Relaxing February ...

If everything have been according to plan, February will be a tough month for me.

This will be the months that I really abuse my legs and started training on sands and full loads. This is also the months that I need to stay healthy, eat well and rest well, so as to be in the right shape for the Sahara Race. There are also 5 business trips, one to the States - which make it harder as our immunity system do will be compromise with traveling. Have to get my health check done and lastly, Febrruary is the last month for my donation drive.

Indeed, this is really a relaxing month.

1) The race was cancelled.
2) Two trips were cancelled - including the long haul US trip.
3) I pig out during Chinese New Year.
4) I put on hold my donation drive.

Since I have moved the race to May, I can afford to relax a little.

Perhaps I am too used to regular workouts.
 The week that I started to relax, I started to feel unwell!

There is this persistence headache that bordered me for a whole week and turn my life upside down. Long story short, I decided to carry on with my exercise. And maybe it is psychological or exercise really help, the headache went away.

So, no excuses - continue to exercise.

Pig out during Chinese New Year

This week supposed to be a tough week.

Yes, if the race is not cancelled, I will be training 3-6 hours daily. And instead of running at the usual park below my place, I planned to do some hills and sands run. Plus weight too. I have not been training with backpack so far - definitely I think I have the stamina now but without backpack training, I won't know how my other part of the body will react.

Anyway, it is supposed to be.
Cos the race has been cancelled - so this week I just relaxed.

Still get my daily dose of exercise done, but just relaxed.
Maybe all things happen for a reason.

At least I get to spend more time with the family.

Happy Chinese New Year 205.

Race cancelled !

The race was cancelled!

On 12 Jan, Sam emailed to all race participants that due to the recent situation in Jordan, 4Deserts has decided to cancel this year Sahara race.

Yes, I am disappointed but I am not exactly surprise. In fact, I was a little relieved.

No doubt all my months of hard works now will be wasted, I feel relieved as the recent incidents involving Jordan and ISIS do make me think twice of going to that areas. As Sam pointed out, the risk is low but the price is high. In fact, the organizer decided to cancel the run 21 days before the race do tell a story of 2. Seriously, ISIS is not just restricted within the "no man land" of Syria and Iraq, there are pockets of them all over the world. And I wont be surprised to find few in Jordan.

I am actually very prepared and ready to tapper down on my training. Only 21 days more ! Now, I have to restart the training program. Very demoralizing ... as all runners know, it is the preparation that is the hardest, not the race itself.

Anyway, safety comes first.

Immediately after Sam told me the Sahara race was cancelled, I signed up for Gobi Desert Race on 31 May 2015. The same 250km self supported desert run, except it will be in China Gobi desert and 2 months later in May.

SkyRunner Asia Championship - 50km

7 Feb 2015.

Today I ran the SkyRunner Asia Championship - a 50km race happening in Sai Kung, Hong Kong.

This is the 1st time HK organized the SkyRunner event and it sure is a star filled event. Many top global runners flew in, from as far as the States to run.

The total elevation gain/loss is 2810/2782m. Took me 9hrs 16 min to complete, although the official timing is 9 hrs 32min. Mainly due to the fact that the organizer gave the top runners a head start of 15 min. Both the winners (male and female category) came from Nepal, no surprises. The male winner took slightly less han 5hr, truly incredible!

HK trail running are always very technical in nature and this one is no exception. Beside stamina to run up the mountain, you need the skill and agility for downhill. Downhill is always my Achilles heel and this one is no exception. 

Overall good run and now muscle aching like crazy. This worries me a little - can I really finish my Sahara run ?

 

Food

Sahara run is a self-supported race.

Runners carry all the necessary gear and food they need for the entire 250km. For better chance of completion, we should keep our gear light, between 12-15kg.

The race organizer recommended average intake of 2000 calories per day. And to keep the weight down, dried food is a populate option. So I ordered some on-line from "The Racing Planet" store. Each pack weight only 200 grams and can provide 800 calories. Perfect!

Most past runners recommend we try the food prior to the race to get used to it and so I did.

Glad I did that ... these dried food are awful, almost cannot stomach it! Audrey told me, when you are hungry then, you will eat them. I am thinking to myself, will I?

Guess I better pop by the Beach Road Army market to get some SAF combat rations. They are heavier but at least I know I can eat them. Bak Kwa sound like another winner too.

Club Rainbow Singapore

I am dedicating the Sahara run to raise fund for Club Rainbow Singapore.

http://giveasia.org/movement/every_rainbow_child_is_a_hero

Last Thursday, I setup the donation portal to start the fund raising activities. 

I know I need some "catalyst" to kick start this. And the best place is with "people around" me. I take this literally, the first email I sent is to colleagues sitting around me. The 2nd email is to my family and the last one my kopi khaki.

People are shy and passive in general and some pushing are needed. I sincerely hope that in my drive to gather donation, I never made things difficult to these early catalyst donors.

Anyway, 48 hours later, 17 people have donated a sum of $1938. I am extremely encouraged by their generosity. When I am back in town next week, I need to cast the net wider to include others.

Thank you guys once again for your generosity.

Keeping me humble

I have a humble upbringing. 

My dad was a truck driver who managed to bring up all this 6 children with a midget salary. We grew up without much luxury but were happy. Fortunately, all his kids did well academically and now living well.

Not having much money when you grew up can be difficult but it made you tough. More importantly, it kept you humble.

It is because we were humble that prompt us to seek knowledge earnestly and getting us better grades. Not because we were smarter.

It is because we were humble that we took up jobs or challenges that others shun and thus, opening up new opportunities. Not because we were luckier.

However, successes do can make us lost our humility. We demand, we criticize and we look down on less successful people around us.

This may not happen to you (congratulation). I know I have became very arrogant over the years.

Which is why, every year I need to make effort to stay humble.

I took up Taxi Driver Vocational License to re-learn how to serve people.

I took up Bus Driver Vocational License to understand their stresses and happiness.

I took up Class 4 License classes so that I can experience the hardship of the truck drivers.

For all these courses, I was taught by people (Taxi drivers, Bus drivers, Truck drivers) who are deem (by society standard) to be less successful, less capable. Every time, I walked away with new respect for them, make new friends and very happy.

This year, I decided to raise fund for Club Rainbow. 

Fund raising requires one to step out of his comfort zone, being judge by others (especially on your intention), to ask / beg for donation, be creative etc. More importantly you need to serve. It is a very humbling experience.

60 second of fame

Run Society, an on-line running magazine portal, published an article on me in their Jan 2015 edition. See link below.

http://www.runsociety.com/2015/01/25/sean-lim-the-ultra-marathon-man-expert-at-juggling-lifes-priorities/

The last time (or the other only time) I appeared in the press was back in 1997, when I was still an undergraduate in NTU.

That year, Internet just landed in Singapore. I was one of the few early adopters who subscribed to "Cyberway", an ISP belonging to Singapore Press Holdings (SPH). To promote Cyberway, SPH  held a number of contests for it subscribers. One of them, is a dinner with the New Face of the Year - a beauty contest by New Paper.

I won a dinner date with the beauty queen. The catch, the reporters (2 in fact) will sit behind us to record the event, plus photo of course. The next day, the article (with my photo) appeared in New Paper. Long story short, I was ridiculed for almost 3 months by friends. The article kind of implied a romance brewing between an ordinary boy with a beauty queen - will it be happily ever after?

Franky, I attended the dinner only because I wanted a free meal at a posh restaurant (Raffles Hotel btw). FULL STOP. Simple motive. Moreover, girl like that, sure have boyfriend wah.

Anyway, back to Run Society interview.

To be candor, some of the contents were sensationalized, languages definitely rephrased (which is good) - but I will say is 75% accurate.

Thank you Aidan from Run Society for featuring me.

chendol freeze

Why chendol freeze?

For non-local, chendol is a popular Singapore (to be political correct, maybe I should say Singapore & Malaysia) dessert that comprises mainly crushed ice, coconut milk, read bean etc. See picture below.

It is refreshing in hot weather here and my FAVORITE or ONLY dessert.

Why only desert ?

Not because there are no other choices in Singapore but because I always ended up choosing this. I am a super boring person when comes to food. I usually order the same stuffs, food that I am familiar and like. And even if I took hours to go through the menu, I still order the same stuffs.

I have chendol 4-5 times weekly. I love the coldness and smell of the coconut. If not because of my level of exercises, I think I will be in trouble - health and aesthetic wise.

So, why chendol freeze for my blog ?

It is my "desired" food.

During my long run, typically around 1/2 way mark, the image of chendol will appear. And I always tell myself, hang on and you will be rewarded to a nice cold chendol.

And of course, I always keep my promise.

Super January

What a way to start 2015!

Never have I ran these much in a month!

Since I signed up for the Sahara run 3 months back, I have been searching around for a 250km race training plan. I found NONE. The almighty Google failed, for once.

There are many 100km or 100 miles training plan, but nothing on 250km. It makes me wonder, can we even train for races like this? Anyway, I decided to make do with the 100 miles plan. 

It requires runners to clock around 120km every week (with 2 rest days per week). I have a day job and can only afford 2 hours a day for training, weekend inclusive. Thus, I need to make some adjustments. I decided to run 6 times a week, each time 21km. And I keep my pace reasonably fast, keeping my 21km training run between 1hr 53min to 1 hr 59min.

This gave me between 120-130km. This week, I clocked 150km, without a single rest day.

I hope I have pound my legs sufficiently.