City Day Run (2) 2010

Date : 21st February 2010
Time : 0730 7km 0740 5k 0745 3k
Venue : Dataran Merdeka
Course : Pretty OK, 7km nia!
Distance : 7.57km
Time : 37 min 14 seconds.
Pace : 12.2kph
Quality : Average

This is one of the few events that I registered my whole family to run, based on 2 reasons. First, the distance is quite manageable for the kids, and second, it's CHEAP!!! Only RM10 for 7k and RM5 for the kids.

The upside : Although there was no T-Shirt nor goodie bag to speak off, I prefer these type of events for family outings where everybody can take part for a song, and you get stuff that you don't really need. I've still got quite a few T-shirts from last year and I've already passed most of my freebie shirts to family and in laws.

The downside : One less admirable aspect of this race is that it was not that well publicised. Not sure whether this was intentional, as there were less participants than last year. Maybe there were some who were still in the festive mood of the CNY.

The races started very punctually with the usual lady MC for FTAA sprucing up the atmosphere with her anecdotes and announcement.

I managed to persuade my friend to join me by enticing him with a free KFC meal if he catches me by the end of the race. He asked me what pace I planned to run, and I told him a 'conservative' number (hehe!). I was hoping to achieve a sub 5min/km pace without aggravating my heels.

My starting pace was pretty quick, actually too quick for my liking. However, I felt good, even going into the 3rd km. From 4km, the effort was becoming tougher to maintain a sub 5min pace. Moving into the 7th km, I picked up the pace, but it might have been too early. By the time I turned towards the SAS building, I had a side stitch and decided to play it safe. 3 usual kaki 'sayured' me from the back with ease as my last 200m sprint was non existent. I was happy that I managed to finish with a sub 5min pace. To hit the 4:45 pace consistently, I will need to think of a new approach to improve my speed.

My family finished within the next 15 minutes and we were off by 9am as we couldn't wait for the lucky draw. My daughter was pretty happy that she got her certificate, although she didn't managed to get a medal.

I've registered for the towerthon which is next month, but I'm having 2nd thoughts as climbing 100 floors of staircase is no small feat. Wonder if my knees will hold out? Hmm....