klscm 2014

the goal this year was to complete klscm in 4 hours 30 minutes. i had no strategy. i had minimal training. basically i only upped my training 2 weeks before the run itself. but i was really hopeful that i could have a new personal best. a girl can dream, no? 

so, the night before, i had dinner, downloaded songs, pinned my bib onto my shirt, and went to bed, nervous yet excited. i went to bed roughly around 10pm. before i knew it, my alarm rang, and i jumped out of bed, super egg-cited about the big day. some people are excited about their birthdays, some their wedding, some their graduation, me, i get excited about a big marathon day. 

i had some biscuits for breakfast. i wanted to have cereal but i was afraid i would get my slight-lactose-intolerant side effect. got there, checked in my bag, and stretched a little before my run. so it was karen's first marathon and cheryl's second. i had high hopes for karen. i was estimating a 5h15minutes arrival for her. 

we could not get in front to where the pacers were. so upon flagoff, it was a pretty long chase for me. we ran along jalan raja/jalan raja laut, then turned on to jalan sultan ismail where sheraton imperial was. i skipped the 1st and 2nd water station. i only managed to catch up with the first 4 hour pacer somewhere along jalan perak and the 2nd 4 hour pacer somewhere right before jalan tun razak. it was a real long chase, probably only caught up with him 6-7km into the run. 

so that was what i did. i followed this pacer at a very steady pace. i decided to follow the first pacer as i thought his pace suited me better. we ran through the roads of kl, on to jalan tun razak, and then on to akla highway. i quite enjoyed the akla portion of the run because my pace was pretty good. when we reached the water stations, i would up my speed, afraid of losing him in the midst of my water breaks. 

it was only till i got onto the duke highway that i could not keep up with said my pacer. 

i felt the urge to use the toilet, so i did, and when i came out, it would have been difficult to catch up with him. yeah, running whilst needing to use the toilet is not pleasant, at all. this happened around the 23-24km ish point. so i started to pace myself. when i was really tired, i allowed myself 30 seconds of walk time then i continued to run. 

running duke was pretty difficult for me. the road was not completely flat but slanted, to the left. thus, it put alot of pressure on my left foot to adjust itself, hence i could feel my ankle starting to hurt. thankfully i pulled through. the other difficult point for me was somewhere near the 38km mark. this was where it said there was 200m more to a rest stop. so i continued, anticipating water/100plus and a short rest. some 500m later, i saw a hill, and no rest stop. it was only after you overcame the hill that you would see a rest stop.

and i crossed the finish line at my new personal best, 4 hour 14 minutes and 13 seconds. i had tears of joy. it might mean little to alot of people, but to me it was such a significant moment. i was super overjoyed. i could not stop smiling to myself. dreams do come true. even now, 2 days after the event i'm still in this 'over the moon' mood. 

i have to say klscm is an amazing marathon. if anyone would want to try running a marathon, klscm would definitely be my recommendation. it was so greatly organized, with sufficient water stations, a great route, or maybe i'm just biased because i pb-ed here haha. results just released. 

2 of my friends made their first marathon. tianyi made a 5h 15 min time and fong made a 5h 22 mins time. unfortunately, karen, hanyang and cheryl didn't make it. it's okay, i'm trying to convince them to come back next year to try again. we didn't manage to have a pic during the event, because we were too exhausted but we took one when we were having lunch, replenishing. 

so what's next? i have a new dream, maybe i have too many dreams. i want to do ironman. i want to qualify for boston. people tell me i have too many dreams.