I'm King of the Road - adidas King of the Road 2011

Thanks Tey for this photo and the support.

How often a toll highway closed for a running event? It happens once every year (for about 9 hours) at the Penang Bridge for Penang Bridge International Marathon. Apart from that, I cannot name any other annual run event that will require a toll highway to be closed for it.

adidas King of the Road 2011 is one road race event that was held on a section of New Pantai Expressway (NPE), a toll highway. This event was missing from the race calendar last year (2010). I took part in 2009, but it was held in Shah Alam. In 2007 & 2008, I heard it was held in NPE. On Sunday 2 Oct 2011, about 8000 colourfully-clad runners took part in this event in Sunway Pyramid, running on a closed section of the highway.

My wife and I took part in this road race. Not often that we could join a run event together. It was just one week after my maiden barefoot marathon. My calf muscles were still sore. I thought I would recover fully after one week. So I joined my wife for this run. She would take part in 10km and I would run longer 16.8km race.

When the race started, I paced at about 4:30 min/km. But then I felt the strain on my calf muscles and had to adjust my pace a bit. Only towards the end, I picked up the pace a bit and finished at 1:20:14 gun time. My wife finished her 10km in 1:09:53. We couldn't stay long after the run to catch up with other runner friends.

In this run, I noticed many barefoot runners. When I said "many" here, I meant in a relative sense. Relative to other run events, this event saw more barefoot runners in it. However, it was still a very small population compare to the total number of runners. Good to know that there were some barefoot runners did their maiden barefoot race in this event. For a run that was sponsored and organised by a popular sport/shoe brand, this (barefoot) trend seemed not according to the script.

During my run, I got some insensitive remarks such as "hey, adidas sells shoes you know?", "eh, mana kasut?", "you forgot your shoes?" and some stares. Anyway, it didn't bother me at all. At the same time, I got some support from other fellow runners that know me. Also, some claps and cheers from some 10km runners waiting to start, when I ran past the starting point from the opposite direction.

Overall, the run was well-organised. Although it was a big event, crowd control was good. Runners had space to mingle around after their run. Volunteers were in good number and did their job well.

Until the next race, do train hard and stay healthy.