Sunsdown Letdown

Had my third run of the year this weekend the Adidas Sunsdown event to be held at Changi Exhibition Centre. I signed up for the half marathon since they had this new category this year and from what was said it seems to be the biggest category.

The event starts from 6pm on Saturday where the Ultra-Marathoners would take off till 9am on Sunday which was the Ultra’s cut-off time. I got a special bib number for this event. Number 2012.

I had bid on this bib number in the Charity Auction held by Adidas. Paid $50 (it was the opening bid) for it the number of course is not to signify the end of the world as from some mayan calender but it was actually the birth date of the twins. I figured I should give it a go and get a bib number of significance just this once.

I got there early just to see the flag off for the Ultra, my event only starts at 9pm so I had some time to waste after the runners for the Ultra started. There were quite a few people I think more than a thousand runners took part in the ultra but not sure how many will make it over the finishing line. There was the One-Arm Marathoner and even a guy (elderly guy) who was running the Ultra SDRAWKCAB that’s – BACKWARDS. It makes you just want to put on your running shoes and run after them.

Above the event site before the sun went down. The Ultra’s Started at 6pm this was followed by the women’s 10K at 7pm and the Corporate/Team events at 7.30pm I was around to see the Women’s finisher and boy was she FAST I think she set a new course record (the one she set last year) and the 2nd place finisher was like 5 minutes behind her. Soon it was time to prep for my event the organizers had these little light sticks that you could bend and wearing around your wrist (gives you some illumination) I got a couple and kept a couple as well, had 1 on my wrist, 2 more on my laces and 1 I hang on my bib.

I got my pre-race drink, did my stretches, deep heat my muscles, used the anti-chaffing cream, now this was something I have found really useful as I did not get abrasions very much for long runs once I used this. Finally had my banana and I was ready. Soon 9pm was drawing near the only other event after this was the Marathon which would kick off at 2359hrs.

We had the countdown and soon all 6000 runners were off. The route was relatively flat and some points were very very straight, we were running the length of Changi Airport’s runway. Could see and hear the airplanes taking off. Firstly I have to say it was a gruelling race. I think the humidity was a great factor, there was hardly any breeze only at the start/end point was there some breeze and that even I could detect the smell of oil which could be from that tanker incident a couple of days back. I had maintain a 7 minute kilo running pace till the 12 KM mark where my left knee started to hurt and I started to slow down, one good thing was that almost all water points had 100 plus and water. At the 17km mark it was a milestone as I had done a 25km run the previous week and that with the 17km would make it that I had run 42km (a marathon distance) so technically you could say I did a marathon and the time taken was  ….. 7 DAYS !! :)

The 18 and 19 kms were GRUELLING, it was humid, my knees hurt, my muscles hurt, practically everywhere hurts. I finally managed to reach the end in around 2 hrs 45 mins. A night race was really tough on both body and spirit. Now the thing about the Sunsdown that irked me was the water stations were not manned properly at practically every station you had to queue up to get a drink and some times you spent like a minute just trying to get some water. This really affected the rhythm of my run and it was really congested. Also the support was not that great not enough medics etc. along the route especially between water points. There were no cheer leading groups which I guess was due to the run in the wee hours of the morning. Getting out of the event venue was something that they needed to work on as well. I spent half an hour trying to get out of the Car Park !!! I reached home around 3am after I had something to eat as there were no banana stations along the way. They did give out bananas at the end point.

I did not really enjoy myself during this run and I think this will be my first and last Adidas Sunsdawn run. The final nail in the coffin for me was the number tag. I wanted to keep my number tag due to the significance of it. But when I took it off, normally on the back they put details of you and the emergency contact just in case it was needed, the entire details had faded away and was now on my shirt, what was left was this.

As you can see all the details had come off (the details were now on my shirt) if anything had happen to me they would not know what to do or who I was. This was the first time something like this has ever happened to me. However luckily the front was still intact and I could still keep the number tag. So half of my 6 runs this year are completed. Next up likely to be the Army Half Marathon.