Desaru Timing

Its official - my time for the 2km swim is 45min....
Total time for my team is just a little bit over 6hrs.

Desaru Long Distance Triathlon (I)

Just completed the Desaru Long Distance Triathlon on Sat (16/8/08). The race consists of a 2km swim in the open sea off Desaru - the South China Sea. The 2nd leg is a 90km cycle through the hilly roads of Desaru followed lastly with a 20km run. Before you go "Wah! So fit ah??!!", I did it with Roy and Adrian as part of a relay team lah.... I swim only..... hehehe..... :-P



















You would think I wanna talk about the race - I'll come to that. But the highlight of the trip was the seafood dinner we had at Sungei Rengit. WOW!! We had lobster, pepper crab, sauteed sotong (local style of course), pomfret among others. Thanks to Audrey, Hans and Yen that we manage to go there. It was so good!! Yum Yum!! Just look at the lobster!! :-O What more could you ask for? There was good food together with great company! Definitely worth the trip! Hahaha....



















On the whole, the trip was quite fun. We started off with Roy forgetting to bring his cycling helmet so he and Charlotte had to take a later ferry at 12pm. (Not so fun for them....) So Adrian, Mabel and I left on the 10am ferry and I had a good time getting to know my teamate Adrian (first time meeting him...) plus Mabel and him squeezed in some time to talk shop.



















When we had re-grouped at Pulai Desaru Resort Hotel, it was time for lunch. We had a nice time chit-chatting at the hotel restaurent. But let me say this about the food... Urrrrggggghhhhhh!!! You get the idea.....



















That evening was of course followed by the sumptous dinner as mentioned above. The next day was the race proper (I'll talk about that later) and here's a shot of a dutiful son awaiting his dad's completion of the race.... followed by the two pictures I took of Adrian the minute he came in through the finishing line. It was quite dramatic actually. The organisers had setup an inflatable arch over the finishing line and the moment Adrian ran through, the whole thing collapsed!! Haha... Adrian, the draft you created must be really something man!! :-D





































Well, congratulations to Team ERA (Eric, Roy, Adrian) for completing the race and heartfelt love and thanks to both Charlotte and Mabel for coming along and standing and waiting for over 6 hours! Gotta run..... Ciao! :-*

Mid-Year Rendition

Been a while since I blogged......

Too bad. I've been busy.

Anyway, a couple of good and fun things that happened. My weight touched 80kg last night before I had my dinner. This is the first time in a long time that I have gotten down to this weight. Was really feeling good 'bout myself .... then I ate dinner. And this morning's reading? 82kg. Right now I'm just waiting for the highlight of my day after I go take a dump.

Still, its been quite fun trying to lose weight. So what's the secret? Just lots of water (even when I wasn't thirsty) and good'ol EXERCISE. I was sharing with a couple of friends that after eating about 70%-80% of your meal, your should just drink a big glass of water. The "full" effect will hit you almost immediately and you probably won't wanna eat another bite anymore. Voila! Instant diet control! :)

And exercise? Just get your butt off the office chair and go do something with some friends. Going at it alone is tough for most people. Doing it with company is a lot more fun. Just don't go on a "weekend run" with a friend who's also an Ironman competitor. The brickwall of self-loath will not hit you so hard as when your friend's already done a half marathon (for his leisure run) and you are still tying your shoe laces.

Summary. Lost some weight, but looked darker for it. Some friends say I went from the colour of Hainanese white chicken to fried chicken to something like that of century egg - BLACK. How black you say? Somebody I didn't know tried talking to me in Malay the other day. Let's see if I can bring it down further to 75kg in the coming months.

Oh, one final thing. Did a timing of 42secs for 50m Breastroke about a month ago. Took the timing again last night. The time? 39secs. :D I managed to shave 3secs off the clock in month. Let's see if I can bring it to 37secs in August in time for the Inter-Con. Ok, enuff typin. Later y'all...

Breakthrough!!

Wow!! What a great feeling! :-D

Did a 2km quick dash at the tracks yesterday and feeling the ache in my thighs today. Not that big a deal... but seeing as how the last time I ran was more than 6 months ago... I think I did alright.. :-)

Anyway, here's the real kicker. JUST came back from a FANTASTIC swim. I started with 2 laps of warmup then got myself going with the 1.5km (30 laps) swim. I was still phsyching myself that I had to finish it and not slack off with whatever excuses I can think of.

Well, not only did I complete 30 laps, I felt strong enough to another 2 more laps - that's 1.6km of swim. After that I STILL felt pretty good about myself. Then, get this, I did 6 laps of 25m SPRINT and 25m relax swim. How about that???

Looks like my muscular stamina is slowly but surely coming back. Woohoo!! And to top the cream on top of the cake - I'm fasting today and haven't had a bite since 9:30am this morning!!

Only one thing left to say - PRAISE GOD!!! :-D

The Swim of Things.....

Did a mini milestone yesterday - I completed 30 laps non-stop in the pool. Last time I did that was a year ago - while training for Biathlon '07. Back in 2005 when training for my first Bi, It didn't seem so tough to swim 30 laps. Now I can really feel the strain. And I KNOW that because my aching shoulders and back is reminding me that 3 years wiser is not 3 years fitter. But still, the timing of about 29min is not half bad.

Back to the swim. The first 10 laps was really gruelling. I couldn't feel that I was catching the water and my shoulders were straining almost from the start. After gruelling comes grinding - that's how my shoulder joints felt like. The next 10 laps was a real test of my resolve. I was telling myself to just finish 1km(20 laps) and call it quits for the day. And I was really gunning for it when......




Nothing happened!! Hehehehe..... :-P



Sorry, I digress. Anyway, towards the 18th or 19th lap (I forget), these 2 guys who've been standing around in the pool the whole time I was swimming (don't ask me why) started to do some laps as well. I found myself wanting to keep up with them. Now, keep in mind my shoulders were burning after almost 20 laps and these gentlemen just started on their swim. But I just could not stop myself from "competing" with them! Its like I was using them to pace myself! The pain was gone and all I could think of was beating them! Hmm... tells you something about yourself doesn't it.... So just like that, I was able to complete my 30 laps straight. Goes to show that a little friendly competition can do to help improve your game.

Well, running tomorrow....

Thanks for your help guys! Whoever you are.....

Starting Training Again....

Well, its the start of the new year and I've just signed up for the Biathlon on the 1st March. Looks like I've gotta pick up on my training. Just went for Weds night swimming training last night.... shiong ah!! Anyway, been going to the gym regularly for a while now. I can bench about 50kg now. Quite a personal achievement seeing as I was never able to bench that weight before.
Gonna be starting my running training today. I should be able to work up to the hour-long run that's needed to cover the 10km for the Biathlon in less than 2 months.

Just had a thought to myself the other day - can I get back the figure that I had when I was 21? I remember I used to weigh about 72-75kg during that time. Well, 13 years later I've added 10kg. That's almost 1kg per year. Hmmm.... How about losing 1kg a month now for the rest of this year? Maybe I should set this as my resolution for the new year....hmm......