And I ran my third marathon yesterday. It was great, what else can I say? I went with the aim of creating a new personal best timing of hopefully less than 5 hours. And so I did, with a new record of 4h50min.
Although we reached there rather early, by the time we waited for everyone to arrive, queued up to deposit our bags at different queues and finally found everybody to get to the starting line, the horn had already gone off. So much of our attempt to start with the horn, quite impossible when you're with a large group of people. But due to the overwhelming number of participants, the crowd was still there and walking to the starting line 8 minutes after the horn. Ran the first 18km or so with my teammates, before going off alone for the whole east coast stretch. The first part was rather relaxinb and enjoyable, we still had energy to talk and joke along the way. The second part was lonely east coast. A test of mental power. But it wasn't too bad considering the fact that there were so many people running and there was a constant supply of water and 100plus, not forgetting the powergels that really works. Besides supporters with banners of encouragement, there was also live school band performing and a cheerleading group made up of primary school kids, they were so cute!! And when I thought I had to run the rest of the marathon alone, I had a new pacer. It wasn't planned, neither was it a coincidence, but it just so happens that I found myself running at the same pace as this guy and so we paced each other for the last 10km. having a pacer really made a difference, especially for the last part when my legs were so tired from the monotonous movement and every km seem so far away. Although we didn't speak or encourage each other, plus the fact that we didn't know each other at all, the fact that there's someone running along with you gives you the obligation to keep up, and it's always the case that you feel as if you are trying to follow the other person's pace and the other person thinks vice versa, so in the end both parties give each other a silent form of encouragement and push. It's tiring but good. I still don't know who was my kind pacer although we did thank each other after we crossed the finishing line. So, thank you stranger!!
This year adidas was smart enough to come up with the series of 'reasons to run' designs, and had tags for you to write your reason to run and pin it on the singlet during the marathon. It provided more of a form of entertainment than encouragement. The best one I saw was 'I may be slow, but I'm still in front of you' Nice try dude, though I did overtake you. And of course there were the elite runners who made it seem like a different country all together on the other side of the road. Genes do play a part. But this year I also saw very fit and old runners, and the visually-handicapped who was tied to the lead runner by means of an elastic band, and they were fast. It's these people that sends shivers down your body and impresses you with their ability to overcome the odds to encourage us that if they can do it, it's shouldn't be hard to us fortunate people to complete a marathon. And there was these 2 women dressed in spiderman and catwoman. cool. Not forgetting people trying to create public awareness. Last year was breast cancer, this year there was this environmentalist, dragging a box of 'rubbish' and trash cans, telling people to be more environmental friendly.
The weather couldn't have been better except for the slight drizzle around noon time, and I'm happy for my constant pace throughout the whole run.
You should have seen how unglam we were to limp and drag our feet to citylink for lunch at a snail pace, whining in pain as we walk down the stairs. What a sight.
Looking forward to marathon 2007, but the stress to do a better timing is piling up as the years go by...