my new toy

i got myself an early christmas present this year. i just need to put a bow on it and pretend to be surprised on christmas day. merry christmas everybody. 

Port Dickson Powerbar Duathlon 2014

i signed up for the pd duathlon on the last day of registration - a product of much hesitation. well mainly because i had viper challenge the day before this event, so i kinda questioned whether i'd be too tired. i don't know wad got over me, but i did sign up in the end. although i only signed up for the sprint version (run 5km, cycle 30km, run 5km). 

my very first duathlon, well cycling event as well. i was super nervous  - mostly because i had no biking experience-and i really mean zero. the most i had cycled was for 10km around my housing area, then i got bored. so yes nervous and scared perfectly described my feelings towards this duathlon. 

my alarm rang at 330am today. in my mind, all i could think was - i'm having a bad headache from viper. i am super deprived of sleep. my body is super-duper tired from viper, why the heck am i awake at this hour again. i seriously questioned my sanity. but i pulled myself together, got dressed, packed my stuffs, and hopped onto the car. 

mucho gracias to my uncle (he is 19) who offered to drive me down to portdickson in the early hours. i hopped on the car, fell asleep, and awakened in pd. we got there about 5 ish. he helped me fix the bike up (thankfully he came along). 

i really was like a lost puppy. i had no idea how to rack the bike. i had no idea how transition worked, luckily daryl helped me with the racking and taught me how to. oh and did i mention i wore the helmet the wrong way. if he did not point that out when i tried the helmet on, well i would have a dangerous biking experience. so we racked the bike. then i placed a bottle of water, a small towel, my cycling pants and a big towel in my transition basket. 

so i just raced like a blur kid. before i knew it, it was flagoff. the 5km run was a breeze for me since i am afterall a runner - not the best runner, but still a runner. then came transition. the initial plan was to use the towel to wrap around my waist, like a sarong, to change into my cycling pants. a friend of mine said this to me 'don't crazy, wait you cause lots of accidents'. so at transition, i thought it might be a little crazy so i just pulled my cycling pants over my running pants. i unracked the bike, and ran towards the mounting line. and off i went to cycle. 

the bike course was super duper hilly. it was definitely difficult for me. i paddled and huffed and puffed. i thought to myself, hmm i'm doing such a great job and i'm pretty tired i must have covered quite a distance already, then i stared down at the speedometre and saw i only travelled 3.95km out of the 30km. that was barely 20 per cent. that was when i went damn. i went slowly and steadily up and down the hills. but having a massive amount of people pass me on the bike course was pretty demotivating - really really demotivating. i felt like i was super crap at the bike course. but then again, it was something expected, afterall i have no training, no experience, what did i expect. but there were moments when i had funny thoughts like 'you wait, i'll pass you on the run course' when people passed me on the bike course. i was so glad when biking was done. 

after getting off the bike, i felt my legs go jelly. it took me some time to get into the running mode. but i managed to pass a number of people on the run course, as vowed haha. i managed to complete the course in 2 hours and 24 minutes. i was gunning for a 2h 30 minutes time. my ideal time would have been 2 h 15 minutes. just have to train harder next time. 

all in all - a great experience. no regrets. much thanks to my support team=)

cfal tristate registered

after much hesitation and persuasion (me persuading myself), finally,i signed up for the campaign for a lane (cfal) tristate 1st edition. this is a 120km ride, starting from penang, down to kedah and perak then back up to penang. this is happening in january next year. coincidentally, i will have to go up to penang for a wedding with my bestie stephy and this race so happens to fall on the very same weekend. it was a sign! i thought since i was going to be up anyways, i should just go for it. so despite being utterly completely unprepared, i signed up. 

initially, what kept me from signing up was because i had zero confidence that i would be able to complete this race. i don't even have a bike yet, let alone have that cycling capability. yes, despite the fact that this race is not a century ride since its 40km short of being officially called one, to me, this is still one heck of a difficult task. my current cycling level is- i'm not sure i can even ride more than 10km. so apart from my heart of steel, i have nothing. 

have to thank kenkent for constantly persuading me and encouraging me to sign up for this. he has been very encouraging and supportive of my ironman dream. it is true that this would be a part of my training for ironman. and if i don't sign up, i would never know. maybe, just maybe i could make it. 

freaked out slightly yesterday and wanted to do a little running yesterday evening, but it started raining, so i could not run outdoors. have to thank miss moy for inviting me to jatomi to workout with her. i decided to do a quick brick workout (which turned out to be not so quick afterall). 5km run followed by 30 minutes biking and wrapped it up with a 3km run. the biking part was the more difficult part for me. i have approximately 3 months to polish up my biking skills. hopefully i will improve exponentially. 

so yes thanks miss moy. 

have got to get back to the groove. have got dreams to chase.