just keep running

RACE ID: 05825-SIN-HMM-OLC
RACE: Half Marathon 21.1 km

Thank you for registering for the Standard Chartered Singapore Marathon 2007!

A RACE ID (above) has been given to you for identification purposes. A copy of this Race Confirmation Slip has been emailed to you.

Payment Acknowledgement Transaction No: 25582XXXX
Description: Half Marathon 21.1 km
Dinner 1pax
Date: 18/07/2007
Amount: SGD $36.00 (VISA)
Registration Details
Full Name: LEE JIA JIE

It's done. I shall attempt to clock under 2hrs 15 mins.

***



Within some 12 months, I've taken part in 10 races, including 1 vertical marathon and 1 adventure race. It's amazing to think I clocked a 13 min 2.4K last yr. =)

Anyway, just for the fun of it and to see how accurate it really is, I put the training log I use at Runner's World (where I got the pretty thing at the bottom left of sidebar) to test and to check if the distances it tells me I'm running are real.



Apparently, it's more true than true.

So else is there to blog about?

***

Ah, Mong's tag.

RULES:
1. Put your music player on shuffle.
2. Press forward for each question.
3. Use the song title as the answer to the question even if it doesnt make sense. NO CHEATING!
4. Tag 5 ppl at their tagboard to ask them to do this!
5. Bold the questions and with the answers, give your own comments on how it relates to the questions.

1. How are you feeling today?
Leave Out All The Rest - LP
Hmm?

2. Will you get far in life?
Hands Held High - LP
This isn't making much sense.

3. Will you get married?
Lights and Sounds - Yellowcard
Yes yes. Big bang wedding, lots of lights and sounds. I can almost see it.

4. What is your best friend’s theme song
What I've Done - LP

5. What is the story of your life?
By The Way - RHCP
Ah?

6. What was primary school like?
Bleed It Out - LP
LOL? I was a peaceful momma's boy in primary sch. No blood.

7. How can you get ahead in life?
No More Sorrow - LP
Yeah I wish. Why am I getting all the LP songs?

8. What is the best thing about your friends?
Same Direction - Hoobastank
Really meh...

9. What is in store in this weekend?
The Middle - Jimmy Eat World

10. What song describes you?
Lips of an Angel - Hinder
LOL!

11. How is your life going?
Welcome to the Black Parade - MCR
?

12. What song will they play at your funeral?
Famous Last Words - MCR
Lol, not bad.

13. How does the world see you?
Checking Email - Plain Sunset
Another "?"

14. What do your friends really think of you?
Given Up - LP
.....

15. Do people secretly lust after you?
Scars - Papa Roach
Ouch?

16. How can you make yourself happy?
My Sacrifice - Creed
Damn I hope not.

17. Will you ever have children?
Valley of the Damned - Dragonforce
!

***



Think this is a shoe?



Lol! It'd be cool when you're running in those Nike Frees and suddenly the shoes jump off you and go Kwuzhichichichik! and you're barefoot looking like an idiot and there's a mini robot with laces in front of you.

In case you're haven't figured it out, those aren't for running.

Bye ppl! @ 22:29

I shall blog about a full day today.

[Edit: I finished the 10K in 55 mins. Not too bad.]

Woke up at 5am for Mizuno Wave Run. Saw the rain, dammit why does it always rain when I have to run Bedok Reservoir? Anw, left house at 6 to get to TP, managed to get a cab.

me: ah hi uncle, TP pls. The stadium there. Thanks.
driver: ah ok. wa so early u go there for what?
me: ah, for run. got run going on.
driver: wa raining also run, siao ah?
me: -_- no lah it's an event.
driver: ahaha okay run how far ah? marathon ah?
me: um no lah not marathon. quite short, 10K only.
driver: WA ten thousand click ah?! i run 5 click beri good oreadi!
me: (LOL) umm no it's TEN clicks.
driver: orh ahha okok (goes on to talk about his son and all, which is pretty humorous talk. damn funny)
*we reach TP*
driver: this one right?
me: ummm looks like it.
driver: (asks random guard standing outside gate) eh brudder, marathon is inside here ah?
me: (damn it's 10K not marathon!)

Anyway, Mizuno Wane 2007 is probably the worst race I've ran. Even ATC was better.
Baggage despoit was into a goddamn TRUCK.



Firstly, VIPs were late. I don't if you're an MP, CEO of VGO or CEO of Mizuno, Japan. Damn, I don't even care if you're Japanese or Indian. But dammit, if you're got transport, can you dammit don't be late? In any case, they were (by 10 mins).

Starting gantry was small. Path way from TP out to Bedok Reservoir was minute. A Lego set would look huge next to it. There were bottlenecks within 5 mins into the race, and I was already walking cos I just couldn't find the space to run. Half the time I was swearing away, and the race barely started.



Out to the reservoir. Rain made the gravel path look like a mud-bath. I did it before, so I just chionged. Overtook a few ppl I recognized along the way. Made it out to the main road. Water point was a disaster. They freaking gave out NEWater bottles. And they didn't even prepare for it. Skipped both water points.

Footpath was about 0.25m wide. I spent half my time trying to overtake slower runners. They have this special ability to hog the whole pathway. Got sick of it, went onto the road. Saw a few nice runner girls. =)


with the free maxim, lol.

Met Daniel and HK(how to spell his name ah?). Spent some time warring with them. Then I went to chase more runner girls, lmao.

Turned back into Reservoir. Ran for another I think, 2K? before I heard the emcee over the system. This was where the fun/chaos started.

I spotted the circular gantry, which I assumed (wrongly) to be the finishing point. (Trust me, I wasn't the only one.) Started to pick up my pace so can end with a better timing. 25m away, I had a killer stitch (of all times). I decided to bear with it and just chiong anyway. Passed gantry (not finishing line, but I thought it was). Stopped. Heard some idiot screaming that the finishing line was further down and that we had to run more. Jogged with a dulan face down to the real line cos of the damn stitch. I saw a lot of dulan running faces around me.


I swear they look identical.

Godammit, if the place was not the finishing line, why the crap did they put the damn thing there?

There was more to come.

Goodie bag collection was an ass. The queue was never ending and the inadequate ah-mas staff didn't manage things well. Most ppl weye cutting the queue. I took 30mins to collect my goodie bag. By then I was damn dulan already.

The baggage was the most legend.



The truck(s) were open and some runners were standing inside and shouting out number tags and throwing out bags that have happily found their owners. I, sadly, wasn't that happy. I stood there for 15 mins or so, but my bag was no where in sight. Wait somemore.

And more.

And more.

And more. (You get the idea.)

I caught wind that there were more bags on the OTHER side, from the other truck, but apparently there was no staff no direct anyone there, cos everyone was happily bidding for their bags in the sole truck.

Walked over, found my bag sitting on the (muddy) floor like a prized gem. In all, I spent more time queuing for my goodie bag and baggage than I spent running. I find it hard to believe that the organizers did not allocate any manpower to facilitate the redistribution of the bags. The ppl doing it were actually participants in the run.



Like I said, this is the worst race I've ran. The interesting muddy path, the nice runner girls =x, the singlet and the shoe bag didn't make up for the lack of manpower, the lousy organization skills and the misplacing of the god damn finishing line. The worst thing in a race is not to know where the damn finishing line is.

Sgrunners forums are blazing with comments now. Lol. I shall boycott Mizuno events for 1 year. Time to stop running and start studying. Next race will be on 2 Dec. Already signed up for 21K again, lol.

Bye all. @ 20:50

The aftermath of the MYEs is more or less over, and I THINK I have performed average bah, although I did expect a better grade for Math. But CCDE for now is kinda good for me, and omg I passed physics (45.8%). That has to be the greatest miracle this year.

Physics P2 was funny cos I answered a question with data from a question that came later in the paper and the marker wrote : HA! HA! 1 MARK FOR RESOURCEFULNESS!

I guess I shouldn't complain.

I have taken an interest in libraries and free books for reading. I'm still at one of the Adrian Mole books and I hope the librarians in TPY do some magical book-keeping so I can somehow eventually find The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner by Alan Sillitoe and The Broker by John Grisham.

I provided the titles and authors so maybe(just maybe), some kind soul would buy them for me.

SCM registration will open on 16th July. I'm surprised to get a 20% for running last year. That would save me about $9. Money seems like a rare commodity these days.

www.mapmyrun.com is a wonderful site, next to fanpop. Allows me to click my distance and all. Pretty accurate.



My run today. It's a there-and-back thing. Saw Yiliang somewhere along the way. He seemed surprised to see me running. I guess I just don't look like a runner.

Bye ppl. Tag leh. Don't lidat lah.

[Edit] Did I mention they made changes to the time tables? Yep they adjusted (not improved) it. Now I end later, and have more lessons(including another 0.5 hr of econs, which I absolutely do not need). Yay! I love NYJC. And my ability to lie blatantly through my teeth. Heroes Season 2 should consider hiring me. @ 21:37

Ha! Months away from bowling and still quite a good score. My PB somemore. I must be really tyco. I hope my luck doesn't run out soon.



Half way into 2nd game. Look at the 3rd row, that's my score. =D



Didn't get as lucky in the 2nd half, still ended up up a new PB. I'm quite proud of it. =D Today and tmr will probably be the last days of rest. After Wednesday, I think it's back to the mugger and no-lifer life.

Saucony had updated the site with the results.

567 3375 AMIR ABAS BIN RAMLAN COMPETITIVE MENS OPEN 00:29:30 00:58:26
568 2712 LIM YONG KWANG COMPETITIVE MENS OPEN 00:29:26 00:58:29
569 2602 LEE JIA JIE COMPETITIVE MENS OPEN 00:28:26 00:58:29
570 3599 LIAU NAM YEOW COMPETITIVE MENS OPEN 00:29:35 00:58:32
571 3109 LIN ZHIWEI ALEX COMPETITIVE MENS OPEN 00:30:12 00:58:34
572 3658 YING MING HUA COMPETITIVE MENS OPEN 00:29:01 00:58:36

I managed to get 569th out of 1369 people in the cat. Not too bad =D. Grand total of 58mins 29 secs. I shall do a <53 mins for Mizuno.

Bye ppl.

[Edit]
Singapore will be having it's first official ultra-marathon(I think) in 2008. Details here. 50K. And if you read the route, its like a round island run =x. Maybe in 2009 I try. Lol. @ 21:07

So I didn't make my target timing and hit a 58 mins for the 10K Saucony PAssion! Run. Not my fault la, got exams. In any case, it was quite a good run. I'll leave out the details.





***
Anyway, I managed to catch Linkin Park Live! Well, sort of.



So LP was performing In Tokyo for the Live Earth nonsense(Let's not go into how ironical this Live Earth thing is and all) and I, being wonderfully informed by Roy, decided to go online and stream the damn concert all the way from Tokyo to Singapore. All thanks to technology, I was watching Linkin Park perform LIVE while I was in Sg and they're were in Tokyo. Live, nevertheless.

So after their first song(In The End), the lights were suddenly dimmed, LP stopped played and this extremely irritating japanese just on and on in Japanese that went like *^&*%^&$*^*&%@^$%#@@!&^@&(to me at least) for like 20mins, and I was swearing, wtf? Could you like, stfu and let them play. And all this while LP was just standing on the stage fooling around with their equipment.(I later found out the Japanese fans decided to go crazy and push down the barricades and they had to stop to regain order.)



Well then the 'Live' concert went on until they sang 'Crawling'. I was quited amazed the Japanese know the words to the song. I mean, they know English! Wow!



Awesome, awesome. @ 22:50

I actually have loads of things to blog about over the exam period, but the exams took away all my inspiration and now I'm left with nothing.

The exams were, ok lah. I just hope the results are acceptable. Didn't study much, don't expect much.

Today was probably the most blog-worthy day in a long time. Woke up at 7, went for 8K run, den swim, den pool-ed and went library. Home, slept, pool-ed again at cine den watched Transformers, again. I swear it's a must watch. Today is probably the only day for a break before the education whirlwind comes back on Monday.

Nothing much to blog about. Life is pretty mundane. I need some enjoyment.

Saucony PAssion! Run on Sunday. I hope to clock <55mins for this. Then Mizuno Wave will clock <50mins, den SCM half this year will be <2hrs. Master plan for running.

I need a master plan for studies. Lol. Bye.

@ 22:17

Every single word you said, sticks around inside my head
and I wish that you would write to me,
wish that you would write to me
Every single thing you say, hits me every other day,
and I wish that you would write to me, wish that you would write me,
Cause I know

I just wanna be with you
Don't want to be without you.

C'MON LET THE FCKING EXAMS END SOON RAHHHHHH I WANT TO RUN PLAY WATCH MOVIES SLEEP PLAY RUN RAHHHHH. @ 22:03