Bukit Gasing challenge ; taubat kah anda ?

I was contemplating earlier to continue with the race on Sunday because I did not want to leave wifey with Qaisya if she's ill. Alhamdulillah , over the night she was OK and back to her own cute ways !! :)
Mafiz and Edrin picked me up early and everybody was excited about the race. It had been quite some time since we did our last run. We were to meet Azad and Halim in PAdang Timur itself to collect our numbers. My training programme was disrupted for obvious reasons for the past few days and totally unprepared for what was to expect..

before the race
Although we had the course map with us for the past fortnight , never would i thought that the Bukit Gasing 11.6 km run turned out to be a real challenge !! haks... I would have thought this run was similar to any 10km run ; thus not as tough as i tought it would be. The gang even estimated the time to go back home at about 9am..

And we were off at 7.30am by Dato Donald Lim , PJ Utara MP. The whole group started running , and of course the earlier part of the route was going across Jalan Gasing to Bukit Gasing. It was uphill... up and up on the tar road... heks.. then we entered the "nature" route. Ok i said.. it should not be that bad ; And boy... was I wrong.

I ended up trekking rather than running through the course. It was more like my mountain trips rather than any typical run !! haks.. When it was uphill , my god! it was up and up and up... Few mat sallehs ran through me.. " PAssing through.... passing through... " yup , of course... please do... please do... I did not have the stamina nor the strength to follow their pace !! And then , it was downhill... ok , through the secunder forest it was. But mind you , it was not just one ! Up and down..up and down.. 5 hills i think !! haks.. It was certainly draining and exhausting ! The sight of the water station was a short acting motivation.. THe thought of we should have joined the 6.5km novice trail came into mind , but at the end of the day ; i was glad that we chose to take this track as it was really "memorable" !!!

success !!
My legs were killing me about 3 km from the finish line. It was at the meeting point between the end of the jungle trek and the tar road. It was cramping like mad ; a result of me not conditioning my physique for this challenge. I was literally walking as i could not run ; yet i cannot stop. If i do , my legs will go cramp big time and i may not be able to move at all in pain !!! Managed to push myself in the hot sun to arrive at the finish line , and of course ; the sight of it made the pain go away !!

Azad at the finish line
I arrived at the finish line at about 1010am ; thus my total time for that particular route 2 hr and 40 minutes. heks.. totally off from what we thought it would be. Mafiz was the first to arrive as he embraced me when i arrived at the finishing line . We then waited for Edrin and then Azad and Halim. It was blazing hot and i'm totally dark now !! haks.. It was worth it though as we were each awarded a medal for finishing the race .Certainly enough to make us grin from ear to ear !! haks..

p/s and to think that we were actually considering to join the Perhentian Island challenge which was held on the same day!!!! haks..

Pictures ; click Mafeitz googleweb

Next week ; Shah Alam 10km run... :)