road Marshal for the event. In total, there were 6 checkpoints located round the islands with each allowing 3 minutes of break time.

The registration began at 5.30am. Each of the participants was given a blue singlet, with red singlet given for the volunteers and green singlet for the organizers. The event flagged off at 7am. For the first 48km, it was a relatively easy ride with most of the route being flat. The average cruising speed was 30km/hr. KC, Brian and me were among the
lead group to reach the NTU.

I thought the rest of the journey would be relatively easy taken from the experience from the first two checkpoints. However, it was a book in disguise. After coming out from NTU, the journey was challenging with multiple endless up slopes to conquer.
Examples:
1) From NTU to Kranji reservoir (58km), we had to pass by some ulu roads with many up slopes.
2) From Kranji reservoir to Yishun Stadium (73km), we had the infamous Mandai slopes to overcome
3) From Yishun Stadium to Serangoon (88km), we had to pass through Jalan Kayu and over come some deserted road with some gentle slopes to take.

On my riding towards every checkpoint, I am thankful to the young volunteers (quite cute and pretty too ?) showing us direction for every turn we need to take. The sun was mercifully hot and I couldn’t have imagined all these volunteers had sacrifice their time waiting in the hot sun, pointing out direction and cheering us.
By the time, we reached Serangoon Stadium, some of the riders had begun to show tiredness. I found out from the organizer that this year, most of the riders were riding much faster than they expected. We were allowed to rest at a longer period waiting for the lead vehicle to lead us out.

Towards Changi Beach (102km), our last checkpoint, the weather was drizzling. At this moment, my legs wouldn’t have the necessary strength to pedal anymore and managed to squeeze in a consistent speed at 20km/hr.On my last lap toward the ending point (Big Splash: 128km), the weather had turned from bad to worst, pouring heavily. I was totally soaked with rain, smelly and tired. Thankfully, I was left with 7km to complete. Total Completion Time: 7hrs.

I was amazing pleased with this event (much better than i anticipated compared to the past). The whole journey was well organized, with sufficient replenishment (Bananas, Bun, energy drinks and bars, H2O) available at each checkpoint, visible signs and sufficient road marshals spreading along the entire journey. Not to mention, a finishing Teen (to my surprise) and a whole lot of full goodies bag for collection at a price of $15 for all!! Plus, all the cute, young female volunteers that adding up the fun (Stop and chit-chat with them). Hahaha.. I definitely will come back next year.

There were lesser of us for tonight's ride. We decided to go for longer distance and exploring a new route. We started off from our usual route of West Coast Road. Subsequently, we turned towards Bt Batok Road, and rided through Old Choa Chu Kang Road.

It was eerie to ride in the middle of night via this road. There was only forest at both both sides of the road with no sight of life. I remembered the only few buildings i rided by was Tengah Air Base, Home Team Academy and some army camps. I was glad we had rided out of old Choa Chu Kang road since there was many up slopes at this road.

Then after, we turned towards Lim Chu Kang Road. The stretch brought back some of my fond memories where i was training with those hard-core runners for the Sundown Marathon, e.g. Kayano, PS, Jancy, Yong, stardust, David, Wendy etc.. It was a memorable night for me as it was my ever first time to run after midnight!!

Nevertheless, the road was dull, uninteresting and totally straight. I was nearly fall asleep several times and my bike was toddling side by side . There were occassional i nearly knocked onto the pavement!! On the other hand, I observed there were quite a number of foreign workers walking along the pavement. When we came to Neo Tiew Road, the mystery was finally solved. At the side of the road, there was a hostel located to house the fore
Next, we turned towards Lim Chu Kang Road. Riding through the Lim Chua Kang( Of course, with the Smell of the Chicken Farm..) brought back ign workers. I could see many of the foreign workers were sitting on the grassland, playing guitar and singing along. The scenery resembled a festival season with the whole place was brightly lit, and music and songs filling this remote area.

Thereafter, we decided to make a U-turn back via Jalan Bahar road, passing by Civil Defence Academy. Before long, our ride was slowed down by the poor visibility due to smoke covering the entire Westwood road. We were puzzled where the source was coming from.

Finally, we stopped at the nearby Petrol Kiosk to refill our bottles and made our way back home via West Coast Road.












Distance : 65km. Average Speed: 31km/hr. Mileage for past 3 mths: 1228km

Susposed to meet up with Ka Liang early morning at 5am for a ride around Mandai area and probably joined the joyrider for another long ride to East Coast. However, both of us couldn't be able to get enough sleep and had to cancel the ride. haha.

Went back to the office in the morning to do some work before meet up with Xiaoming and Linda to watch an Abstract Art Exhibition - Shape of Colors at The Art House. Ha.. finally, I had to give up in understanding the oil paintings. I had to admit i had no genes in appreciating fine arts like these. Xiaoming took certain interests in the pieces especially as we were wondering how the artist had created the brush strokes.

Dinner appointment at Jumbo Seafood restaurnat at East Coast was cancelled. Jianxing had contracted skin allegry and was admitted into the hospital. The fulfillment of our 10 years contract(made by all bunch of secondary school classmates) had to be postponed till his recovery.


Instead,I did a fast ride(40km) to East Coast Park. There was quite a heavy traffic along the way. I was irritated by some of the inconsiderate taxi drivers whom drove against my lane to avoid the traffic jam. Around the same time, Adeline had finished her bladding at the park. Met up with her at Carpark D1, and passed her the coke which she ordered (since she didn't bring any money) before resuming my ride. Interestingly,there was a small discovery of miniature battleground field setup next to T3 Cycle for kids to play around with their "remote control" battle tanks.

A busy day for me. In the afternoon, skipped over to the F1 Formula venue to recce the area. I took a few photos there and happened to run across Melvin on my way to Suntec.

In late afternoon, i did a quick ride along the West Coast way. During my way back, I came across three trucks being crashed one after the other with the traffic police regulating the traffic over there. In addition, I spotted a new bike shop at Pasir Panjang and found the clipless pedals i been searching for - Speed Play

This was perhaps the night when everything seems to go wrong. To briefly talk about, I and Ka Liang had lost our way on our cycle to Toa Payoh. Then, Ka Liang's friends had difficulties in finding us and we arrived deeply late at the rendezvous. Before even started, one of the bike had some problems of its front derailleur. Eddie and Calvin were only able to fix it incompletely. Added to the woes, there were news of another biker having their typre burst and was stuck at the nearby Esso Kiosk. Thus, the group decided to cycle over there to meet him first.

As a consequence, we were late at our set-0ff time. This time, the route would cover from Toa Payoh, Upper Bt Timah, Pasir Panjang to Fort Road and returned back to the starting point. There were few inexperence bikers in the group, which nearly caused an accident at Upper Bt Timah. Subsequently, while cycling to our way East Coast Road, the leader had made a wrong turn, plus a dispute was nearly occured from one of the bikers with a taxi driver for no reason or whatever so. Finally, the group decided to take a break at the Merlion status before proceeding any futher.

I decided that I might have enough for one night and cycled with Ka Liang, his father and friends to Lau Pa Sat first for supper before going back home. At the hawker center, a lady sitting at our back was furious with the service from one of the stalls, shouting and throwing plates around. Luckily, after a few hassles, her boyfriend managed to drag her away and i was able to have my peaceful "dinner" at last. Yes, I was having my dinner at 12.30am!! :(

Rush. Rush. Rush. This was the description for the series of events happened to me for today.

After finishing my afternoon agendas, I sent my bike for inspection in the evening before the rode with Toa Payoh began. My new triathlon bike has been making squeaking sound ever since I gotten hold of it. Initially, I thought it was normal but my suspicious arose as I experienced difficulties in pedaling it. The shop owner of the bike shop (at Zion Road) confirmed my suspicion. The crank set and rear derailer had not been aligned properly. However, talk about rip-off!! I was charged $25 for the service rendered. Gosh!! Without other alternatives and running short of time, I agreed to the fee. : (

Subsequently, Yean, Ka Liang and his father had cycled to Zion Road to meet with me. Together, we rode via Orchard Road, Newton Circle and reached Toa Payoh to meet with the rest of the group. It was a huge group for today’s ride. There were about 14 of us. The group made up a mixture of roadies and mountain bikes. Tonight, our route would cover Mandai Road, Choa Chua Kang to Bt Timah. Talk about déjà vu. I would still remember the rode with Alvin, Eddie, PS and the rest where I was exhausted and could not catch up with the rest. Tonight was a chance to prove myself again. Ha.

The ride was extremely smooth along the journey. Perhaps it was due to the alignment done at the bike shop. I could pedal the bike with no problem and manage to conquer one slope after another with little trade off in speed. On average, I was riding at 30km/hr. Geez!! Hee hee

The group’s stamina does not match equally with each other. At several junctions, we would stop to wait for the rest to catch up. Nevertheless, this also provided the chance for us to chit-chat and know each other better. At Bt Batok petrol kiosk, we decided to rode to Adam Road Hawker Center to have our supper before we spilt off from there. Unfortunately, after 700m before reaching the point, my tire was punctured. Luckily, there was mechanic support in the group. Ka Liang and Calvin came to my rescue to change a new tube. At 12am, the group greeted each other good-bye and reminded ourselves to meet together at next Saturday. In the end, although there were some confusions and disobeyed of cyclist’s rules at certain T-junctions, but the ride was fun and enjoyable overall.

I was suffering from a terrible headache for the whole night. I couldn't able to sleep and after thinking through for safety reasons (me and for the others). i decided to give up the race. This was the first race ever i had given up.

Back to my sleep, woke up and saw PS's SMS saying some major screwed up in the race. I wondering....

I had missed this morning Easter service. To make up for my absence, I arranged to meet up with Mun Hoe in the late afternoon to attend his church (City Harvest) service. Hmm. That left a couple of hours for me to do some short run…

I have not been doing many long runs lately, mainly due to reason of the pain at my calves and knees. I have been quite mindful of the condition of my legs (esp. at the lower calves) and reduced my pace every time the stitch resurfaced. After a typical rainy weather for the past few days, the island had finally received a hot, sunny afternoon. For this afternoon short run (Tiong Bahru -> Botanic Garden -> Holland Rd -> Queenstown -> Tiong Bahru), I intended to keep a slow pace at 6min/km. When I started off with my run, the agony at my lower calves came back again. It was difficult for me to keep a constant pace as the pain kept disturbing my advancement whenever my foot touched the ground. Similar to my ITB which came as sudden as it likes, dark clouds begun to form in the sky and thunders roared. While I was running along the Holland Road, rain started to pour. Well, I couldn’t able to stop for fear of being late to meet with Mun Hoe. In the end, I managed to do a well decent speed to complete 14km at 1hr 35mins.

The City Harvest was totally unlike the Church of mine. The building at its Jurong West was elegantly built, which occurred nine storeys (four in the basement and five on top of it). When I stepped into the hall that could cater for about 2000 members, the seats were fully occupied. After a few ushering here and there, we (Mun Hoe, Gin and me) managed to get hold of the seats directly in front of the stage. I was impressed by the drama put up by City Harvest Drama group. The music, acting, singing, sound system and the costumes were nowhere inferior to any drama put up by the professionals. I could see that the members of the church have devoted a lot of hard work to make this show a success. It was entertaining and meaningful as the drama told us the origin of Easter Day.

After the service, I met up with Cedric to have a dinner at Jurong Point and bought a bottle of Glucosamine in the hope that it could ease my pain. Although the supplement is more targeting to neutralize joint problem, but now I could try for anything to help me to recover from my ITB since my KL Marathon is coming up. Besides, I read reports that many runners have found that it is effective to assist them to recover from ITB.

At late evening, my Sis and Brother-in-law fetched me from Jurong Point together with their children for cycling at Chinese Garden Park. It is always enjoying to see my two little nephew and niece playing around, with their laugher and shouting surrounding us. :) We have a supper at McDonald before I reached home at 11.30pm. It was a nice, fulfilling day for me to enjoy this Easter holiday…

What would you want to do on a windy and cloudy afternoon?

For me, I cycled o East Coast MacDonald, which took me about 1hr 38mins to complete the round trip journey. Made a stopover at Vivo city and surprised to find the mono-rail had commissioned.

The plan: To cycle from my house to East Coast again. The result: An on-and off shower and 2 stopovers at Tanjong Pagar Old train station and Raffles place. Finally, I decided not to inflict any more damages than caused by the rain and clean up my bike instead. Therefore, I made a return trip back from Esplandane.

The cleaning up had taken much more efforts than I expected, partly due to my negligence to maintain the bike for all these years. First, I used a damp cloth to clean the body part of the bicycle. That was easy and quick. Next, I had to disassemble the rear wheel to clean the chain portion. The chain was full of grease and rust after years of exposure to sun and rain.( I left my bike on the balcony) I resorted in using a sandpaper, filing or craving tools that I could find to clean out the obstinate rust. It was a tough battle and needed a lot of patience. Like a good lady stitching a broken trouser, I sanded and rubbed the rust away each and everyone of the roller chain. It took me at least an hour to finish the task. L Subsequently, it was my pedals turn. It didn’t look good either, and stained with rust. I took my craving tools to scrub the rust away from both inside and outside of the pedals. I promised after today, I won’t ill-treat my bicycle again. Ha After finishing the 2 most troublesome parts, I began to clean up the front and rear bracket. It was full of dirt, grease and contained sand. After removing the dirt and grease, I utilized a brush to get rid of the sand hidden in the deep corner side of the brackets. Finally, the last part was the gear portion and it took me a while to finishing it off.

By the time I done with the “Spring” cleaning, it was 10.30 pm. I went to the newly opened 24hr Malay food shop and ordered a “Maggie Goreng”. Not really fantastic but would be enough to fill up my small stomach.

A pouring wet experience!! This was the adventure I gotten on this ever Hara Raya Haji holiday. Nevertheless, it was fun and full of laughs. I wouldn’t miss for a second chance. :D

We all gathered at Changi Jetty around 7.30 am. There were 20 totals of us. The weather seems to be kind since it had been raining continuously for the past few days. It looked like we could enjoy a dry morning and afternoon after all. I had decided to rent a bike with the rest instead of using my own. (I am too lazy to clean my bike if it caught hold in the rain.)

Setting Off
The cost of renting a bike was $10 for a whole day trip. It was those mountain bikes with fat tires, wide seat and heavy body weight.(*Disappointed*) Surprisingly, when I sat on the seat, it was relatively stable, and not using too much strength to peddle the wheels. After a hassle of adjustment made on the equipments here and there, we were ready to set off.

At the jetty station, I saw a few cyclists crossing the sea to the same destination as us. Their bicycles were mostly those MTB equipped with semi-slick tires. At the sales counter, the staff member told us that we needed 13 people to fill up the bumboat full before it could depart. Since we had 20 people and not wanting to waste time waiting, we decided to pay for the extra 3 empty seats not taken by anyone. After the staff member recorded our names, we loaded our bikes one by one onto the bumboat. And guess what!! The staff member turned out to be the bumboat driver too!!

After 45mins ride, we had reached Pengerang, but our blessing had vanished to the thin air. The weather started to pour immediately when we touched on the Pengerang jetty station with the wind growing stronger. We booked the bumboat driver to meet us back around 3.45pm by paying off our deposits first. The station closes at 4pm. (see left)

The Ride
After an half an hour wait, we decided to cycle in the rain while those without raincoats would catch a cab and meet us in town instead. The road was relatively flat with few up and down slopes. The whole route was straight with only one right turn heading towards the town. During the ride, the raindrops had been splashing on my eyes. (My cap had lent to Hwee Li). I wouldn’t open my eyes and been blinking them on and off. I did try to wear my shades and naively to think it might block the water coming to my eyes. It was not effective and I better off without the shades. The raincoat that I bought at Bali did help to keep my shirt minimum dry. After a stopover for photo session, we arrived at 11/2 hr later for a distance of around 17km.(see below)
The Town
The Sungei Rengit was a relatively small town. We met the other 5 whom took a cab down there. The cost of arrival was RM18. Apparently, they had started their feast. (see left) We split into two tables and our table ordered a “Lobster Set Meal C” which cost RM280. I fond of the vegetables and the soup particularly. The butter lobster and chili crabs also smelled good too!! Contrast to what I pictured, the lobsters were those small ones and the chili crabs were in mid-size. My friend told me that the crabs were caught from nearby shores. Overall, the whole dishes tasted super!! My stomach was too full and lazy to ride back. Ha.. The rain hadn’t been stopped yet.

The Ride Back
It was a non-stop ride back to the jetty, which took me around 1hr On our boat ride back, the rest couldn’t stop taking photo shots on this memorial day. We disembarked to Singapore at 4.30pm. I was completely exhausted and slept in the MRT train…..