Race Report: Putrajaya Night Marathon 2012

This is my 7th full marathon. Like all other runners, I was expecting a wet night run in Putrajaya. The sky was so dark when I am on my way to Putrajaya and no one will belief that we will eventually don’t have a single rain dropped that night, and the whole morning before the flag-off was dry and sunny too.

Arrived the parking around 6:40pm, already the parking is filled with cars and runners. Walked around the starting line and bounced into Khoo and his family. He was volunteer last PNM but this year only come to show support. Met with Nick before we were called into the starting pen. Not much warming up for me as I think the slow pace will only do the warming up on the route. The race flagged off right on time. I ran with Nick from the start. I think we started too fast, the pace for the first 10k was around 6.5~7 minutes, which is too fast for my target (but too slow for Nick :P). I knew that my under-trained condition will not allow me to hold on to this pace, so I just slowed down at 10k water station and Nick continued to pushed on.

This year got more runners in full marathon category, the route don’t felt so lonely this time. But this time I got new problem to deal with… I felt sleepy! This is the first time I felt sleepy in the middle of the race. The sleepiness really took away my pace and I beginning to slow down to some walking break from 21k onward. We were running on the long boring stretch of the highway at this point. Used varies methods to kept myself awake, counting lamp poles, cons, cars, and people passed me; stopped at all water stations too.

Finally, reached the 30k u-turn point and collected the gel at 33k (I don’t bring gel with caffeine). I gulped in the gel and slowly ramped up my pace again. Anyway, that the hilly section of the route started, and continued all the way to the finish. I had to reconfigured my running / walking mode. Walking up all the climbs and running on the declines and the flat route. I found that I actually enjoy doing this! Slowly regain my momentum, and I started to run all the way from 40k. Crossed the finish line in 5:46’13”.

Charging to the finish line.

Overall, organizer did a great job in PNM 2012. My only request for 2013 version will be allowing more runners to join the full marathon category (only about 800 of us registered this year). Putrajaya have wide open road to handle more 42km runners, properly this can be grow to 3rd biggest marathon event in Malaysia.

Good thing from this race, my feet seem recovered or the focus on the running gaits really help on it condition. I have one more full marathon (PBIM) to test out my goal of sub-5 marathon. I will need to ramp up the training to normal level now. Can I achieve my goal in Penang? We shall see :)