| 5 September 2004. Sunday. |
| The week hasn't been going so well, been feeling tired and also been bogged down with loads of school work. I have a Media Law midterm tomorrow so I'm pretty much stressed out over that. Well, looking forward to the one-week semester break next week and also the desaru half next weekend. This week I've got an intervarsity 3000m track race, and being the defending champ I'm hoping to win again. But seeing the condition i'm in now.. well, i'll just be trying my best. It's pretty much off season right now, well at least I am gonna be taking a break. Gonna do base endurance work for the rest of the year I guess since there aren't anymore races.. will be running the marathon for fun and hopefully i can win the vertical marathon again. That would be an awesome way to end the year! Nothing much else has been going on. Oh, i realised today that the camera doesn't add ten pounds, it adds TWENTY. if you caught the OSIM race highlights on channel 5 today, there was this little bit on me, and gee, i never wanna see myself on tv again! Well I am really bored now so if you guys have anything interesting please drop me a mail and brighten my day.. |
| 13 September 2004. Monday. |
| Just got back from swim training at SPE with the Triathlon Family. It's my 2nd time training with them and I must say that training with them is so much more fun than.. uh... some other training of mine. It's great to meet people who are so passionate about triathlon and train hard but have fun while their at it. Trainings are pretty noisy and it's social yet competitive at the same time. Love it, pity I can't join them every Monday because I have class till 6pm on Mondays and they start at 7pm at Bukit Timah. Well I felt pretty good today actually, which is great because I've been feeling super tired the whole of last week. I took the advice of some friends and took a day off and went easy for a few days last week, and I'm feeling recharged by that. REST! VERY IMPORTANT!! Having mid-semester one week break now so it's all good... this weekend I will be racing in the Desaru Half-Ironman. But i don't see it as a race really -- just a long training day that I'm really looking forward to. It's going to be fun... :) Oh, got a new race suit from Jeff (who runs a great online store hivelocity.com.sg). It's by desoto and it's a silver-white two piece -- the bottoms are the low-rise women's tri short and i tell you, THEY'RE THE BEST FITTING SHORTS YOU'LL EVER WEAR! It's like the levi's super-low of triathlon tights, ya know? Very good cutting and fit, highly recommended! Better go grab a pair for yourself at the store before it runs out. It comes in a men's model too. ok enough of advertising, i need sleep! Goodnight! |
| 21 September 2004. Tuesday. |
| HELLOOOOOOOOOO how's it going?! Been a while since I written anything. Well once again after a couple of SH*T weeks of training a breakthrough happens.. over the weekend i won the 16-29 age group at the Desaru International Half-Ironman 2004 over a 2k swim, 90k bike, and 21k run. it was only my 2nd half ironman ever but i was well pleased with my race. i went into the race with the mindset of simply ENJOYING myself and finishing the race -- it was just a long training day for me. but it's really funny how when you least expect it, when you're most relaxed, that you produce a good result. we started the race at 10am, well 10.15 actually after the usual delay in waiting for the Guest of Honor to flag us off. The sea was pretty clear but the current was strong and waves were a li'l choppy. I treated the two-1k-lap swim as my warmup and even managed to sneak in some mischief in the water along the way (engaging in a mini water fight with david). i was just glad to get out of the water (my least favorite element) and jump on the bike for a hot and hilly 90k. once again i was in a really relaxed mood and managed to have another water fight along the way to T1 (splashing water from the aid station in Jeff's face). i paced myself on the bike and managed to get through the bike without much pain at all (thank you cycling buddies!!!!). towards the last couple of km on the bike i just took it real easy and spun it out. although this meant that i let esther get to t2 a minute ahead of me, i knew there was still a 21k run and there was no point rushing it. i stuffed two gels and one powerbar into my tights (sounds sick but it's much better than lugging a fuel belt) and headed out onto the 2lap super duper hot run. sure enough barely 3k into the run i had caught esther and was pacing her together with another male competitor. then the guy picked up the pace just a tad and i latched on and from then on the gap between esther and i just grew bigger. let me clarify something here: my goal was still just to have fun and i'm not hard up to beat esther or something. but she is an extremely strong triathlete and to be able to run away from her is something i surprised myself with. ok anyway so i had a pretty darn good run, but the last 4k or so was really testing. it didn't help that the aid stations had barely any water left and it was about 3 in the afternoon. well thank GOD that i just hung on for the win with a time of 5h 33min and uh, don't know how many seconds. what's really cool is that i placed 4th overall among ALL women, with the first three being professionals (ie. they do it for a living!). so that was my race for you. and surprisingly i felt really good the next day and even managed to pace Sara on the run when she did the sprint race. well, i am about a thousand dollars richer now and feeling great. it's all good! (other than the fact that a huge assignment deadline looms around the corner..) |
| 30 September 2004. Thursday. |
| The last day of September. This month flew by like the breeze and now i'm left with one month before the exams start. Starting to feel the pressure of it all, yet looking forward to the end of university. It will be my last university examination (because being the kiasu singaporean student i cramped my 1st three years and after this semester would've completed all my academic unit requirements.) HOORAY! After this sem i'll be spending my final semester at home doing my final year project (which is due March 31 2005). Life after graduating? I don't know. If you guys have any job openings related to the media, drop me a mail! but yeah, i can probably just dream on.. jobs in the media ain't so easy to come by (especially now with the media marriage). Anyway training this week was pretty average... i am in an off-season mood and also bogged down by loads of school work and readings, so i'm not in the best state mentally and physically to train. (Un)fortunately, i still have one major race to go -- the Hong Kong International ITU next weekend. Hopefully i can make good what i couldn't do at the Singapore Triathlon. Hope you guys are having a good off season and please feel free to drop me a mail anytime. Ciao! |