Race Report......

Last Sunday was special. The day when I had a journey of 42.195km on foot in KL. Passing those roads and places. prior to the journey, were mostly of no significance. Roads that you have passed and places that you have seen countless times, especially when you were travelling in a moulded steel frame vehicle powered by a combustion engine called automobile. Now this is my report.

Errr...my deepest apology. The report is still haphazardly stored in my head and I just unable to translate them into writing because, you guess, I am yet to complete my Income Tax Return and the due date for submission is tomorrow!! Ammahhhhhh!! Yeah, I am just another typical Malaysians who just love to wait until the very last minute to submit the dreadful Income Tax Return. Guilty as charged, no need to call for my defence. Before I lost more RM for late filing (which I could use to buy another pair of trainers etc), I just need to complete that form today. Now where are the #$$%%$ receipts of the books that I purchased last year (or I might have just thrown them away!!!!). Ammahhh.

FMV and the Day of being Terlambong

I am a FMV!

First, I need to confess that I did register for the full category in the SCKLM 2010. Yes, i ticked the Yikes run's box....triple ammah!! (Diket, sorry for stealing this term). The original intent is to run in the half marathon cat, with an office colleague who planned to attempt his maiden 1/2. Sometimes in late April, that friend of mine threw in the towel due to overwhelming work loads, which were expected to continue until well past the month of June. It was during my prep to Sundown 2010 that the idea of clicking the Yikes came to my mind and click I did. The reason is simple, I think I could double up the training for Sundown to include the Yikes run in SCKLM. The plan is to reach the 30km LSD a week after running Sundown and a 32km LSD in the subsequent week before starting the tapering period. Though I managed to do my snail pace 20-25km-ish LSD for every weekend until Sundown, my plan to bag that 30km LSD was derailed with a week of forced rest to recover the problem of the prolong untreated shin splint of my left leg. Though from the 24km LSD done last week I am pretty sure that my leg can take the poundings of the yikes run (with a slower pace of course), I was in self doubt whether to proceed with the same without any 30km LSD done. And last Tuesday, utilising the 2 days' leave for a brief family vacation, I started the day with a targetted 30km LSD and finally managed to reach the distance of 31.6km with my super slow pace. With such LSD done, the plan is to start tapering till the big day (or so I thought).

The day of Terlambong

Today is the day of me being terlambong. Everybody have been warned of lambong melambong LSD with the star studded Geng Kaki Lambong (GKL) and RBU (those who were at the crime scene: Diket The King Mambo, Nik the Lanun King, Syah King Dolphin or Jaws??, Chief Poco-poco KLCC Shuk, the Speedy Crushio/Syed, Rayzeef Harimau Malaya, Det the Head Bouncer of King Mambo, Nizam the Chief Adviser of King Mambo and Azwa the Ironman).

To tell you the truth, the lambong melambong is not for the faint of heart as I am pretty sure once kene lambong you will terlambong-lambong especially with a full strenght GKL around :). From a planned 10k run I was terlambong to 20k run. I considered myself lucky as the King has given his command for the army not to conquer the Double Hill, otherwise I would be the biggest terlambong macai of all hahahaha.

Overall, with the mercy of the GKL, the pace was indeed slower from the last weekend LSD. I was not really prepared to run 20k today and think I struggled almost from the start. The series of meetings outside office yesterday and a late dinner with clients did exhaust me a bit (alasan ajer hehe). Be that as it may, I believe the run was good to train my body to take a little bit of more exertion before the yikes run. The second part of the run back to Bkt Aman, I ran mostly in my normal super slow pace and the last 2.5km was the point where the others activated their turbo engines. Just continued with my snail pace in avoiding to put the stress on the legs (sebenarnya dah tak larat dah) and finished the run much later than the others.

After today's 19.69km (the actual distance recorded via the Endomondo GPS Tracker), I can start tapering for the big day (or has the tapir already gone back to the woods??)

You can check out the LSD's tracking below.

http://www.endomondo.com/workouts/v9i_S5WUmTk (Part 1)

http://www.endomondo.com/workouts/uV5WULxyIUo (Part 2)

Happy tapering and all the best for all in SCKLM 2010!

Endomondo Tracker - LSD 12 June 2010 (Bkt Aman - Matrade - Hartamas)

As I had written in one of my postings before, I had never done the Bukit Aman - Hartamas route. In NB20k Pacesetters earlier this year, we ran part of the route, i.e. looping Matrade and back to Padang Merbok via Tijani, Lebuhraya Mahameru, Jalan Sultan Salahuddin and Bukit Istana Selangor.

This morning, after resting slightly more than a week (I did 2 post treatment trial runs around my neighbourhood earlier this week), I decided to join the LSD organised by Syah pursuant to the royal decree of King Lambung, plying the route above. With the medication and the "ice-ice baby treatment", it seems that the recovery of the shin splint at my left leg is progressing well and the LSD will be the test whether it can take the poundings. By the way, distance wise, I did not put any target and I have to admit that the route, with the inclusion of Matrade and Double Hill in the menu, as well as running with far stronger runners did daunt me. I told myself to run up to any distance that I could handle and the possibility of skipping Matrade and Double Hills could not be discounted.

The First Part

There were 5 of us, me, Syah, Diket, Ian, Syed and Irwan (Syed's friend). We started off circa 6.45am. I tried not to think about my pace, just trying my best to follow the others (as long as I think i will not bonk by 3km hehe). Pace wise, we were going much faster than my normal pace. By the time we reached the incline to Matrade I started to struggle and at last resorted to take my walk break, with Syah as my company coupled with his encouraging words, to overcome the final incline before joining the others to finish the first part of the LSD at Petronas Hartamas, where we had our brief re-fuel break. I run my fastest pace LSD completing a 12.3km distance (10k at 62min is a PB for this olie snail runner hehe)! You can check out the split times recorded by the freebie Endomondo GPS Sports Tracker downloaded to my Cik Kia E71.

Endomondo Running Workout (First Part) [Note -To know the splits, just point to the mileage on the map]

The Second Part

I think I started out OK, again trying my best to follow the pace of others (it seemed really easy peasy for them). But once the elevation increased at Matrade, I started to struggle to run pass those inclines. This time, I had a royal company, where the King himself walked with me, to tackle those inclines. This walking routine at certain level of inclines continued for the rest of the journey and though I tried to do the smallest steps going up the peaks of the Double Hills, the task of reaching them was just to tough for me to accomplish. Syah then took over Diket's role and accompanied me to Jln Mahameru and we re-grouped with the others at the junction near Bukit Istana. We run back together to Bukit Aman via Bukit Istana and Tugu Negara.

You can check my split times below (Note - the tracking was slightly delayed after we started our run from Hartamas. The tracking stopped somewhere near Wisma Tani for an unknown reason (it rarely happened).

http://www.endomondo.com/workouts?w=mBp0yY_qHu4

Conclusions

(a) The run proved that I can run faster than my normal pace of 7:30-45min/km-ish (and above) for my easy run.

(b) I got a LOT of advises and tips from the others. That may be a blessing in disguise for being at the back and spending longer time with a stronger and faster running buddy. Thanks guys!

(c) As Syah has highlighted and stressed upon, I need to find ways to improve my rehydration plan with me having problem to take isotonic during my run. I plan to carry along both plain water and isotonic drink (or ORS mixed drink) in my long runs as well as dates/raisins.

(d) More focused mind. I lack ANCHORING (term acquired from the King). I must set the target at the start of the run and the slightest thinking, the like of "lets see how long I could go or if I feel tired I may skip certain routes" is just a recipe for failure in a LSD.

(e) My injured leg could take a 24km-ish run quite well (with the new footware..ehemmm). Felt a slight pain post run last night and this morning but some icing would do. Decided to ditch a 10k run this morning to rest the leg.

After all are said and done, my running journey will continue, God willing.

Kissing Good-bye to SCKLIM 2010

Yim's postings on his knee issue and his consultation with Dr. William has prompted me to consider seeking proper consultation on the pain around my lower left leg (near the shin and during a run could also be felt around the calve), which has been bugging me since before the Energizer Night Run. All this while I have classified the issue as minor due to the facts that:

(a) the pain would be apparent at the start of the run and later eases as the run progresses;

(b) the pain returns after the run and may become a bit worse in the next morning but eases after a day or 2 of rest;

(c) I could continue my run and training as long as the pace is easy; and

(d) since I could run, I am convinced that the pain is temporary (most probably it relates to some muscles soreness) and once I log in more mileage, naturally my running muscles would be strenghtened and eliminate the pain, in time.

I made a visit to Dr. William's clinic at Subang Jaya this evening and after the facts finding interview, some physical examination of my foot/leg, x-tray and ultra sound of the related parts, it has been confirmed that the pain is a second stage "Medial Tibial Stress Syndrom" or in a layman term, "shin splints".

The most important thing about shin splints is to identify the actual cause of the injury. Training wise, a runner should not suffer shin splints if the mileage is around 20-30+km per week. I have been doing about 32-37km per week for the past 4 weeks and this is far from being classifed as excessive mileage. Having ruled out the cause relating to "training errors", the second possible cause is the "biomechanical inefficiencies" and this is where my case fits the bill. In summary after all those examinations, the following are the causes why I suffered shin splints:

(a) I have a left "over-pronate" foot;

(b) my footware did not support the above (case of ignorant or just being lazy bum to dig for more information about running shoes); and

(c) my running style of "forefoot landing" and "big toe pointed outwards" just compounded the (a) and (b) above.

A stage 2 shin splints injury would require a resting period of 6-8 weeks. As Dr. William is a runner himself, he did provide an option that if I still want to run in SCKLIM (restricted me in 5k category!!), he could give me certain medication sometimes nearer to the day of the run. This is the time where I reminded myself why I took up running in the first place. I may ignore the Dr's order and run in the coming Setia Eco 1/2 this weekend and hope with the medication and treatment, I could still run in the SCKLIM but at what cost? I am not running for the podium (I wish I can hehehe). No need to guess the answer. I will be a good boy and listen to the Dr's advise.

Now Yim, when we should start shopping for the bike that we talked about quite sometimes ago :)