Giselle's Debut

There's no better place to introduce Giselle to the world than at our happy hunting ground, the Broga loop. Since PCC, KOTRT, MKH, P2K and a whole bunch of others were out there on Sunday, it would make a fitting debut for her.

Unfortunately, what may sound like a good idea at the beginning may not always be at the end.

We started at Tekala and as I took Giselle out of the car, there were some oohs and ahhs. She looked splendid in her all-white livery and because it was her debut, i kitted her out with the Zipps and the 23t cassette on her feet. She started blushing as the compliments flowed in.

We rolled out of Tekala, and she was all business, sticking to the front pack all the way to Lenggeng. At this point, Giselle was brimming with pride, and so was I. Never before have i rolled into a regrouping point with the front pack. I'm pretty sure Giselle's used to it. Pretty soon, the other riders who started from Bt14 showed up and Lenggeng looked like a Village Depart of a Tour de France stage. We felt it was getting crowded, so we left early.

This is where it started to get pear-shaped though. For this is when the road started pointing upwards. Up the first short, steep climb, Giselle performed brilliantly. Up the second, I started to fade. Giselle was urging me on, but my legs couldn't take it. She started to shake her head, embarassed. As we peaked the second climb, she insisted on showing me what she can do, taking me down the descent at 70km/h!

But the final straw must have been going up Bukit Tangga. As I was struggling up this climb, Giselle urging me on, I was given a push by William Mok on his scooter. It was a nice gesture, immediately bringing my speed up from 13km/h to 26 but Giselle just couldn't take it. She was embarrassed beyond words. I'm sure she must be thinking, "My siblings get to ride with Credit Agricole. I get stuck with this loser!"

So embarrassed was she, that we zipped down the descent at break-neck speed and maintained a steady pace all the way into Kelawang. This has not been a good ride for either of us so far.

After a quick refuel and refill, I headed off towards the dreaded 14km climb that is Peres with three others. As the road to the Peres foothill was relatively flat, with some slight undulations, I used this opportunity to let my legs recover and burn off some excess lactic acid. As soon as we hit the foothills, I began dropping my three companions with ease. Giselle's head suddenly propped up! "What's this?" she said, "We're finally dropping people now!"

And so it began, her ruthless climb up that hill. Sure, we still got passed by the likes of P2K and Letua, but that's alright, we were doing some passing of our own. Giselle was relentless, chewing up the riders who were falling by the wayside. The heat and fast pace earlier on had taken a toll on many riders and now they were paying for it.

We breezed up to the Peres Spa and Waterfall Resort. We took a quick stop there so that I could refresh myself. A lot of other riders had the same thought and there was a little party going on there. Feeling better, Giselle and I continued. We started catching and passing riders who passed us while we were stopped at the waterfall. We just kept going and going, even passing her twin, which made her feel even better! The highlight must have been passing a certain bike shop owner. The pride she must have felt!

Finally, we reached the top. We stopped for a quick drink before she decided to reward me with one of the best descents I've ever experienced. She was so smooth around the corners, gripping them like she was on rails. There was no wobble, no shakes, just smoothness rounding every corner. She just gave me the confidence to not even touch the brakes as we headed down. I was duly impressed.

We finally arrived at Tekala before 2pm. Senn was already there waiting for us. Unfortunately, she and Miss Diva had to pull out of the ride early because she wasn't feeling so well. So she took on the duties of support car driver and did a good job, picking up riders who couldn't continue anymore.

In the end, we were both pretty satisfied with the ride. This being my first long ride since Ironman and the fact that she should have been wearing the 25t Ksyriums instead of the 23t Zipps, there was not much more we could have done. I was amazed at how well she handles, I've never experienced anything quite like it before. Today, my legs are feeling the burn, but I hope that soon I will be the rider worthy of Giselle's prowess.

Finally!

I finally broke the one hour mark for Double Hill today.

But only just.

59m39s.

Previous PB was about 1h05m. Very happy!

The Reluctant Run

Woke up to the sound of pouring rain. And SMS beeps enquiring as to whether we should still go for the Orange Run since it was raining. None of us really wanted to go but since we were up already we decided to go anyway, but instead of running there as planned, we drove there. Stupe picked us up in front of my guardhouse and away we went.

By the time we got there, the race had already begun. We had about three minutes of catching up to do. Fortunately for us, most were already walking early on, so we caught up with the main bunch just after Tesco.

Stupe kept an easy pace throughout but I was pushing like mad to keep up. We were chit-chatting most of the way, although Stupe was the one doing most of the talking, I was out of breath!

We stopped at the water station at 5k to wait for Senn. We continued the run at about the same pace, winding through the roads near Tropicana, then through Bandar Utama.

As we approached the finish line, we saw PM Tey snapping pictures, so we doubled back to have our picture taken! Such cam-whores!

Finally, we crossed the line in about 55 minutes, which was kinda disappointing for a 9k run. But after checking the distance on Stupe's Ipod and another Garmin 305 as well as mapmyrun.com, we found out the distance was actually 9.9km. So the time wasn't all that bad after all.



Overall, I'm getting happier with my runs. I used to average about 7min/km but I can see an improvement over the last few runs. I'm actually able to get under a 6-minute pace for shorter runs and my KLIM half marathon pace was just above 6 minutes. If i can keep this up and maintain a 5.5min/km for those olympic distance tris, 6min/km for half ironman distance and 6.5min/km for ironman distance, I'll be a happy puppy.

Living Vicariously Through My Kids

In my two years doing triathlons, I've never made it to the podium of any race and I most likely never will. So when Shaqeel got second and Shafeeq third at the TriKids triathlon at UPNM yesterday, I was ecstatic! I think I was happier than they were!

Must have been the proudest moment of my life. Well done boys, I'm proud of you guys.

LOOK at what the cat dragged in...

I ain't complainin' :)

Better than Expected

Last week's panic attack about the KLIM half proved unfounded. Surprisingly, I didn't suffer as much as I thought I would.

I'm also quite pleased with my time. Although I missed my initial target of 2h10m, I managed to meet and exceed my revised target of please-let-me-just-finish-within-cutoff by quite a margin.

Some notable observations:
- Senn ran with angel wings on her back. She was playing guardian angel to Mac and Jo.
- Some dude showed up in a Spiderman suit, complete with mask! Dude must have been hot as hell!
- Another dude ran in tight-fitting jeans and Doc Marts.
- The 5km mark wasn't really 5km. It didn't take into account the extra 2km loop we had to do at the beginning.
- Ditto the 7.5km and the 10km mark.
- The East-West link highway after Menara Seputih is uphill. Always felt flat in a car.
- The Sungei Besi airport runway is damn long! We were running alongside it and it just seemed to go on forever.
- Running near a cemetery during Qing Ming is not a good idea. The traffic was so bad that we had to run between cars sometimes.
- Overtaking Stephanie Chok at Jalan Imbi was a highlight. Though it must be said, she was probably taking it easy and I was going flat out!
- The adidas climacool shower on Sultan Ismail was a welcome treat.
- There was a traffic jam of runners from Jalan Imbi onwards where the half route merged with the 10kand the 7k route.
- The guy at the last water station said "last 3km" but it was actually a lot less than that. It was more like 1km to go.
- The 10k runners' finish was an anti-climax. Instead of powering through the line, arms raised, they had to line-up to cross the line.
- The organisers really discriminate the 10k, 7k runners from the half and full marathon runners. I sat down to dip my feet in the post-race recovery area but they wouldn't even let Senn (who ran the 10k) into the area.

So, I've survived the KLIM half. What's next?

Uh Oh...

I'm in trouble.

Went for a one hour run on the treadmill yesterday. And got my ass kicked big time.

Stepped off the treadmill and the room was spinning. Got back home and almost passed out. Not good.

Although I did manage to cover 10k, I was left exhausted and in pain the whole day. I guess this is what happens when you do absolutely nothing since Ironman.

I'm now re-adjusting my KL Half Marathon target from 2h10m to please-let-me-just-finish-within-cutoff!