the 42.195

Apparently, 4 hours of sleep insufficient to sustain me for a gruelling long race.. Unless I'm on drowsy medication, the probability of me hitting the sack before 22:00 is remotely possible.
Not to mention I was roused from sleep after minutes of tossing and turning by the persistent phonecall which i eventually picked up. :(

Arrived @ Tampines Stadium to catch the shuttle bus to the starting point amidst slight drizzle. The ratio of male to female was heavily skewed towards the former. Perhaps females runners prefer shorter distances.

It was a pretty sight to be running under the brightly lit Orchard Road, with the shimmery dazzling reds and blues. As Mr. Sun had yet risen in this part of continent, it was a breeze to be running on the tarred-road with minimal traffic. (Not to mention no human road-blocks in the form of strolling runners which appear en-mass on Sheares Bridge at the tail end of the race!)

 lol wonder what were the two guys standing in front of the trees looking at..

 waiting for..

 the star to fall.. 

The hyper supporters from all walks of life really made a difference as they cheered us on in their hyper mode. :) Not to mention some of those random messages donned by the runners themselves, either to spur others or some are totally uhm weird...One of the irritiating one that motivated me to overtake him so as not see that message again went like:

"Eat!Eat!Eat!Eat!Eat! 

Drink!Drink! Drink! Drink! Drink! 

Pee! Pee! Pee! Pee! Pee! 

Run! Run! Run! Run! Run!". 

This ah-pek whom I eventually overtook towards the last 500m has this message on his back:

I hope his friend quit smoking despite him not finishing under 4:50..

Saw a number of Japanese grannies & grandpas who persevered on in spite of the sweltering heat. One went on even after seeking medic help!

Other interesting sights were like superman in spandex, male runner donned in sequin tennis-skirt getup.., lady with sledge of toy doggies for cause against cruelty towards animals.. etc :)

Oh well, as for me, the lazy bone-me did like at most 5 secs of warm-ups and started on the 42.195 journey. No wonder the left and right calves tightened in protest towards the 27-28km mark.. Which I resorted to walking and walking and more walking.. Not to mention that it was bright and sunny.. and the route after ECP to Marina Barrage did not have much shade as that part of the island was still pretty much in a state of WIP.
Since i started walking.. i took out my dying iphone (drained out of battery as I tried to mapmyrun but that apps was a battery-killer!) and snap a few pix before it finally went deads minutes after i reached the Finish line.

 i was almost dying.. en route to Marina Barrage - the desert stretch!

The peeve of the race was the human road blocks. It’s just massive human traffic when the routes of the 10km/ 21km /42 km merged. Not to mention by the time the full mara runners meet up with the 10km peeps, the 10km peeps would be the leisure walkers.. I am not prejudiced against the slow pacers. But it would be much appreciated if they would not hinder the path of others trying to pick up their pace. Road hogs. Maybe high beam would work on them. Afterall, this is not BIG WALK. Perhaps the organizer should have different finish point for different categories.

From the official photographer (hence the watermark):

 woo i'm a couple of centimetres off the ground! flying.. lol

Collected the coveted (not) finisher tee (which was gigantic despite taking the xxs –smallest available size)!

 the tee collection tent!

 mine!:)

Headed for the leg massage that was complimentary for all full -marathon runners. (reckon that will do some good to my tired calves!) Not much of a queue since I would suppose not many has finished the course yet. After the 'free-spa', the over-worked limbs made their way to the land of farfaraway *the Pit Building* for baggage collection from the Padang. Thankfully, I've the foresight to pack my flipflops cuz a HUGE blister evolved from the friction between my right big toe and its friendly neighbouring toe. (Perhaps toe-socks will help?)

the new blistered toe & the blue-black toe [one-month old injury..thanks to the old pair of shoes i tried training in.. :( ]

the huge wheel... it's a bright & sunny day! (And I'm glad I finished the race by then as it was fuming hot!)

As my friend had to zip off to his class with his wifey straight after his half-mara, (which our original plan would be the brekkie thereafter), dragged my feet to the promenade station in which I passed by the continunous stream of runners trying to finish their last lap..

It was an alright race, would have been better if I'd not fallen sick and disrupted the training for 2-3 weeks (btw I was still coughing on the eve of the race - cuz of the nasal backdrip, and the cough miraculously disapeared on sunday, re-emerge on monday.. :(], did ample stretching, and ample rest..

Oh well, despite walking like at least 7km ( perhaps the speed of my walking is faster or equivalent to another's slow jog), did not make it to my target of sub-5 ( e wanted me to do a sub-4:30, which i think in my alright condition would be achievable), completed the long march in 5:09:09 net time. The race result:

In case the font size was too small for reading, I'm #230 among the local ranking & #340 among all the females of all nationalities who took part in this race.. 

But sigh, it's not about the placement. The way that e put it summed it up (when I was trying to cover up the timing was not too bad despite not meeting the targeted timing..
".. the fact that we both know that you can do better than that; even though you come in first ranking in the world, it is still your 2nd best timing.."

Oh well, perhaps the sundown would be better? Definitely.. :)