YS's First Marathon Training Facts

Here are some records of what I have been through since I started to run for recreation.  Hopefully the logs serve an insight into what to expect if you are just about to start running, and you are as lazy as I am with almost the same engine specifications...

Engine specifications
Built in 1972, am a typical 4-eyed 5.5ft 70kg working father of 3 who has not been exercising for nearly 10 years.

Engine and body parts were completedly un-tuned and mostly rusty.

Though exists in human form, ran more like a penguin (with short and round legs) at turtle pace (more than 7 minutes per km).

The following training runs were logged for a period of 1.5 years, from 1/1/2009 to 26/6/2010, before and excluding KL Marathon 2010.  Prior to Jan/2009, I could only run 2.4km non-stop at very very slow pace of 7 to 8 minutes per km, breathless.

Running goals
I decided to start exercising regularly in mid of 2008.  Running was naturally my (the lazy type) first choice for its simplicity.

My running goal had been revised, un-planned, every half a year:
- 6/2008: to be able to run 2.4km non-stop (will explain why 2.4km in my later post).
- 1/2009: to be able to run 10km non-stop by June,2009 (for SCKLM,2009).
- 6/2009: to complete a half marathon by Dec,2010 (no race to aim for).
- 1/2010: to complete first Marathon by June,2010 (for SCKLM,2010).

Distance
I started to log my run beginning of 2009.  Here are some facts about the distance travelled leading to my first Full Marathon.

Total training runs, in distance: 2168km.
Total training runs, in time: 238hrs 57mins 5s.
Total training runs, in counts: 208 runs.

First 5km: was done after 6 training runs, 2 weeks into running, on 20/1/2009.
First 10km: was done after 55 training runs, 17 weeks into running, on 10/5/2009.
First 15km: was done after 101 training runs, 31 weeks into running, on 16/8/2009.
First 21km: was done after 131 training runs, 41 weeks into running, on 25/10/2009.
First 25km: was done after 154 training runs, 49 weeks into running, on 18/12/2009.
First 30km: was done after 191 training runs, 66 weeks into running, on 18/4/2010.

Shortest training run: 2.65km, the 1st training run, was done on 5/1/2009.
Longest training run: 38.6km, the 204th training run, was done on 6/6/2010.

Plot of Distance v.s. Runs., Year-2009:
y-axis: distance in km;
x-axis: runs in count.



Plot of Distance v.s. Runs, Year-2010 till 26/6/2010:
y-axis: distance in km;
x-axis: runs in count.



Time
Total training runs, in time: 238hrs 57mins 5s.
Shortest run, in time: 18mins 50s.
Longest run, in time: 4hrs 58mins, 29s.
Earliest training start time: 4:20am.
Latest training finish time: 9:46pm.
Longest absence from runs: 8 days.

Races
There were only a handful of races that I joint.  Reason: laziness.
1st race: SCKLM 2009: on 28/6/2009, 10km,
2nd race: Jog for Hope on 19/7/2009, 9km,
3rd race: Putrajaya Night Run on 6/2/2010, 21km,
4th race: Energizer Night Marathon on 27/3/2010, 21km.

Money Matters
Total money spent on running gadgets (excluding shoes): RM1150+,
Breakdown...
- Nike arm pouch: RM68;
- Nike dry-fit T-shirt: RM89;
- Polar watch: RM600+;
- Hydration belt: RM180;
- Python: RM100+;
- Sony Walkman: RM120.

Total money spent on rubbers (i.e. shoes): RM852
- First shoes: Bata RM15... yes, it's school children's shoes
- Second shoes: Ambros RM49, at 23rd run, on 10/3/2009.
- First running shoes: Adidas Supernova RM399, at 67th run, on 31/5/2009.
- Second running shoes: Nike Lunarglide RM389, at 148th run, on 5/12/2009.

Engine changes
Maximum weight loss: 3kg (67kg).
Maximum weight gain: nil.
Weight change on the first marathon: nil.
Injuries: once (check "Dumbest moments" for the cause).
Broke-down: twice.

Engine refuel and pitstop
First time drinking water during run: 112th run, 14.67km, on 13/9/2009.
First time running with hydration belt: 131st run, 21.1km, on 25/10/2009.
First time taking power gel during run: 142nd run, 23.16km, on 21/11/2009.
First time taking power bar before run: 154th run, 26.46km, on 18/12/2009.
First (and only) time running with walkman: 199th run, 35.8km, on 15/5/2010.

Dumbest moments
1.  Run with normal cotton-based white bermuda-pants.  The pants turned transparent when it was completedly soaked with my sweat, and started to stick on my skin.  My superman's inner beauty was exposed without me noticing it.

2.  Forgot to wear socks for a 5km run in a bright hot sunny and crowded day.  Blisters all over my feet.  Was forced to take off my shoes, hold it like dumb-bell in my hands while continued to run the remaining distance.

3.  Trapped by a tiny insignificant loop of string and fell like a total idiot.  Left knee and left elbow injured with blood loss.  My first and only running injury, thank goodness.

4.  Tried to out-run "men's best friends".

The journey continues...

Judgement day... Mission completed... so far...

Thank you!
Before commenting on my maiden Full Marathon, would like to sincerely thank my sponsors again.  Here are the kind souls who have contributed to the National Cancer Society of Malaysia.  Thank you!

The night before KL Marathon 2010: Extreme Time Mis-Management
The race start at 5am (read five o'clock in the morning) --> I have to arrive at Merdeka Square at 4am.
To arrive at Merdeka Square at 4am --> I have to catch the Rabbit RapidKL at 3:30am in Bukit Jalil.
To catch RapidKL at 3:30am in Bukit Jalil --> I have to leave home at 3am.
To leave home at 3am --> I have to wake up at 2:15am to do my big and small business.
To wake up at 2:15am --> I have to sleep at 8am to have a minimum 6-hour sleep!!!

How could I sleep at 8am on Saturday-night + WorldCup-night + maiden-Marathon-high?  I didn't.

The fact: I slept at 10:45pm when it was half-time for Uruguay v.s. South Korea match while the TV was still 'on' and kids were still having fun in the living room.

To add more excitement to my much anticipated pre-marathon night, the 6-year-old boy had nightmare (again!) at 12am midnight... was waken up.

An hour later, the 2-year-old girl had nightmare (too!) at 1am... was waken up, AGAIN!

Finally, I had collectively less than 3-hour sleep before my very 'kan cheong' first Marathon.

The final 3 hours before KL Marathon 2010
With all the excitements, I woke up at 2:15am, before the alarm clock rang.  After the big + small business, a ran through on the packing list...

race bib 317 - checked,
IC + license - checked,
cash - checked,
arm pouch - checked,
python - checked,
handphone - checked,
Touch'N Go for RapidKL - checked,
virginity hydration belt - checked,
water bottles - checked,
Power bar x 2 - checked,
Power gel x 3 - checked,
camera... - UNchecked (proven to be useful)
counterpain - UNchecked (dearly missed during the run)
MP3 player - UNchecked (what for?)
contact lens - UNchecked (proven to be useful)
cap - UNchecked (was lucky that the weather was nice)
sunglasses - UNchecked (only if contact lens is 'checked')
GPS - UNchecked (was lucky that was not lost)

As planned, I left home at 3am.  Arrived Bukit Jalil at 3:20am.  A 'young-gun' in full race-suit was quarrelling with the RapidKL driver wanting him to leave despite there was only 1 passenger before I joined in.  Ended up, the driver left with only 3 passengers at 3:40am.  I really didn't mind to wait for more passengers as I knew we could arrive in 20 minutes, just didn't know why the 'young-gun' had to quarrel with the poor driver who had to give up sleep to drive in wee hour.

Unlike the 2009 version of SCKLM, this year there were only 3 miserable passengers in the bus.  This time, I 'proudly' put on my race-bib in blue (meant runner for Full Marathon) while taking the ride.

I remembered that, just barely 1-year ago, I was taking the same shuttle heading for the same place only at 4:30am... and the bus was full.  Almost all passengers were 10k runners (including myself) with a few 21k runners.  At that time, I was scanning the 21k runners with much admiration wondering how could someone run a 21k distance?  Who could anticipate that, as a lazy bum myself, was taking the 3:30am shuttle heading for the 5am race, was feeling really nice when the impossible was made possible.

Pre-race fuel: 1 Power bar at home, another Power bar onboard of RapidKL bus, 1 bottle of Gatorade.

Pre-race mission: man-hunting
Arrived Merdeka Square 4:00am.  First mission: man-hunting.  I have been reading and commenting in 2 blogs mostly about long distance running, Mr. Foo (owner of lifeisxtragreat.blogspot.com) and Mr. Yim (onwer of yimster.blogspot.com).  Am attracted and benefitted from their articles as there are 3 similarities between us:
1.  we are amateur runners with full time job to commit;
2.  we are in about the same age group;
3.  we started long distance running for less than 3 years;
4.  of course, we blogged about long distance running from the perspect of amateur.
With the similarities and liked interest, we have been friends (and my 'sifu'), virtually.

Now, before the race started, I was hunting for the following 'wanted' faces: first, Foo (sorry for stealing your photo without prior permission)...

... and Yim (sorry for stealing the photo without prior permission)...

After wondering around like a headless chick, I started to realize that it is very difficult to look for someone on the race-day without any pre-arrangement for e.g. exchanging of phone number or specifying a meeting point.  There were too many people, runners from various categories (wondering why some of them came so early), many many supporters, fully dressed-up cheersleaders, race-stewarts, the DBKL workers, polices, medical personels, tom, dick, harry... just realized that I was like looking for needles in haystack.

At about 10 minutes before the race started, I finally identified Foo and the "Seremban Group" he mentioned in his blog.  Shoke hand and greeted for the first time with Foo in person.  Shoke hand with the many 'kaki' in Seremban Group.  A nice person and gang... best of all.... all cantonese speaking!  After a short chit-chat, in less than 3 minutes, the race started.

Didn't see Yim during the whole event, first mission partially failed.

About the race
The 42km route around our familiar Kuala Lumpur (the muddy river-bank)... it passed by Mid-Valley, Federal Highway leading to Seremban Highway, Sungai-Besi old airport... etc...

and the elevation of the route (i.e. how many hills/valleys along the route)...

The organizer also gave a live-like run for the whole 42km route condensed into a 7-minute video.  Very informative, especially when I viewed it again after the run.  Here it is...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQ3bUDM0cPA

At the flag-off, I was captured by "RunWitMe" at the starting of the race in the following video.  I appeared at 1:08-minute of the video.  Thanks to "RunWitMe".  Can you spot me in the video?
http://runwitme.blogspot.com/2010/06/video-standard-chartered-kl-marathon.html

At the flag-off, I was thinking only 'morons' would start running in a rainy 5 o'clock Sunday morning after the Ghana v.s. USA World-Cup last-16 match.  Worse still, we had to pay for it, and I was one of them!  Unthinkable, 1.5 years ago!

I was feeling privilleged to be able to run the first 5km with one of the member of the Seremban Group, Heng.  He is a veteran marathoner.  This was his 29th marathon, if I remembered correctly.  He used to run a sub-4 marathon.  We chat for the first 5km in rain, am glad and benefitted from his advices!  Thanks Heng!  Unfortunately, lost him after 5km.

Yimster posted a wonderful report about the race, for the first 21km when the sun was still sleeping...
http://yimster.blogspot.com/2010/06/on-road-we-go.html

And the second 21km, again, nice coverage by Yimster, a fellow runner...
http://yimster.blogspot.com/2010/06/curtains-down-take-bow.html
Thanks to Yimster for the reports and photos. We both started and finished almost at the same time. Everything he reported and snapped were things that I saw when I was running through the route.

The re-fuel I took: 1 Power Gel at 15km, 25km, 35km respectively. Drank plenty of plain water / 100Plus at every pit-stop except the first one.

Applied countless amount of counter-pain from km-28 onwards.

Saw unusual scenes in the usually-busy roads of KL (trust me, you have never seen these before!):
- penguins/tortoises/runners openly littered in front of DBKL officers and polices, no summon issued;
- men randomly pee in the bush along the road;
- many traffic polices blocked the traffic at ALL junctions for the passage of penguins tortoises runners;
- many DBKL workers helped to man the traffic and clearing the rubbish, mainly empty paper cups;
- many men/women dressed in various costumes, with face-painting, singing shouting along the road;
- Ah Pek and aunties came out for Sunday morning tea watched us while shaking their head.  Many workers at various bus-stops watched us in disbelief;
- a group of taxi drivers cheered us diagonally-opposite Lot-10;
- supportive drivers;
- impatient drivers. One almost knocked me down at km-40 near Jalan Raja Laut;
- random men/women doing stretching in agony at the road side;
- ... the list goes on...

Finally, at the finishing line... after travelling for 42km in 5hours, you can see my suffering and 'kok' face in the video here... and the photos too... remind me of the penguin-running in Discovery Channel.  Here is penguin running for the final 50 meters:
http://www.marathon-photos.com/scripts/event.py?event=Sports%2F2010%2FKL+Marathon&new_search=1&match=317

and

http://player.marathon-videos.com/cgi-bin/viewer.py?race=166;stage=273;angle=a1;bib=317;lang=en_NZ;host=www6.marathon-photos.com
In the second video, I raised both of my middle index-fingers at the final 5 meters to indicate "first marathon completed".
Notice my finishing time at the top of the video, it shows 5:03.

Overall, a very well-organized event, nothing to complain.  Will definitely be back next year, hopefully, with new running buddies.

Lessons learnt
At the start of the race, I was glad that the sky started to pour, not just drizzled, but poured. Am a 4-eyed-frog.  My glasses were all wet. I was running with minimum visibility, exactly like driving in the rain without turning on the wiper. For the first 5kms, was virtually relying on the runner in front to avoid stepping on pots of water.  I learnt that contact len is not an option but a necessity. Besides, my Shoes and socks were all wet. Thanks to previous trainings in the wet, I was not too worry about running in the rain with wet shoes and socks.

Run-through-pain?  Run-through-cramp!
For the last 8km, there were 4 "hot zones" on my right leg and 2 "hot zones" on my left leg.  It is possible to "run through cramp", by changing the landing point/position of our feet.  For most of my final 8km, I was running by bending my right foot upwards and landed the foot on sole, just like a hockey stick.  This was to prevent the cramping of right calf.
Besides, both of my front thighs were starting to cramp too.  To deal with it, I was trying to relax the thigh as much as I could, while continue to run at a slower and slower pace.
Yes... I have finally learnt to run through cramp, and "counter-pain" is needed.  Besides, I have to find out if 'salt tablet' is useful to prevent cramp.

I followed the wrong pacer.  I've just found out that my pacer (with a 5:00 hour balloon tied around him) for the first 24km actually completed in 5hr 20mins.  I started to notice that the pacer might be running too slowly as there were no margin for error for the final 10km should I follow his pace.  Realising that, I immediately switched to another backup 5:00 hour pacer at 24th km, who was still within my sight.  Unfortunately, he eventually was out of my reach as cramp-devil had started to haunt me.  I learnt that communication with the pacer is necessary before the run.

Without prior arrangment, it is almost impossible to look for someone on the race-day.  I didn't manage to meet Yim during the whole event (even though we were just 1 minute apart at the starting line, and 3 minutes apart at the finishing line)... and I lost the Seremban Group after the run.

Run through cramp
Cramp-devil started to haunt me at km-28 onwards.  I was virtually running through cramp and pain for the final 14km.  My motivation to keep running...
1.  Compared to the suffering of cancer patience, what is cramp?
2.  No matter how painful I am, keep running, as slowly as I wish... just don't stop... do NOT stop...
3.  This is going to be the last marathon of my life, I wouldn't need to endure such torture anymore, who care if there is pain.
4.  Since the pain is still there even if I walked, why don't I run?!
5.  Mental calculation as a form of 'self-talk' and 'pain killer'.  I was constantly checking the watch and mentally calculating the pace needed to complete the run within 5 hours.  I repeated the calculation over and over mentally until the pain was temporarily forgotten.
6.  Finisher-T... finisher-T... finisher-T...

After the race
Instead of looking for the drinks booth, I spent the first few minutes after the run looking for the place to collect my finisher-T, that's the T-shirt printed with "42.195km Finisher" only given to Full Marathon finisher.  That was one of the main reason that I ran the Full, I wanted the finisher-T.  I wanted to wear the finisher-T after the race, on the way home in the RapidKL LRT, the finest moment of my recent life.  I guessed the biological-drug had taken control of my mind at the finishing line.  I didn't feel tired nor thirsty, my priority was the place to collect finisher metal and finisher-T.

After getting the finisher-T, only then I realized that I need drinks.  Downed few cups of 100Plus.  Downed a banana too.

While changing from my all-wet race singlet into finisher-T, realized that the safety pins pinning the race bib had rusted!

Spent the next hour wondering at the carnival-like ground looking for familiar face, but failed to identify any.

At 11:15am, in my hard-earn Finisher-T, took RapidKL LRT back to Bukit Jalil from Masjid Jamid station.

Forgot that I hadn't had my breakfast when reaching home at 12pm.  Think the "runner's high" effect had overtaken fatique and hunger.

For the next 72 hours (3 earth-days)... muscles pain on every inch of my legs.  June Malik's reported EXACTLY what I experienced...
http://june-anakmami.blogspot.com/2010/06/first-day-as-marathoner.html
Thanks to June!

Surprise bonuses
I did not aim for any finishing time, but was forseeing that I might be able to finish somewhere more than 5hrs 30mins. This was based on the finishing time of my longest LSD (38.5km) of 4hrs 58mins. However, I was very surprised and glad that I was able to finish the run in 5hr 3mins, almost did a sub-5. A sub-5.5 was never in my initial plan, an added bonus indeed.

Medic every 4km with counter-pain supply was godsent! Thanks organizer.

In Sentul area, at about 8:30am, overheard an old Chinese uncle chatting with his friends at the road side saying "wah... these people are so geng... been running since 5 morning...". Cramp on legs magically disappeared, though not for long.

Top queries
With merely 1 marathon completed, there are more questions to be answered...
1.  What is Counterpain?  What is the suitable muscle pain-relief for me?
2.  How does it feel like hitting the 'wall'?  Did I hit it at all?
3.  What is salt tablet?  Is this the pro's secret to deal with muscle cramp?  Where to get it?
4.  Where to get a sweat-proof camera that fit into the 'python', with battery capacity lasting more than 5 hours.
5.  Contact lens, or not?

To keep the flame burning...
After the exciting 1.5-year journey to my first full marathon, my 're-newed' running goals listed in the order of importance...
1.  Run a sub-5 Marathon (may be achiveable if discipline last).
2.  Get a non-runner to start long distance running (radar is scanning).
3.  Run a bare-foot Half Marathon (do-able).
4.  Run a bare-foot Full Marathon (do-able, or not?).
5.  Run a sub-2 Half Marathon (insert a big question mark here).
6.  Run a sub-4.5 Marathon (insert an even bigger question mark here).