I know it has been *far too long* since I’ve updated this blog. Oh well. Guess my life is not as exciting as I thought it would be?
Suddenly felt like writing some thoughts about my running in 2016, so here it goes.
I just completed my 1,000th mile this year in a morning run at Marina Bay today. In some ways, completing it (unknowingly then) at Marina Bay was quite apt. Many of my running memories this year were formed in Marina Bay. After joining Running Department for realz after the Run 350 pacing project, I found myself running more (with buddies), running longer and loving it. (And also eating more, oops)
I have never hit 1,600 km in a year before. In fact, last year when I broke 1,000km it was such a big thing. And now I’m on track to hit 2,016km in 2016.
Right now, however, I find myself facing the difficulties of marathon running. As some of my friends may know I got a free slot for the Standard Chartered Marathon Singapore at the end of the year, and after many inspiring stories of RD people completing the marathon in awesome timings, I decided to take on the challenge. If there’s going to be a year at a clear attempt at the marathon, it will be this year – my last year as a full-time student.
So a few weeks ago I started on a marathon training plan on Strava, that I try to stick to as closely as possible.
Some of my friends may find the marathon simple for me – they probably see that I can run 10km and perhaps 21km pretty easily. But frankly it’s unchartered territory. My 23km run three weeks ago was my longest run since my first marathon attempt in December 2011. And despite starting the run at 5:30am, and ending 2 hours later (before the heating up of the land), I was thoroughly exhausted and dehydrated. I did bring a 500ml bottle of water that I finished faster than I had expected. According to plan, I was to do a 1 hr 45 mins run on Tuesday, which I did – running almost to Tengah and back – and without the coconut water break at a petrol station at Cashew, I may not have been able to finish it.
I respect people who do real long distance running. Like my friend You Liang, who seems to be able to do a 100km any time. He does not seem to have trained for his ultramarathon attempts and yet he finishes strong.
I think one problem with me is the lack of patience. I just want to get to the end – pronto. Which is why it’s great to have had the Run 350 experience, to remind me that the journey is more important than the destination. And the fact that the Strava plan classifies workouts by duration rather than distance is pretty awesome too.
More long runs in the pipeline. After skipping one long run last weekend to run a 10km at the Performance Series (with Fadzly, Cher and Rui Feng… and getting 3rd in the team category on paper), a 2 hrs 30 mins long run beckons this weekend.
Nobody said marathon training was easy!