When It Is All Over

It’s either I over estimated my body, or I was a tad over confident with myself.

Last Saturday we had another LSD run training, which was planned to start from Bukit Aman car park at 6am. After settling our morning obligations at the nearby mosque, we kicked off our run at around 6.35am, if I’m not mistaken.

One funny thing though, I prayed Subuh twice! Ahaha.

I remember doing ablution when I took shower in the morning. So, when I arrived at Bukit Aman, I went straight to the mosque and prayed, thinking I still have the ablution.

On the second thought, lepas bagi salam, I remembered I’ve kissed my sleeping daughter and wifey prior to leaving the house.

Duh! Kena solat sekali lagi…

This time I can’t remember all their names. My apology.
There’s actually another runner, Shaqi, which was out of frame (he’s standing to the right of Syah)

We slowly made our way from the car park towards Bank Negara (now I know where Padang Merbok is). As always, it is fun to be running in a group. It was still dark and peaceful. Fortunately my whole body system was still showing all green lights despite of the very lack of sleep I had the night earlier. I arrived home from JB at almost 1am, and being awakened twice by my crying daughter (ngigau punya kes ni), just to force open my eyes at 5:15am to prepare to go for the run.

Pelari-pelari tegar, bak kata Shakhir.

Ever since the starting of the run where I stayed with Shakhir, I knew the pace was slightly faster than the one which I did the week earlier. Still able to hold conversations though. Ok, let’s see how I can maintain this high pace during LSD, I told myself. And we proceeded our way in the darkness at Bukit Tunku.

Met up with Fong, Bacin and Anita. They started the run at 5am, and were already on their way back to Bukit Aman. Daud a.k.a CheRaMiChe made a u-turn and followed them.

We re-grouped just before crossing Jalan Duta.

Sekali tengok nampak macam pelarian haram lompat sempadan daaa…

As we ran pass Masjid Wilayah and towards Hartamas, we saw many other runners were already making their way back to Bukit Aman. It’s pretty normal, when races are around the corner, the more runners can be seen on this route on either Saturday or Sunday mornings. I even heard that Sunday morning is normally much more crowded with runners.

We saw Doris and Meng too.

Taking a short break, refueling at Petronas station at Hartamas. This time we ran around the back of the Petronas before making the break stop, to make the whole distance 20km.

Heading back to Bukit Aman. Still feeling strong, still plenty of jokes to share during the run.
(Thanks to Shakhir who snapped these photos, or else cameraman’s face takde peluang nak enter frame)

Shakhir: “How many km? 10km? 20km? 30km? 42km? Semua boleh la bro, takde hal punya. Wa memang TEGAR!!!”

The sun started to drain much of my energy after 1.5hrs running. Many have turned silent, saving up all the inner strength to complete the run. This was the point where I thought I over estimated myself, or perhaps, being a little bit too confident.

The serious faces finally emerged, first signal of fatigue.

Knowing the distance left to cover was only another 5 or 6km, I started to feel fatigue on my thighs. I thought 20km was easy. And I do want to feel easy (i.e. comfortable and not feeling tired like dying) when doing a 20km or 30km runs. But at the current state of affair, I know I have to do more LSD runs so my body can adapt to higher pressure. Having had this fatigue for a 20km run, I don’t know how I will feel when doing 30km run this coming Sunday. I just want to finish the run smiling.

Heading our way to Lake Garden from Bank Negara, I saw Syah pushed his pace up at the front and I knew he was chasing for a good run time. So, I chased him up, and plodded on behind his steps. Looking at my stopwatch it was already showing 2hr 02min as we reached the car park, but Syah said his watch showed 1hr 58min. (we stopped our watches during breaks so that we can measure our run-only time)

Cooling down and post-run stretching. Good for injury prevention.

So, there it was, my last LSD training as a preparation for the upcoming NB Pacesetters 30km run this Sunday. And the good thing is, I will convert this 30km race as another LSD training, for the upcoming Putrajaya Night Marathon.

That’s the only way I can calm my nervousness down, a little bit.

[Training Log]
Last Week Thursday: Run, 1hr3min, easy/moderate
Friday: Rest
Saturday: LSD run, 20km, 2hr2min, easy/moderate
Sunday: Rest