Malakoff Powerman Duathlon –Sprint Event
4th November 2012
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| Powerman Duathlon Completion Medal |
Prologue 1: Duathlon?
I have always been keen to take up the challenge of
a triathlon. So this duathlon seemed
like a good build up towards a triahtlon. Take part in a “duo” first then graduate to a
“tri”, was my thinking. Found out about
this Duathlon event sometime in July 2012. “Good! There should be plenty of time to train
for the event”, we thought. Buddy, Boon
last year mentioned that this duathlon event was held in the Universities where
you run and cycle only. So when the
Malakoff event came to our radar screen we decided to try it out. The shorter version of the duathlon; a 5.7 km run followed by a 32 km bicycle ride
and finally another 5.7 km run was achievable, we collectively agreed. Hence began another “chapter” in my life and
my “to do list” where I can say, ”Yup! Been there, tried it and DONE it!”
This time Boon and Eric have joined the cycling
group. Boon bought over the other Raleigh
Diablo from MK and he also signed up for the Duathlon. Edward did not join us. Instead he registered for the team relay
event with his office colleague runner.
The following is a brief story of my first sprint duathlon.
Prologue 2: PRE-Race
Anxieties
Stamina
I am not a runner and I opted for this event as the
run distance is only 5.7 km which I considered as not a long distance. As I had done a few rounds around the KLCC
park, I thought to myself that the distance is only about 4 laps of the KLCC
park running track (1.3 km/lap). “It
should just be a bit more than 4 laps”, I thought. I just have to force myself to run at KLCC
park and make sure I can do about 8 laps.
I eventually did only 6 laps which took me
about 1 hour 15 minutes. I did not run
the entire distance. When I stopped running I would force myself to walk at a
fast pace. During the not more than 5 training sessions at the park, I timed
myself and realised that at best it would take me about 10-11 minutes to pace
walk one lap. If I jogged I would be
able to shave off 2-4 minutes. As the
distance of the sprint is only 5.7km, I reasoned that it won’t matter much if I
jogged or walk. I would probably gain
about 10 minutes if I jogged. I thought
I’d better focus on endurance and stamina.
I estimated that it would take me 3 hours to
complete the sprint event. (45 minutes to walk 5.7 km and 90 minutes to cycle
32 km).
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| Event Day at PutraJaya - View of the Starting Point |
At this point in time, Boon and I only have an
entry level mountain bike which is already three years old (Raleigh Diablo; a
new version of the Diablo is already in the market). Boon and I were already discussing the disadvantage
of the MTB’s weight and speed. We estimated that we would be only going at
about 20km/hr. Boon had tried cycling on
the Guthrie corridor bicycle/motorbike lanes and timed his speed. We concur that our MTBs will be severely
handicapped. Initially we were thinking
of purchasing another bicycle i.e. a road bike. On second thoughts, we decided to hold buying
a road bike as this was just our first duathlon event and we were not sure if
we would enjoy it. We did not want to
purchase a road bike and then find that we did not like the event and would not
want to participate in any future duathlons. So we opted for the easy and cheap way to gain
some additional speed. Change the MTB
bike tyres to that of a road type (slick tyres). Boon was the first to change and he phoned
back saying that they road tyres really help increased his speed significantly.
That was good news for me. (I
changed my tyres two weeks before the event and so I tested out the road tyres
once)
So I put my focus on increasing my cycling duration
such that I can have enough stamina to endure a 3 hour exercise duration. It is this time that I discovered a beautiful
cycling track in Ulu Langat-Pangsun-Semenyih Dam. I could also cycle from my house and back and
the duration taken was about 3 hours.
It was perfect!
The three of us;
Eric, Edward and I would eventually settle at this location for our
training area. We also tried two other
training routes i.e. MRR2-Duke Highway
(Ulu Klang to Duke highway throught to Setiawangsa and Wangsa Maju) and Mount Kiara-Jalan
Kiara. Boon did his training on his own
at the Guthrie corridor location near to his house. The Ulu Langat location was actually far for
Eric to travel to in the early mornings of the weekend. We could only manage one training session per
week. I would cycle from home to Eng
Soon coffee shop at Jalan Sungai Tekali, the meeting place and from there we
would do our training after our early
morning ‘tea-si”. Eric bought
himself a new car boot bike rack to transport his bike as he changed his car
and could no longer transport his bike in the rear seat.
Knee joint pains
My left knee joint has been complaining lately. I noticed that once I have been exercising
more than two hours my left knee would be screaming out to me to stop moving. This is more so when I am running/jogging. This now lead me to try taking glucosamine
tablets. (Oh no! Drugs!! J) It seemed to work during the training
sessions as the pain subsided during the long training stints. My left knee did not complain anymore. Little did I know….
Prologue 3: Race PACK
COLLECTION and Briefing
The race pack collection point was to be at The
Marriot in Putrajaya. I decided to go on
my own instead of going together with Edward and Eric. I wanted to go on my own so as to familiarise
myself with the route to Putrajaya Palace of Justice, the starting point of the
race. I left home at about 8:45am on
Saturday, 3rd November to drive to the Palace of Justice. I had the old “google map” printout and as
predicted I missed a turn and had to come in from the North instead of from the
East. Coming in from the North was not
advisable as the main road was closed to traffic in preparation for the
duathlon. (there was an on-going event as I saw a group of cyclist on Jalan Persiaran Perdana too.)
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| Putrajaya- Palace of Justice and participants |
I arrived there at 9:45am. The organiser’s
registration and collection tables were not ready, so I wondered around the room
looking at the big information board with information of the race. I was one of the earliest participants to
arrive. There were three queues set up: full
duathlon, sprint duathlon and relay duathlon.
I was at the first queue and thinking that this must be right one as
there were more people of my age group. When
the organiser informed us that the second queue was for the sprint event, I was
a bit embarrassed. Wow those “old
fellas” all taking part in the full event and here I am the “younger fella”,
taking part in the sprint event only.
The room was beginning to fill up with
participants. The organisers were still frantically preparing the race
packs. I then moved over the
other room
to view the instructional video. I
had finished watching the video and as I was coming out of the door, I
bumped into Edward who had just collected his race pack. I said my
goodbye to him and headed to the car
park to go home. (In my haste, I had
forgotten to collect my Power Bar. Eric and Boon mentioned
it on the morning of the event, just before the race)
Boon called me up later as he went to collect the
race pack. Told him he could actually
park beside the road as there were many cars parked along the road even though
there were numerous “no parking” and “towing zones” signs along the road
leading to the Marriot. Boon wisely
decided not to take the risk of having no car to drive to the race tomorrow.
Prologue 4: THE NIGHT BEFORE
I
was getting all my gear ready, making sure that I
would not leave anything behind the next morning. I received a call from
Boon telling me that after reading the information booklet that came
with the race pack,he did not have a rear seat bag to carry his spare
tyre tube and pump. He also rang his friend up and the friend
told him that he should bring a puncture repair kit in case the tyre springs a
leak on event day. Boon was worried as
he recently had two leaks while training. His call also made me get worried. I
had not planned to bring the puncture repair kit and I had wanted to reduce my
already heavy MTB weight. I also did not
plan to bring my water bottle. The
booklet on the other had advised us to bring those items. So now I decided to
bring all the items.
Event day
Race Morning
Got
up at 4:30 am on race day. I received a
text each from Boon and Edward, there were already there at 5:15 am. I was preparing steam bread with butter and
kaya at home with my new steam oven, when Boon called up asking where I
was. When I told him I was at home, he
was surprised and told me that it is already 5:30 am and I should be on my way
to Putrajaya. That call panicked me and
I quickly gulped down my bread and Milo and drove like a mad-man to
Putrajaya. I was mentally cursing why
the route I had chosen had so many road bumps that morning. On one occasion I did not see the road bump
and had to brake at the last minute. I
was worried for my rear boot bike rack as the bump really jerked my bike and
the rack. This time I found the right turning as Boon in his early morning call
reminded me to follow the Precinct 3 road signages. I found the correct parking spot (near to the Palace
of Justice) and wheeled my bike to the transition area. The time was 6:30 am. There were many participants still wheeling
in their bikes. Once I had everything
ready i.e. the bike placed at the right spot and cycling gear all ready, I
called the rest of the guys and met up with them. The atmosphere was jovial. Many participants were taking photos and
chatting. There were a lot of group
photos being taken.
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| Group photo (note our well coordinated colors XD ) |
(Mental Note: Learn how to repair a puncture!)
Run 1
The flag-off was held in stages. The full duathlon started off at 7:00
am while the sprint event flagged off at 7:10 am. I was hoping that the running route did not
have any incline. Initially it was flat but towards the halfway mark there was a slight incline which
we had to climb. I was running with a rather a good rhythm but as expected Boon and Eric were nowhere to be
seen. They sped off ahead.
Bike
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| Reaching end of Run 1 |
I put on my helmet, gloves and my backpack. I placed my bicycle repair kit in the backpack
and cycled with it. One of the event organiser
was watching me closely as I got ready for the cycling leg. I was wondering why he was observing me. Pushed the bike to the bicycle mount area and
sped off overtaking some cyclists on the road.
I was happy that my pace was quicker than I had estimated. My spirit was high.
The initial route was flat and uneventful. I was on a mountain bike and was slower than
the road bikes. I eventually found a
pair of pacers with whom I could follow. I noticed that I was faster on the downhill stretch
but the two pacers would overtake me again on the next uphill. So this happened
a few times and I was glad that I could keep up with the two road bikes. However
disaster strucked after the 10 km mark. My
left knee started aching. “Dang! No! Its
not even half way.” At this point
onwards my two pacers overtook me and were nowhere to be seen.
It was here too that I realised that I had put my
gloves on wrongly. The padded part of
the gloves were now on the back of my palm. No wonder the organiser was watching me. He
probably was laughing quietly back at the transition area.
Eventually both my left and right knees began to
ache continuously. I had to bear the
pain and relief came whenever I was travelling downhill as I need not have to pedal. I could not straighten both my legs together
to relieve the pain as I had to continue pedaling. This went on until I reached the transition
area. I had to tell myself to take it
easy, relax and enjoy the scenery. I
remembered this as I was passing the equestrian area of Putrajaya. I was resigned to the fact that I would not be
able to complete my estimated cycling time of 1 hr 30 minutes. (This was my estimated time of completion
based on my training pace with Mountain bike tyres). So from the equestrian point onwards, I just took
it easy and enjoyed the view.
Edward who took part in the team relay also passed
me on his road bike
I was wondering if I could run the last part and
hoped that I could still jog slowly. If
my knees were to ache I would have to walk the last 5.7 km.
Run 2
I was very relieved to reach the transition area
again. I got off my bike and wheeled it
to my parking spot. As I walked to the
running area I was surprised to see that the organisers had bananas for the
participants. I took two and gulped them
down as I walked to the run area. I dared
not test my knees at running yet. I kept
on walking for another 100 metres. I
then decided to try to run and was again hit with pain on both my knees due to
the jarring action of the run. “That’s it!,
I told myself. I had to walk all the way
to the completion line. I was overtaken
by all the runners from this point onwards. I noticed one guy who was behind me and he was
doing an extremely slow jog with small steps. I thought I could make him my pacer but he eventually pulled ahead of me
and could not be seen at the next uphill.
Finish line
The weather was really ideal. It was not hot as expected for Putrajaya is known
for being hot and the organisers kept advising us to take plenty of fluids. In fact during the last run I thought that it
might rain and I would get soaked as drops of rain were beginning to fall from
the cloudy sky at the halfway mark of the run 2. Luckily it did not.
After an extremely long time I was on the downhill
stretch leading to Jalan Persiaran Perdana.
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| Buffet lunch after completion of event |
….pant!
……
…….
…...pant!
(Dang! my mind was playing tricks with my body!!) I walked past the finish line and stepped on the timing mat to record my completion time. I collected my finisher certificate and medal. At the same time my timing chip was taken off from my left leg by one of the organisers. If I had to bend my knees to remove the timing chip, I think it would have taken some effort from me. Phew!
(Dang! my mind was playing tricks with my body!!) I walked past the finish line and stepped on the timing mat to record my completion time. I collected my finisher certificate and medal. At the same time my timing chip was taken off from my left leg by one of the organisers. If I had to bend my knees to remove the timing chip, I think it would have taken some effort from me. Phew!
I could not sit and I just rested while walking
slowly and leaning against the table. I also enjoyed my free Cornetto ice cream bonus and water
melons at the finisher tent. It
was this
time that Boon called me on the phone asking what’s taking me so long as
he
was going to go home. (He had reached the finish line much, much earlier
than me and must have been getting bored. Hee..hee..hee)
We met at a shaded spot at a building and managed to
take a few celebratory photos and exchanged stories. Both Eric and Boon were complaining that they
were being overtaken by the road bikes. Their mountain bikes just could not generate enough pace. (Lesson learnt : Need a road bike to compete
with the competitors.)
Boon did not stay for lunch. So Eric, his wife and
I queued up for lunch. The dining area was air conditioned. My jersey was soaked for I did not
change into dry clothes. My change of clothes was in my car at the car park. So it was quite chilly in the air conditioned dining
area. It was while we were having our
lunch that Edward showed up. He had
completed his 64 km bike ride and was totally wasted. He still had to wait for his relay partner to
finish the race. We had lunch together. After which both Eric and I decided to pack up
and leave. We did not stay for the prize
presentations. We went to collect our bicycles
at the transition area and there were still participants who took part in the full
duathlon coming into the finishing line. Both of us noticed that some of the
finishers looked much older than us. Our
admiration goes out to them tough blokes for being able to complete at that
age. We wished we could still remain fit
in time to come.
Epilogue 1:
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| The old and heavy steed (psst!..who r u referring to?) |
My overall timing is as below. It took me 3hours and 18 minutes to
complete. I was surprised that my cycling time was just 3.5 minutes off my
estimate time of 1.5 hours despite my pain.
My new road tyres actually helped to increase my cycling pace. Of course
my timing for Run 2 was disappointing. It
took me 57 minutes.
Official 3:18:39
Run 1 0:41:36
Cycle 1:33:30
Run 2 0:57:38
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