Venue : Putrajaya Water Sports Centre, Presinct 6
Time : 0600-1200 hrs
The Beginning
In
June of 2011, I took part in a mini-triathlon called a Hoohathlon. In
fact this is my inaugural “triathlon” event. The very first time I was
introduced to the word “triathlon” was during my university days (in the
80s) when an athlete called Grant Kenny was in all the Kellog’s
Nutri-grain corn flakes box covers. He was Australian’s “Ironman” in the
80s. That was when I found out that there is a sporting event where the
athlete has to take part in three different events i.e. swimming,
cycling and running.
Towards
the early nineties when I was working, I was mixing with a group of
recreational scuba divers and we got to talking about triathlons. We had
planned to take part in a triathlon as part of a relay team. I was to
be the designated swimmer. At that time I had sustained a prolapsed disk
(lower back injury) and the doctor recommended swimming as the best
form of exercise. I had no choice but to swim in order to strengthen my
back and hence was swimming up to about 45 minutes per pool session.
Hence I volunteered the swimming leg of the triathlon. The three of us
were supposed to train individually. When we were supposed to register,
we lost our designated cyclist as he said that his borrowed bike was
stolen. That was the end of that attempt as we lost one vital team
member. Secretly the two remaining relay members (myself included) were
relieved as we then had an excuse not to compete. Phew!
Now
fast forward to 2011. My colleague at work rang me up one day asking me
to lend him my mountain bike. When asked why he said that he wanted to
sign up for a mini-triathlon. Then he asked me if I was interested. My
appetite was whetted again. After going to the hooHa website links that
he sent me, I decided to try for real this time and to complete in all
the events. Wrote an email to my cycling buddy Edward, asking him if he
was interested and he replied, “Okay. He will take up the challenge
too.”
So that’s how I entered this mini-triathlon. I officially enrolled in it on the 5th
June 2011. This was after I had timed myself by running around KLCC
park for 5 km on 1 June and cycling along the Guthrie corridor on 3rd June. (What? I had to make sure that I was able to complete the course mah !)
Pre -Race training
The
actual intensive training that I did was done 3 weeks before the actual
race. I was most worried about my knees as I had somehow injured my
knees in my student days (Sydney to Surf race circa 1989) and the
injury recurred again when I was coming down Mount Kinabalu (circa
1993-94). The last time I tried training to run again was at KLCC park
back in 1996-97. I started with walks around the park, increasing my
walking rate as the weeks went by. I only walked about 3-4 laps
(maximum). Then when I was confident enough to run, I started by walking
1-2 laps mixed with 1 lap of running. This time I injured my groin. So I
had to stop my walking and running altogether.
Anyway
about a year ago I took up mountain biking and that was my form of
exercise. One weekend morning per week of cycling in the jungle trails
of Kemensah.
About
four-five weeks before the race, I started the KLCC walks and training
runs again. First, the fast pace walk, followed by a combination of fast
pace walk plus run and finally the run alone. Towards the last two
weeks before the race, Edward and I started to test our endurance by
doing the run, followed immediately by a swim. The so called “full dress
rehearsal” I did was a 5 km run around KLCC park, followed by a half
hour bike ride at the Dua residence gym and lastly a ten minute swim at
the condo’s pool. (facilities courtesy of our friend,MK who has a unit
at Dua Residence).
The Night Before
We
decided that Edward should spend the night at my place so that we won’t
be late for the race. We planned to get there by 6 am which meant we
had to wake up a 5 am. So Edward brought all his gear to my place on
Saturday night. We hooked up the two bikes onto the car boot bike rack.
Arranged our clothes and went to bed about half past midnight. We slept
late as we had a night cap of teh-tarik at the corner mamak shop.
Early morning Drama
Got
up at 5:30 am. Both of us complaining to each other that we were not
able to get a good night’s sleep. Edward was complaining about the
splashing sound from the mini aquarium outside the room window. I got up
3 times during the night. We set off at about 6:10 am and arrived at
the hoohathlon event car park at about 6:50am. It was still dark. We
parked beside a bunch of cyclists who were there not for the hoohathlon
but to cycle around Putrajaya. When Edward saw the group of cyclists
with their helmets, it dawned on him that he had forgotten to bring his
helmet.
“****!
I forgot to bring my helmet!”. So there we were far from home with
only one helmet. We asked the group of cyclists for a spare helmet. One
of them offered his construction safety helmet. We were desperate
enough to use it if the organizers allowed it. We contemplated driving
back home to collect my son’s helmet. The time was 6:55 am. We decided
to get ourselves registered first and while at the registration counter
we asked the organisers for a spare cycling helmet. Unfortunately they
had none but one of them made a public announcement on the public
address system asking the participants if they had any spare helmets.
Anxious seconds turned to minutes as we were contemplating making a dash
back to my house to fetch my son’s helmet. We thought that if we
stepped on the accelerator, we might just be able to make it back in
time for the 8 am start. (30 minutes home and 30 minutes back to
Putrajaya). Anxiety turned to relief when one of the participants came
up to the registration counter offering Edward a spare helmet. The
helmet belonged to the participant’s son who came along not to
participate but to cycle around Putrajaya.
With
that solved we busied getting ready for the race. We had to get our
bikes to the bike storage area. Stick the race numbers one each for our
bike and our helmet. A basket was provided at the bike holding area to
keep our running and cycling gear. We also had to pin a larger race
number which had our names on to the back of our shirt. I found out
later that the number should have been pinned on the front of our shirt.
(Refer to The Finish Line)
All
the while the organizers were blaring out instructions to all the
participants on the public address(PA) system. Giving instructions to
the participants to go and register, where to the park the bikes, where
to go to the toilets with music in between the announcements. It was
quite noisy in the early morning hours at the Putrajaya lakeside. Of
course I could not remember what was being blared on the PA system due
to the early morning scare.
PreRace Briefing
We
gathered at the lake side for a short pre-race briefing by the
organizers. It was here that I was able to pay attention to the
instructions given. We were told what to do and what not to do, etc. during each event. We were told to wear the 
timing bands all the time (on the left ankle leg) and to step on the timing mat at the start of each event.
timing bands all the time (on the left ankle leg) and to step on the timing mat at the start of each event.
Picture
on left shows the Pre Race briefing given by the Orange-man. The fun
part of the event was that we had to be "shao-lin" monks for the
duration of the swim (skin coloured swim caps)
First Event:The 150 metres Swim
The swimming event was tackled very cautiously by me. I
was told by a friend earlier that during the swimming event there will
be a lot of contestants jostling and kicking to get to first place.
Hence there would be a lot of frantic kickers and I was to be aware of intense body contact. With that in mind I told myself to stay behind and not get knocked about by the other contestants. I had to tell myself to calm down, focus and breathe normally and do not get into a state of frantic swimming.
Initially
I tried swimming with my head down but then I could not get my bearings
and swam away from the supposed route. I had to switch to swimming
breast stroke so that I could get my bearings to swim in the right
direction.
I accidentally took a mouthful of the water while swimming the first 50 metres. Earlier when I dipped into the lake I was thinking to myself, “Damn. The water is greyish in colour. Is the water clean or not? Maybe it is filled with pathogens and bacteria?!” I cou
ld only console myself by saying that at least the water is warm and not cold unlike the swimming pool where I trained. Upon taking the mouthful of water I immediately spat out the water in disgust. “Phui! Spit!” I
had to keep swimming to the end, climbed up the platform where the
showers were, took a mouthful of fresh water and gargled my mouth to
clean it. I had to keep moving. I stopped at the next shower to take another mouthful to gargle again. I
had that disgusted plus worried look when the picture(see right pic)
was taken thinking “ Hopefully no stomach ache or diarrhoea later"
ld only console myself by saying that at least the water is warm and not cold unlike the swimming pool where I trained. Upon taking the mouthful of water I immediately spat out the water in disgust. “Phui! Spit!” I
had to keep swimming to the end, climbed up the platform where the
showers were, took a mouthful of fresh water and gargled my mouth to
clean it. I had to keep moving. I stopped at the next shower to take another mouthful to gargle again. I
had that disgusted plus worried look when the picture(see right pic)
was taken thinking “ Hopefully no stomach ache or diarrhoea later"
So I ended up swimming breast stroke for most of the route so that I could reach the two midway points and the final point. Not a very fast start. (Mental note: learn to swim freestyle with the head out of the water to see where I am going next time)
Second Event:The 10.6 km Bike ride
Ran
to the bike area. Put on my cycling shorts. I was again advised earlier
by a contestant to make sure your soles are clear of sand and pebbles
before putting on the socks. Otherwise the sand and pebbles will cause
you undue pain during the running event. So I took my time, sat down on the tarmac and cleaned my soles before putting on my socks,
making very sure no pebbles were trapped between my soles and the
socks. Edward came running in complaining that he too was not able to
swim in the right direction and had often wandered off track. I got geared up, put on my helmet and gloves and was ready to ride. I jumped onto my bike to try to make up for lost time. I had forgotten that I was not supposed to ride the bike but had to push the bike to the “ride out” area first. Immediately I got off my bike, looked around and pretended to cooly wheel my bike to the “ride out” area. Stepped on the timing mat, heard the beep of the recorder and then began to cycle furiously out onto the cycling route.
I had managed to borrow my brother-in-law’s road bike. It was an extremely light bicycle. It was a full titanium frame with composite wheels. I
managed to gain some ground here and overtooked some cyclists on
mountain bikes. It was an unfair advantage as I was effortless
overtaking a few of the straggling cyclists on mountain bikes. It
was a great advantage to have that bike. Going up the ramp to the
highway was easy and while going downhill I told myself to pedal hard to
take advantage of the downhill and momentum.
I finished the cycling circuit much faster than I had anticipated. I
borrowed the road bike a week before the event and I dared not take the
road bike out for a test spin as I was afraid that I might puncture or
damage the expensive bike. I only took it out in front of my house for a
short two minute test ride just so that I could familiarize myself with
the bike’s gear change system as it was different from my mountain
bike’s gears. The bike’s gear change was on the brake handles and not
via levers on the main handle bar.
Third Event :The 5 km Run
Made
a loop and cycled back to the bike holding area. Removed my brand new
padded cycling shorts (bought 2 weeks before the event) and put on my
running shorts. I bought the padded cycling shorts as I did not want to get “pins and needles” after the bike ride. The shorts did not do its trick as when I began to run I was feeling numb on my rump and at the other "important " spots. I
slowed down to a walk and began to loose momentum. This was just about
50 metres from the start of the “run-out” point and I had a long way to
go. What a blow. I told myself not to worry, just walk fast and complete the race. At this point in time Edward ran past me. I encouraged him to “Go man! Go!” I
began to walk as fast as I could. My chest(heart?) was feeling the
stress too.(I had a slight chest pain and that worried me.) Many participants were already on the way back and passing me. All I could do was just put a “thumbs up” sign and smiled. I could hear behind me an announcement that the first participant was about to reach the finish line. Then there were shouts and claps as the organizers announced the winner of the Hoohathlon. I was still a long way to the halfway point where we had to double back on the same route to head to the finish line. In fact I kept asking the passing participants who were heading back to the finish line where the half way point was? As I was nearing the half way mark, the participants on the way back started to cheer me on. I started to move my legs again and then began to jog slowly. Somehow their encouragement got my legs moving again. Yeah! I caught my second wind and I began to jog slowly. I had to maintain my rhythm and hoped that it would not stop. I
reached the half way point on one of the Putrajaya lake embankments
just pass the dam, turned around and headed back. Only 2.5 km to go, I
told myself. I caught up with Edward who must have stopped to walk too. He was also running when I caught up to him. I noted that his shoe was a little loose and told him about it. I maintained my slow jogging rhythm and at long last I could see the finish line ahead.
The Finish Line
I
remembered seeing the finish line as I was jogging slowly
simultaneously trying to ensure that my breathing is okay and trying to
make sure that all is well with my heart. I could see the crowd at the finish line and they could see me. Slowly I turned my body to the left to head towards the finish line. As I was approaching the line the organizers/crowd began to be vocal and started cheering me on. When I passed the finish line, one of the organizers gave me the completion medal and put it around my neck. I was elated and said thank you several times. I could hear the camera clicking. I headed for the drinks station next to the finish line and asked for a cup of hundred plus. A few minutes late
r Edward also reached the finish line. I called to him and passed him a cup of hundred plus. Thus ended my first ever triathlon.
r Edward also reached the finish line. I called to him and passed him a cup of hundred plus. Thus ended my first ever triathlon.
I think I speak for all who participated
in the Hoohathlon. It was truly a feeling of a great sense of
achievement as I stepped over the finish line onto the timing mat. I was
thankful that physically I was all right as that was foremost on my
mind. Take part in the race BUT do not over exert yourself was the
thought at the back of my mind throughout the event.
As I mentioned earlier, the race number should most importantly be pinned at the front of the shirt. This is so that the organizers/crowd
can easily identify you as you approach the stations. Besides it will
look better when your photo is taken as you pass the finish line. As I was reaching the finishing line I think the organizers /crowd were not sure
whether to clap or give encouragement as they were not sure if I was a
participant as my race number was pinned behind my shirt. I
think only when I changed direction and headed towards the finishing
line that the organizers realized that I was a participant that they
began to shout and gave encouragement. Out came the cameras and the
shouts of congratulations. (Very Important Mental Note: pin your race
numbers in FRONT of your shirt.)
Now
I can tell my friends that I took part in a triathlon. I might forget
to mention that it was just a MINI-triathlon but then that’s okay :-)
Overall Results
Official / Swim / T1 / Cycle / T2 / CP / Run
01:17:09 / 00:07:35 / 00:03:58 / 00:25:17 / 00:02:01 / 00:21:18 / 00:38:20
T1 is the changing time from swim to cycle T2 is the changing time from cycle to running
CP is the time taken to the half way point of the run
Bottom right picture is Edward and I with our completion medals. Edward is holding onto the precious borrowed helmet.
Bottom left is a picture of my Brother-in-law's road bike (the silvered
coloured one). The brand new red coloured bike belongs to Edward
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