Letting Go

PBIM is close to my heart.
I did my first half marathon on Penang Bridge.
I did my last sub5 marathon on Penang Bridge ( cerita lama bosan ala lemau).
I love running at night on the bridge. It's breezy and sometimes, if you're lucky it rains.
Some say it's monotonous and boring but I love running towards Penang island's skyline.
And imagine running uphill towards the booming drums and the magnificent lights on the middle part of the bridge.
Awesome.

This year will be the last PBIM on Penang Bridge.
They say, next year, runners will be running ( and trying out) the spanking  new , longer second bridge.
I don't know if they'll keep the name. I don't know whether it'll be just as good.
We'll just have to wait and see.
Sedihla pulak.

Last year I gave PBIM a pass due to last minute stomach issues.
This year, I won't be running  the half marathon again for the obvious reasons.
And due to my fondness of this race, I've decided to give out my racing kit for free.
It's such a waste to let it peram in my almari just like that. Kalau boleh jadi jeruk kat Chowrasta tu takpe jugak. Lebih baik berbakti kepada others who failed to or somehow forgot to sign up for the race.

Anyway, I'm giving it all away. The vest, the bib, anything inside the bag. Even the pil che ke teck aun (betul ke eja ni?)
Except the Salonpas which I'll keep for my neck aches.

So anyone of my readers who are interested, tell me why you'd like to run the last PBIM in the comment box. If you're too shy, you can email me at octopusgoreng at yahoo.com.
Kalau ramai sangat takers, I will somehow choose one.
Kalau takde yang nak, by next week I'll mention it on one of the running groups in FB.
Please do take note, it's strictly for those who are interested in running the half marathon Women Open category. And no selling it to anybody else, okay?

Hope to hear from you guys soon.

Larian 1Malaysia Padang Rengas - Sebagai Penonton

Saya tak pernah jadi penonton.
Serius.
Rasanya tak pernah la. Tapi nanti kena tengok balik past entries to make sure.

Usually if there's a race and there's nobody available to take care of the kids, he would always volunteer to take the back seat.
I pretend to ask if it's okay once or twice and then I'd be off running.

Kesian dia.

So I decided ( or I guess it was decided by fate) to just be a penonton for this race.
And see how it feels like to be on the other side.

I actually signed up for this race despite me saying Taiping International Marathon's 10K was the last for this season.
Talk about being fickle minded.
But blame it on the pakcik yang jaga the race registration.
" Sayang oo kalau tak masuk, dik. Orang pompuan tak ramai lagi yang sign up"
Saje je pakcik ni kan.

Registration pun murah. Aku pun bayar je la. Niat kalau tak lari aku sedekahkan je la.

Pastu bila seminggu pegi kursus, mula la contemplate nak lari ke dak.
Even though it was advertised as only an 8K race, I hardly ever done more than a 5K distance ever since I hit the 2nd trimester.
Pastu nama pun race, for sure I'd overexert myself even though niat pasang taknak buat sedemikian.
I don't trust myself to behave.

Tambah race would start at 8 am. Dianjurkan parti politik.
CONFIRM start lebih lewat.
Overheating will become an issue.

Kejap-kejap aku tepon WW. Nak race ke? Tak nak race ke?
Dia pun dah mula malas layan.
But like I said, fate decided for me.
After I got back from my kursus, I asked mom whether she was free to take care of the kids.
" Boleh, tapi....mak dah miss kelas agama 2 kali dah minggu ni"
Tu dia, punya subtle rejection.

So it was decided. Penonton je la.

Berapa banyak punya mukadimah da

Cantik kan? Bukit apentah.

So 7:30 am sampai kat Sekolah Tun Perak untuk Larian 1 Malaysia kat Padang Rengas..
Aku tengok muka-muka biasa geng-geng Taiping Road Runners buat warm up.
Lepas WW salam-salam sape-sape yang patut, dia pun buat warm up jugak.

warm up melawan arus

Dalam pukul 8.00 am, MC suruh pelari berkumpul kat court tennis.
Ramai jugak la for a race not widely advertised.
And then sessi MC buang masa membebel sebab kononnya organizers masih lagi recce route race untuk clearkan route.
Adeke?
Bebel pokpek bebel pokpek, matahari pun dah naik. Terik.
Aku ngan anak-anak dah mula lapar tapi sebab takut termiss the start of the race, kami tahan jugak.

Tunggu
Tunggu
Tunggu

Ramai runners keluar  'kandang tahanan' by this time sebab:
1. Dah panas
2. Nak warm up balik
3. Nak pi jamban.

Tup-tup pukul 8.55 am baru nak start.
Masa tu matahari naik betul la.
Aku nervous jugak, kot-kot la organizers nak bagi politician berucap sebelum start.
Depa ni bukan boleh. Suka benor dengar diri sendiri bercakap.
Sep baik takde.

So they were let off. And we cheered and cheered. We watched them until they were nowhere in sight.

Silly camera phone can never snap on time. Argh

And then my children looked up to me.
Now what?

Now we wait.

So kami pi kantin dan makan.
Talk about killing two birds.

Ikut resam nasi lemak kantin.

Sedap dan murah. 

goreng pon sodap 

After 26 minutes, we heard the MC announcing the arrival of the first placing runner.
Aik? Lajunya.
Kalut-kalut rush balik kat race site.

Aku tengok sorang-sorang cross the finishing line
1,2,3,4,5..(alamak, podium nak habis)
6,7,8,9...
Just as I was about to look elsewhere, Chiam spotted his old man.
We were cheering, and jumping and clapping. All three of us. Aku nampak paling buruk kot.
And trying to take pictures at the same time.
Which of course came out crappy.

Camera phone aku ada reputation taknak snap at the right timing.

( yang depan tu category budak sekolah 3K) 

Tengok tu! Dia snap tinggal bayang je. 

Harun hashim sungguh. 

But he did it.
No 10. in 32 minutes.
We were pumped.
The kids were really happy ( mostly sebab papa bagged a prize)
"30 hengget je?" kata Chiam.
Jadi la tu. Janji pulang modal.

 Yay!

Ate, takdele besinye koman benor yeop.

The prize giving went smoothly. We didn't have to wait long. The prize money was given promptly and only first 3 finishers had to wait for the prize giving ceremony ( which I heard was held late).
Not bad for a small race. Good quality medal and despite all the lateness, it went smoothly afterwards.

And finally I've officially became a penonton!
I've embraced the other side!
Which is not so bad provided there's nasi lemak.
But then again, nothing can go wrong when there's nasi lemak.

something okay and not okay

It is okay to strike a pose biting your well earned medal at the end of the race.
It is not okay to take several dozen pictures posing the same way and posting them online every 5 seconds.
Your friends just might wish the next picture will be of your chipped tooth wedged on the medal.

It is okay to say " I've finished the race in the 25th position!"
The feat itself is respectable and not everyone is podium material.
It is not okay to say, " I got number 3 at the first 500 metres until those damn Kenyans caught up with me and I finished 25th". Everytime.


It's totally okay to congratulate your female friends for getting a good placing.
It is not okay to say that women are comparatively slower runners and if your friend was a man, she'll get dead last.

It's okay to encourage a newbie friend to race.
It's not okay to comment that getting 40 minutes for a 5K is kinda slow .
He's called a newbie for the obvious reasons okay.

It is okay to like talking about running with your running buddies.
It is not okay to blabber on about the fundamentals of runnning and bring out all the jargons of the sport to anyone not remotely interested.

It's okay to be proud of what you've done so far.
It's not okay to constantly gloat.
Macam goat.

It's okay to be competitive. It fuels  the run.
It's not okay to dengki-mendengki.

It's okay if you like to sign up for races every other weekend.
It's not okay to abandon your family plans for these races.
The key is moderation. orang lain pun tak meluat dengan hobi kita.

It's okay to join races every other weekend.
It's not okay to constantly whine about your various injury because of this. Hey, you asked for it.
Be real, relaxlah. You are not a robot. Humans need time to heal. Okay, what about people who are constantly racing and not getting injured? Well, I guess they're superhumans and most of us aren't built like that

It's okay to wite your blog post.
It's not okay to write it while the course speaker is blabbering on with things you have no idea  of.

I'm not taking a jab at anybody. Mostly I'm making fun of myself and other silly things I've done or encountered  in the past 4 years of racing.
It' s all for a good laugh and a slap on the forehead so chill.

Mostly I'm bored because I'm stuck here in a 4 day kursus aim to bore the hell out of me.
The only highlight of my day is running on the gym's treadmill. I'm not even looking forward to the buffet.Sebab tak sedap. Huhu.

Sorry of the typos. I'm tapping this on my hp. Maybe wW will be kind enough to edit later.

Have fun guys :)

The Oath (?/!)

Let's face it, since my last race, I've been kinda neglecting my runs.
Kinda? Who am I kidding?
Mosta.

I've only ran about 3 times since. Sure, I had that oncall thingy ( again!) last week which was a pretty valid excuse not to run. But I  have no excuse for overeating.

Yep, I've kinda been doing that a lot these past few weeks.
Kinda? Who am I kidding?
Mosta.

It doesn't help that I'm hungry all of the time.
Seriously, no kidding. ALL of the time.
I used to have breakfast and be quite  full till lunch time but now it's like ;
breakfast at 7 am, then by 9:30 tummy starts grumbling again as if completely forgetting I had an egg sandwich 2 hours before, then after a snack at 11 am, I get the hunger pangs again and it'll go on and on for every 2-3 hours.
Worser yet, if I ignore the hunger, my mouth will get all payau, and it'll  be a retching fest.
And I'll be retching like crazy behind my mask at work and my assistant will be like, " Why are you making eyes at me like that?" or " You look funny."
( they still haven't got a clue in the office)

My parents are thrilled at the prospect of overfeeding me during these times.
They'll ask me repeatedly if I'm craving this and this and that and that.
Which I don't. I don't really crave anything in particular. I only want food in general.
Like the last time I was pregnant, I innocently asked my dad the difference between nasi kandar and the normal nasi berlauk at the mamak.
" Why? are you craving?" he asked, eyes gleaming.
The next thing I knew, he brought home a big bungkus of nasi kandar.
I'm not kidding. Bungkusan sebesar kepala budak.
Semua dia taruk. Ayam, telur, lembu, kambing. Silap takde burung unta je, kalau tak , tu pun dia sumbat.

My mom pulak is a traditional believer of eating for two. Although I've told her repeatedly that, technically, it's actually eating for one and a quarter. You only need to add 300 calories per day. She hates it when I go all scientific on her.
When I eat my meals back at the kampung, she'll eye my plate and say, " You're only eating that?"
SETIAP kali.

Don't get me wrong. They're great help. They care so much.
But in terms of gaining weight healthily, it's not helping.
Especially bila napsu nipis when I'm hungy ALL the time.

So I made a deal with myself yesterday when I officially hit the 2nd trimester mark.
That I'll eat frequently in small amounts.
 No more  piles and piles of nasi lemak sambal lebih  to keep my tummy full till noon . ( not to mention bloated)
A healthy breakfast of sandwiches or kuihs or noodles with a granola bar, fruits or some jajan nuts in between. ( note to self: it's either/or not and/with)
No cereals since suddenly I'm allergic to milk ( go figure) .

And run regularly.
And not to fuss about the pace and mileage since it's now  more about how much time I spend on the mill.
And to  ignore that blog of a running pregnant mama who claims she runs at a 9:30 min/mile easy pace ( ah, phooey!)
And ignore that urge to sign up for small short races.
 Ugh.

Eat regularly, run regularly.
I know I'm making a fool of myself for making the oath here.
But it's the only way I can keep it.
 Mosta.