My First Ever Run - PJ Dawn 2012  

Posted by: Audrey in , ,

Okay, my bad for procrastinating until now....it's been a couple of weeks since, but I'm still kinda proud that I've actually completed a run! A 12km run too...*grins* Yeah, it's not much in view of so many others who've been running for ages and can run marathons with ease, but for me it's quite huge since I've only started 'training' (and I say this loosely coz I haven't been training like how the other runners would) about 1-2 months ago. 

It all started when some friends at boot camp asked about whether we will be joining the famous KL Marathon organized by Standard Chartered Bank every year. I've often heard of the marathon but never gave much thought to it since I'm no runner, but that day I've been rather inspired and motivated by how I'm feeling good with boot camp and almost daily training so I told my friends I'd love to try a run. No, I didn't sign up for the marathon....it's 42km!! I didn't even dare try to attempt the half marathon but I signed up for the 10km run =) From then on, a few friends of mine also wanted to join and we made a little 'pact' to do some running at least once a week (not much I know, but I figured with daily boot camp and stuff, it would be sufficient with the weekly long run) and we did keep up with the schedule, I'm glad to say =) 

Fast forward to about 1 month before the PJ Dawn race...my friend asked me if I would be interested to join this race since she would be joining as well (she's been joining runs for some time now, so she's like a seasoned runner). I thought, why not? It's only an extra 2km from the 10km run of the KL Marathon...and it might be a good experience to try and finish. Up till this point, I still haven't reached my goal of having tried out a full 10km run. In fact, up till the day of the race, I've only attempted one try of a full 10km run and was wheezing the heck out of my lungs and knees throbbing when I was done...eep! Not a good sign!

Anyways, long story short (not really short also come to think of it =P) I went for the run right after attending a Russell Peters' show here in Malaysia (YES, he came to Malaysia for TWO days! And he was HILARIOUS!). I reached home at about 1am after supper and stuff with my friends, and checking the race programme I realized there was a runners' warm up exercise thing at 2.30am. Thinking it was compulsory I changed, packed my stuff and headed out at about 2am. I reached at 2.15am and was stumped! SOOOOO many people! And there was no 'exercise' thing as I thought it would be...so it turns out I was super early for the run. LOL!

The start / finish line...

Since I had so much time on my hands I decided to walk about the place...on the one hand, I get to 'look' busy and not so lost as the throngs of runners start pooling in for the 21km flag off; and on the other I will be able to get a bit of a warm up before the race and also keep myself from feeling sleepy (I've been running on no sleep from Saturday morning). I didn't have to keep myself busy so much...the flag off for the 21km run was so festive and cheerful, it made me excited to go! Suddenly I couldn't wait to start my run...LOL!


Moments before flag off!

4am came soon enough and I went to the starting line with (I think) thousands of other runners raring to go. The horn blasted, and we were off! I got to say, having not experienced a run before, this first experience was amazing....the cheerfulness around the runners (despite it being so early in the morning), the helpfulness of the police and volunteers during the race, and even the weather was being cooperative! All in all, a very good experience =) I started out in the middle of the crowd, and the first 2km was a bit shaky since I kept looking out for my friend (who was gaining speed as the crowd dispersed into their own comfortable running pace) hence losing my own pace. But after I lost track of her, I decided that hey...I should just enjoy the run as it is, and concentrate on finishing it in time. Maybe even beating my own personal time! So, I concentrated on my music from my iPhone and started getting my own pace.

I also had the Endomondo app running on my phone, so it tracked my progress as I ran/walked and updated me at every km on how long I've taken up for each km. Perhaps it was the weather (it was cool and breezy at times), or maybe having some water replenishment every few km (they had water stations every 3 km), or maybe it's just sheer adrenaline coursing through my veins along with the atmosphere of being in a run with so many other people that got me through it. I was pretty impressed with my own timing...no, I didn't win anything. I didn't even place in the top 100 runners (my friend did though...so cool!) but my objective this time around wasn't to place anything. It was just to finish the run within the time limit (2 hours) and I'm proud to say I've finished my 12km run in 1 hour and 37 mins (according to my Endomondo app)! YAYY! It definitely beat my previous 'best time' which was 1 hour and 27 mins for a 10km run I tracked *grins* I find myself being able to push through whenever I focus my mind on something else and just like keep my legs running instead of concentrating on how winded / tired I was. LOL! Kind of hard to explain but I guess that saying "Mind over body" does have its merits =P

Anyways, the official race results have not been out yet so I don't really know my official run time just yet, but I'm hoping it's around the same time that I logged. Still, it was a lot of fun though =) After that I went home (at around 6-ish after downing a whole 500ml bottle of water, collecting my goodie bag and catching up with my friend) and slept for a few hours...only to wake up and start my baking 'marathon'. LOL! More on that later *wink*

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