Building From Scratch

My runs can be counted with the fingers on one hand since my last race on the 16th April 2011. Since then I only did some easy body weight workout plus some stretching so that not to exaggerate my knee injury. Apart from that, busy with the renovation and moving into a new house gave me some excuse from pounding the road or trail since then.

If it was few years back, I would keep on running even if it is just for 15 minutes but getting injured again and again from running or playing other sports had make me more patient, and this time I took time chilling off with the hope to build everything from scratch and to stay injury free as long as possible.

The last two weekends I had been pounding the FRIM trail again and really glad that I can go down the hill running cautiously without my knee guard although the uphill is a totally different story as I need to build up the endurance again from roughly three month of not running at all.

I am trying a new routine which will includes weight training twice a week and maybe a little bit time spending on the stationery bike and dipping in the pool at my apartment's gym and pool to give the legs more rest while building up the mileage again. Got to fully utilised the facilities. :)

Selamat berpuasa to all my Muslim friends. Till the next blog.... which I do not know when... kehkehkeh! :p

Enjoy the random shots taken during my run at Frim last Saturday......

The trail at about 7am

Taman Botani Kepong's lake from the trail

Green scenery

Overlooking Kepong township from the top of Bukit Hari (helipad) aka Steroid hill

Going down the steep trail

Rebound

With the left knee injury I got a week from my maiden marathon race still giving me problem to charge down even a slightly steeper slope, I'll have two choices...

One is to continue doing what I like most, that is running with the pain even running for as little as 1km... irrational but I get to do what I love most just as the time I contracted iliotibial band syndrome on my right leg a few years back.Back then I would go out for a run of 5k plus up to 8km even though I usually felt the pain around the 5km mark.

The second choice is to stop running completely and build up from scratch... this is really hard to do... :(

What should I do...?

It had been two weeks since the race which I was so glad to finish and I am still thinking about which one should I choose... hmmm.... It is very hard to do but I have chosen the second option and I am going to build up my run as slow as it required and at the same time start lifting some weight again to build up some strength and a more balanced muscle to try to avoid injury in the future.

I have come to this decision after a long thought, running for me will be a lifelong thing to do and if that means I need to stop running for some time and doing other form of exercise so that I can continue running freely again then that would be the thing I should do for the time being.

Now, it will all down to my heart to resist the temptation to go out and run hard, run long, charging the trail... The trail will be very hard to resist as last weekend run revealed that I can still charge hard going uphill at FRIM, Kepong without any pain on the knee but when it come to downhill it is so painful that I can only walk down the hilll and with the help of the knee guard.

I hope I am strong enough to resist it......

First LSD In Years

Summary

Location : Taman Tasik Titiwangsa

Weather : Humid, no wind

Distance :18.2km (7 loops of 2.6km per loop)

Time : 1 hr 48 min 42 sec

Average pace : 6min/km

Report

Well... did a 7 loops at Taman Tasik Titiwangsa yesterday.... Updated in Dailymile as 18.9km which is about 2.7km per loop which I go round and round with my car years ago to get the average mileage, but according to mapmyrun website it is only about 2.6km per loop. If so than I was running the pace which I had planned which is about 6min/km pace instead of the 5.45min/km as posted in Dailymile.

Start the run at about 7.30pm after a light stretching. The weather is not that hot... but is humid as always.

Drank half a bottle of Gatorade before the run, the balance half after the 3rd loop and another half a bottle after the 5th loop as started to feel hungry.

Overall, the run was great other than the three blister I got - two on the same place on both my little toes and another one right at the bottom of the ball of my left foot.

Cool down with a walk of about 6 minutes followed by a full body stretching which took about 20 minutes to end the run.

Getting regimented again... or more appropriate to say getting race bound again??

23rd April 2008.... that was a long way back since my last and the one and only post i'd ever made... never been good in sharing my stuff... . :p

Since my last post... i'd only joined another two races... they were Adidas KOTR 2008 at Shah Alam and Men Health/Shape Run 2008 at Lake Garden...

Last race i ran (10k) on 24th Aug 2008

After that i just logged a mileage of not more than 30km per week for the past two years... nothing regimented... two easy run of 5km-8km during the weekday and a long run of not more than one and half hours during weekend (occasionally). Really glad that I'd get rid of my IT band problem with some weight training and stretching...

For two consecutive saturday i'd joined a group of runners (Corporate Athletes to be specific) and scrutinise the blogs of my newly met friends (which triggered me to write in this long abandoned blog)... Thanks Ian for organising the Progressive Outdoor Run (POR)... nice outings with you guys (and gal) and nice treats after POR 4 as well.. hehehe!! (sorry Nik & Yim... curi2 guna gmbr u all...)

Going up the Steroid Hill at FRIM (POR 3)

Group photo before POR 4

Party after POR 4

I found that running blogs are very inspiring and motivating especially when you do most of your running alone and didn't plan to join any races, nor being member of any running club.... Where does the motivation for running comes when you are in this very same situation as i am..? Hence, I'd made a decision to share my running stories here... in the hope that anyone out there who have passion for running to keep on running... no professional advice here, only sharing of my very own experience (and pain)...

Will come back with my logs and activity soon......

Start to feel worry.....

I registered for the RMAF half marathon which is going to be on the 25th next month, but now a bit nervous because I have not been seriously train for competitive since leaving secondary school. Things get worst when I started feeling pain on my IT band few years back and I usually cannot go any further than 5K. :'(

Now, it is getting a lot better. Hopefully it will not haunt me anymore...

Thanks to my collegue who invite me to be his teammate for Trailblazer run last November. It initiated my will to run again and see how far I can go against the running enthusiast out there. Be prepared friends!! I am coming your way.....

Photo after Genting Trailblazer 2007

I have been training more seriously since beginning of the year and trying to build up my mileage and do weight training twice a week, I still feel like it is not enough to finish the 21k run as sometime I have to skip my training due to my work. Although I still run in a local park all this while - Taman Tasik Titiwangsa to be specific, but it were just some easy runs for a few laps (no more than 5 laps) which is about an hour or a little bit extra if I see some beautiful girls. Kekeke!

Let see how my training goes. I am not very ambitious, only try to clock below 1hr 50min if possible.

Cao.... See you guys out there!