Run, Rain and Pain: 25k at the New Balance Power Run

I'm not a fan of the rain. I miss gym workout sessions when it rains. I miss my running training program when it rains. I'd rather stay home and keep dry.

All that changed on a rainy, Sunday morning of November 6, when I forced myself to go out of bed, and attend the NB Power Run event. I didn't want my money to go to waste; I paid 1000 bucks as registration fee for this! Hehe!

Good thing I'm all geared-up for the downpour. I had my running jacket on as well as a cap to protect my eyes from the rain. My pair of shoes helps keep out water as well. Puddles of water were everywhere, and there was a particular area in the race route were flood waters were about an ankle high. Runners had no choice but to submerge their running feet. Wet shoes... Wet socks... Blisters!

Luckily, I had running company with me, my teammates from Team Alpha1 Coyote and FFS. FFS graciously offered to pace me and Martin. No pressure for me though, as this is my first 25k event, with a sure PR as long as I finish. I appreciated how FFS controlled our pace at the first few kilometers - making us slow down on road bends, advising us to keep steady on uphills, and on top of that, running ahead of us when we're approaching hydration stations and handing us cups of water as soon as we reach the water station. Now that's good pacer service!

We picked up pace at the final 10 kilometers, and by this time, we were overtaking a lot of runners who weren't able to manage to balance their energy reserves well. FFS' strategy worked! We managed to finish in 2 hours, 36 minutes and 59 seconds. Given the weather condition, that's a great time.

Almost at the finish line!

Team Alpha1 25k Finishers

Post-race breakfast at Pancake House

Runpix Analysis - Notice the negative split at the final 11k!

Now the only problem I had with this race is why the heck the finisher's medallion given during registration? If there's any rationale to that, I'd like to know.

Online Raffle Winner! Woot!

(Gift voucher photo courtesy of Kulitrunner's site)

I love reading other runners' blogs. One site I frequently visit is Kulitrunner's site since she's almost always first in announcing details of Runrio races. Last October 30, she posted a blog entry, letting 5 lucky readers win a complimentary race kit in Run United 3. I seldom join raffles since I feel luck is not on my side, but when I read this particular contest, I really felt good so I gave it a try.

3 days later, the winners were announced. Snippet of the blog entry on the image below:
Thank you Ma'am Vimz for this great running gift! I have registered already in RU3 32k (did not want to rely on chance alone) but Ma'am Vimz told me the voucher is transferable (but should never be sold) so my Team Alpha1 teammate Speedygiant will be using it for the 15k category.

Time to join more online running contests! Haha!

Signed-up for my 2nd Full Marathon!

Hongkong, baby!

Flight - Check!
Hotel Booking - Check!
Full marathon training - Started last October 17!

I'm soooo excited since this is the first out of the country trip of Team Alpha 1. This will be my 3rd visit to HK. I love this city!

Hopefully my HK full marathon time significantly improves compared to my epic fail Singapore Marathon last year. Train, Noel, train!!!

Adobo Run - My First Official Night Race

Last October 29, Saturday, I officially ran my first night race at the Adobo Run After Dark race event. I did not consider Nike We Run Manila as a night race because a.) the gunstart was at 5pm and b.) I finished 10k even before sunset. (Can you just feel I'm such a Nike Run hater? :p)

I thought Team Alpha 1 would be well-represented in this race but it turned out that only myself and Bryan FFS ran the 15k category. Barefoot Daves participated in the 5k category but he had to continue on his 25-kilometer LSD so I wasn't able to see him post-race.

We met KB and Mish - they did a competitive 5k run with Mish having a 6-minute head start. (Mish eventually won.)
The gunstart was crazy - it was announced in posters and Facebook posts earlier that 3k gunstart was at 8:10pm, 5k gunstart at 8:20pm and 15k gunstart at 8:30pm. Well guess what happened on race night? It was completely reversed and on different times! 3k costume runners were surprised to have been given the go signal to run 7:50pm. 5k runners were released around 8:20pm and 15k runners were the last to start at around 8:50pm. None of the original gunstart times were followed. I wonder what caused this but it definitely pissed-off a number of runners. I saw a lot of confused runners' faces.

Still, I enjoyed the race. The route was nice even though 15k runners had to bear doing 3 loops. The route was vehicle-free, much to runners' delight, hydration was ample, and lighting was satisfactory. I still haven't recovered fully from sickness, but after recovering from the initial feeling of heaviness of my legs, I began enjoying the cool breeze and increased my running pace. While running, all I'm thinking about is making it to the first 500 finishers since I really wanted to receive one of the limited finishers' medals.

During the last loop, I felt I passed a lot of 15k runners and I was excited that I'm going to have a strong race finish. Here's a pic take just before I reached the finish line. Triumphant!
I got the medal! Yay! (Photo courtesy of Adobo Run After Dark Official FB Page)
Surprisingly, I placed 50th among 400+ 15k runners when the results were released:
BUT (there's always a but) - here's the catch: Race Director Edward Kho released an official statement:

To all adobo Run participants. All the 3 race categories were indeed short as there was a considerable distance that were truncated in favor of the safety of all runners and consideration of motorists (the run was originally supposed to go out to Macapagal, pass along EDSA and cross the intersections of Coral and Bradco). All of that were scrapped in view of a major traffic flow because of the long weekend rush. I will own up to that shortcoming. It was a decision I had to make. Runners' safety (which includes provision for hydration and marshaling) and enjoyment of running and consideration of other road users are my utmost concerns in putting executing a race. If anybody felt cheated I am conveying my apologies to them.

So in effect, I just ran 13.5 kilometers. I'm still happy though because with my time, I managed to maintain an average of 5:30 pace which is the fastest I've ran this year. I'm gradually building up speed again. Yeah!

(Nike) We Run as (Adidas) Kings of the Road

The eternal rivalry between big brands Nike and Adidas - even in race events they're both trying to outdo each other. Nike We Run Manila was scheduled October 15, 2011 - a late afternoon Saturday race; Adidas King of the Road follows one week after, October 23, 2011 as a normal early Sunday morning race. Both are international events, with legs in other Asian cities. Both also have (outrageous) race kit claiming events. The most peculiar commonality though is that both races have the same organizer - Runrio.

RACE KIT CLAIMING EVENTS:

Both WE Run and KOTR had 3-day race claiming events in BGC area, with two days overlapping. Imagine the surge of people queuing up on the claiming locations after work hours.

First stop: KOTR at the NBC Tent, October 10, 2011. I and two TA1 teammates Daves and Rolly met-up and had a sumptuous dinner at Itallianis (and yogurt at Hobbes) before getting our hands on our KOTR race kits.

Cibo delizioso! Pre-birthday celebration of Rolly:Normal hair, afro hair, long hair, no hair (LOL!) - with Coach Rio:
Next stop: Nike We Run Manila race kit claiming in front of Nike Park BGC, October 13, 2011. Met up with Daves and claimed our (better-looking) race kits/bags.
With Pinoyfitness folks Ms. Mars and Jeff:
Compare: Nike and Adidas race tops. I posted this in Facebook and Nike was the clear winner.
RACE DAY:

October 15, 2011 - Nike We Run Manila. 8000 runners queued up at the starting line. Imagine that. No waves whatsoever. At 5pm gunstart, everyone started the long walk and attempted to squeeze through other runners (and walkers). It took me more than two minutes before reaching the start arc! That's how congested the area was.
Me and Earl - the only picture I have for this event - taken minutes before gunstart.
The race for me, was a disaster. 8000 runners for a single race category was simply too much to handle in BGC. I still managed to clock in at 1 hour 2 minutes, but I know I could have done better given better running space (and if race participants knew about running etiquette).

The fun part: post-race! TA1's got talent! Videoke at Red Box with the team is pure bliss! Haha! Best song of the night: Martin and Rocky's rendition of Careless Whisper. Such a classic!
October 23, 2011 - Adidas King of the Road. With different race categories offered - 10k, 16k and 21k, this one's obviously better-managed. I was really looking forward to this 21k event, but unfortunately, I caught a bad case of flu days before. Friends advised me not to run anymore, but I just couldn't resist to get my hands on that three-striped medal.

Strategy: Take 1000 mg of Alaxan 1 hour before the race to make my body numb. It worked! I still managed to finish in 2 hours and 13 minutes, though I really hated parts of the race when I had to deal with runny nose, my breathing definitely was affected.

Here's me running in my takbo.ph singlet! Got thinner after just a few days of being sick. :(
I wore my KOTR singlet after the race. Here's me and the rest of the TA1 KOTR runners after a hearty breakfast meal at Kabisera.
AND THE WINNER IS: Adidas KOTR! Sorry Nike, but there are a lot of improvement areas you need to focus on next year. KOTR has learned a lot from the previous years, and the KOTR medal this year is one of the best in my medal collection, so I am quite biased. :p

Octoberun Festival 2011

A hybrid team - Team Alpha 1 Max, composed of 25 well-oiled machines (or runners), joined the 21k team event. I joined the run to support my halimaw teammates, and to pace my TA1 teammate Rocky in this event.

Here's Rocky and I on the last few kilometers - Rocky smiling, and me forcing one. Haha!
Post-race, while waiting for the 25-runner team category results (Martin and Gian not wearing their TA1 singlets):
Rocky, Armbanded, Sprintingswine, FFS, Eugenator, Martian, Deemen, Chad:
TA1 Max did not place due to some race technicalities, but an average time of 1 hour and 40 minutes for its 25 runners is a feat worthy of a win.

Camsur Marathon: I am Ferdinand (What?!)

What a weird blog title. Haha! Let me explain.

Since my running comeback, I've been regularly attending Team Alpha 1's weekly race events. A surprising text message from Bryan (FFS) arrived early week of September telling me one of the supposed participants has backed-out of the trip, and I could use his plane ticket. Free airfare to Camsur? I didn't need much convincing.

The dilemma? I need to pose as this person during the flight so I had to present a fake identification in the airport. My god, am I really blogging about this? Haha! And you guessed that right, his name's Ferdinand.

With the help of a 'master' forger, I was able to get my hands on a very convincing fake identification card (let's just leave this person's identity secret; he might get apprehended). Haha!

Let's fast-forward to our arrival at Naga. Runners were greeted at the airport with much hospitality. I really felt the government's effort in making CamSur one of the premier race destinations in the country. The welcome party didn't disappoint and is just a precursor of things to come.

Here's the team upon arrival at the CWC reception:
We had a lot of food trips (or carbo-loading to lessen the guilt). Here's us after dinner and sound trip (!!!) at Triboo Grill.
Race day finally came. Numerous shuttles brought runners to their respective starting points. The wait time was long, but the atmosphere was festive. Fireworks lit the sky before gunstart (a little too close for comfort I'd say), the countdown commenced, and off we go!

I was pacing with Philip (BBR) at the start of the race. I think by kilometer 7 he told me to go ahead so I was mostly on my own after that. There were no U-turns, the route was basically one big loop, so there was no opportunity to get to see the other TA1 members.

It was an all-terrain race - I ran on cement, asphalt, wood (bridge), metal (bridge) and soil and mud. The scenery was tops and the air so fresh (with occasional smell of cow poo, lol!). A lot of locals were on the side streets cheering racers on, and I particularly like the kids giving runners high-fives along the way.

The last few kilometers, I paced with Daves. There were still some crazy hills before we reached the finish line. Here are our finish line photos taken by Kathy:
Team pic (BBR still missing) - all wearing our "sili" 21k medals:
Our post-race breakfast with a killer wait time! We just cheered full marathon runners on while waiting.
Dinner at Bob Marlin - best food award! Haha! Ms. Mars of Pinoyfitness graced the occasion (parang celebrity lang, hehe!).
The following morning was a different story! Typhoon Pedring arrived, signal number 3 was declared and all flights were cancelled. It's as if Sunday's great running weather was a thing of the past, and the winds were howling crazy as we were scrambling on deciding what to do next. But the odds were still in our favor - our van driver's wife works in bus dispatching, so we were able to buy first class bus tickets going back to Manila that night. It'll be a long 8-hour trip, but we took the risk instead of waiting for the typhoon to leave (which might take days).

Presenting the Team Alpha 1 bus:
Everyone arrived safe and sound early Tuesday morning. This out-of-town trip with TA1 was a blast and will be fondly remembered. And I have to thank Ferdinand for it.

The Jump of a Lifetime

Last September 21, 2011, I finally crossed one of the items from my bucket list - do a bungee jump! I did this on the highest commercial bungee jump in the world - Macau Tower, with a drop of 233 meters. I've been to Macau 5 years ago for a quick side-trip from Hongkong, and this is when I started the dream of doing that crazy jump someday.

So here it is, in all its video glory! The day I braved to jump the jump of a lifetime! Given the chance, I'd do this again in a heart beat.