Borneo International Marathon 2010 - Unofficial Results

First, some unofficial results of BIM 2010 as posted by the organiser at the Likas Stadium.

Please check in official website later (organiser promised to upload by 5 May) for the official results.

Full Marathon Men Open:
1. Peter Kipleting Ketgr - 2:38:00
2. Johnson Kipkosgei Tarus - 2:39:09
3. Sila Kipruto Sematei - 2:45:19
4. Mohd Faizal Waridi (Malaysia) - 3:11:55
5. Faslee Mojudo (Malaysia) - 3:21:34
6. Mark Miller - 3:25:29
7. Syawal Mahmud (Malaysia) - 3:37:31
8. Franky O. Madalag - 3:40:42
9. Joseph Lau (Malaysia) - 3:49:29

Full Marathon Men Veteran:
1. Liew Joon Kim (Malaysia?) - 3:24:26
2. Alam Shah Ismail (Malaysia) - 3:24:52
3. Timothy .... (unreadable last name from printout, sorry) - 3:40:13
4. Neil Soden - 3:51:04
5. Sikin Aggom - 3:53:20
6. Dany Matias - 4:12:39
7. Robert Santi - 4:15:39
8. Edmond Gusui - 4:16:08
9. Shum Kok Khoon - 4:18:44

Full Marathon Women Open:
1. Tagami Mai (Japan) - 3:23:28
2. Susan Jemutai Chepkwony - 3:33:48
3. Peris Poymo - 3:33:58
4. Monica Chepkurgat - 3:46:37
5. (Michelle) Tan Bee Kiang (Malaysia) - 3:50:59
6. Akiyama Naomi (Japan) - 3:59:11
7. Judy Liew (Malaysia) - 4:13:54
8. Natalie Privette - 4:17:25
9. Tan Lee Lee (Malaysia) - 4:32:04
10. Claire Bowden - 4:52:44

Quick update on BIM 2010

Completed the most difficult race so far. Ran more than 1 hour with the sun in my face. Almost fainted at the finish line. Barely got my PB. More details later.

Cari more makan

Penang is a food heaven. The treasure hunt took us to Penang for the weekend. There were more than 45 cars joined the hunt. The hunters were on the prowl for good food after the hunt. While many were heading for the-best-in-town nasi kandar, I was heading to another location for this supposedly best in town cendol near Chowrasta Market in Penang Road.


After giving this cendol a try, I thought it was overrated. I didn't understand why some many people crowded around the stall. Maybe it used to be good before, but I felt that the quality has degraded.

There was another Penang Assam Laksa stall just besides the cendol stall. I was told that the assam laksa there was also quite good. So I tapau 2 packets back to KL for dinner/supper.


Then, my team headed to Sri Ananda Bahwan Restaurant for this banana leaf rice. The location is at the junction of Lebuh Penang and Lebuh China.


I must say I am quite skillful when eating banana leaf rice with my hand. And I like Indian food as well. Raj sometimes jokes with me that I am a half-Indian.

Anyway, on the way back to KL, Prasath recommended a better cendol in Taiping. So off we detoured to Taiping for this Ansari Famous Cendol.


This Ansari Famous Cendol has been around for 3 generations. This cendol was better than the Penang one. So it was definitely worth the detour for our afternoon tea time.

If you are interested to know the exact location of the good food above, you can drop a comment here.

Cari Makan Trail to Penang

Last weekend, I went on a treasure hunt organised by our company's sports club. I was on business trip since last Thursday and just returned home 8 hours before the flag-off. I wasn't sure I would be able to make it. But I did. The destination: Penang. The theme: Cari Makan Trail.

It was the first time since the last theSun Motor Hunt that I went treasure hunting. This time Raj & Doug couldn't join. So Prasath & I teamed up with Harin and Alex for this hunt. The CoC is Time Out Solutions.

Leg 1 was before Penang and Leg 2 was in Penang. Leg 2 was around Lebuh China, Lebuh Penang, Lebuh Campbell, Chowrasta Market and Jalan Kapitan Keiling. There were two challenges. Challenge 1: Make roti canai. Challenge 2: Eat Yau Char Kuay with wasabi topping.

After doing the same challenge in the Food Hunt last year, I knew I have to let my team mate to do Challenge 1. Prasath stepped up and did his best. Now I really appreciate the mamak that make us roti canai. It is not an easy job to make a perfect roti canai.

Anyway I did the second challenge which was eat Yau Char Kuay (crunchy type, not the soft type ok? Very hard to chew and swallow in short time) with wasabi topping in 90 seconds. As long as you finished eating, you would score some points. But it was not clear the scoring mechanics, i.e. how to score 2, 4, 6, 8 or 10. So after completing the challenge in slightly more than 90 seconds, I have little clue on how well I did.

Anywhere, fast forward to the results. We did quite poorly for the challenges, scored 11 out of possible 20. That resulted us to tie on points with the runner-up. We won on tie-break on Leg 1 score.

One interesting road safety question to share, worth 1 point.

Q4: Setelah lulus ujian amali calon dikehendaki memohon lesen memandu dalam tempoh:

A) 3 bulan
B) 2 tahun
C) 1 tahun

Pick your choice. Answer later.

Apparently now, there is a requirement to have one officer from the Road Safety Department to give a talk on road safety in the pre-hunt briefing two days prior the hunt. I didn't attend that as I was on business trip in Jakarta. But my team mate told me that it was not a pleasant presentation as the guy showed photos and video of fatal accidents. Not very pleasant indeed. I don't need to elaborate.

One more road question to share. A simple one really. Worth 3 points.

Q25. Which street used to be called the street of the "new maidens"?

Answer can be found in the sign below. Click the photo below for a larger image.


Anyway, I would like to say that the hotel that we stayed was Parkroyal Hotel in Batu Ferringhi. It was a nice hotel with good food and a nice beach. We enjoyed our stay very much.

Energizer Night Race 2010 - The Good and the Bad

As promised, my half-cent comments on the Energizer Night Race 2010.

The Good or positives:

1. A lot of volunteers and crew members stationed at road junctions and strategic locations. These volunteers showed good enthusiasm and cheered the runners on. Not forgetting the volunteers at the start and finish station. E.g. when I got a drink at the drink station, I said to the lady volunteer, "sen fu sai!" (appreciate your hard work in Cantonese). She replied, "mm sen fu, le bao 21km tong sen fu...." (translated literally to: not hard work, you ran 21km is more hard work). The baggage counter was well organised as I waited about 5 minutes in the queue and when it was my turn, I got my bag pretty quickly.

2. Water stations and fluid were enough for everyone.

3. Organiser was willing to take inputs and suggestions from the runners. I actually wrote to the organiser to ask them to:
i) delay the full marathon start time to at least 7:00pm or later. In the end, organiser wrote back to say they were looking into it and later agreed to postponed to 6:00pm. I am not taking any credit for this, as I know many other people requested the same thing. So it is more like a collective requests from the runners.
ii) increase the medical support team. The organiser wrote back to say that they would increase the medical station and personnel. I am not taking credit as well.
iii) issue/publish medical advice to all runners before the run. The organiser actually did this. No credit for the author asked.

4. Good goody bag with water, cakes, sponsors' samples and discount vouchers. Good medal design as well, although the size could be bigger.

5. Easy-to-use disposable timing chip.

6. Quality and personalised running bib.

7. Got dance/performance before the start of race.

8. Got sprinkler shower from firemen/fire engine for the runners.


The Bad (areas to be improved):

1. Running vest size issue. I don't want to elaborate. Onus for the organiser to get this right.

2. Only one check point for 42km and none for 21km. Although many road marshals were stationed to ensure runners follow the right path, but without more check points at strategic locations, it is difficult to ensure all runners ran a fair race. I noticed in the result, there were some discrepancies between the first 21km split and the next 21km for a few runners. Other discrepancies e.g. large gaps between chip time and gun time. I would hope that these discrepancies were due to timing chip system issue.

3. Long queue for 10km runners to collect goody bag. Actually there were different counters for different categories, but I saw men and ladies lining up the same queue. No clear direction?

4. No clear direction/signage on how to get to the designated car park and start/finish station.

5. The finishing line was not cordoned off after the the timing mat. All the runners who were leaving the area were trying walk in reverse direction of the finishing gate/line to go home. It was the same way out of the finish area. This caused the runners who were just finished their race bumping into crowd of people walking towards the finishing line in the opposite direction. The crew members were trying very hard to divert the people to go to the side of the road.

6. Distance markers not accurately placed. Please don't put the markers for the sake of putting up the markers. It really means something to the runners who were looking for these markers.

7. Official photographers I heard were not allowed near the finish gate. I couldn't confirm this. I am happy to remove this point if someone could confirm otherwise.

8. No medical team was stationed at the finish line. A few runners cramped and were helped by the crew members. Later an ambulance was called to be stationed near the finish station.

9. Crowd control still need to be improved as the finish area was quite crowded.

Energizer Night Race 2010 - Running in my first night race

It was my first night race and what a tough race it was.

I arrived early with the intention to shoot some photos for the full marathon and the relay. The full marathon and the relay started around 6:00pm. The sun was quite hot at flag-off. Eventually at around 6:40pm, the weather became cloudy.

Time to change into Energizer batteries!

I started shooting at about 500m from the starting line, where there was a 1km marker (it was definitely not 1km at that point).

Mr Yong also running in the full marathon.

After shooting the last few runners at start, I ran to the next junction at around 3km mark and continue to shoot more photos.

Eugene Chan looking focus and strong.

Then I ran to the 8km mark (near Ericsson office) and then 12km mark to shoot more photos. By then it was already 7:00pm. So I have to stop and slowly make my way back to the starting line.

I bumped into this 'bunny' on her ride many times on the road. She was supporting her BF and other runners.

Because of shooting photos in various locations, I think I ran and walked about 6km even before the start of my 21km half-marathon.

I quickly changed and deposited my bag and went to the starting line. Then only I collected my headlight. Should had collected it earlier so that I could just put it in my bag.

The 21km flag-off was on time. I ran the first few km trying to pace with Kwang Leng. At around 6km, I felt pain in my left abdomen. A stitch! What a time to get it. I think I had drank or ate a little too much the hour before the race. I had to slow my pace and watch Kwang Leng running further and further away from me.

For the rest of the run, I just tried to adjust my pace and forcing some air out of my stomach. It did get better later part of the run, but then I was tiring fast. My heart rate was above 160 bpm (~85% max) from 14km onwards. So I have to slow down the pace towards the end of the race. Also, there were a lot of 10km runners running on the same route by then.

In the end, I finished with a time 1:52:17. Nothing to shout about. It was only my third half-marathon and I achieved my personal best in a tough condition.

After that, I had to cool down and do some stretching. I also drank a lot of water and isotonic drink to rehydrate myself. I met Ben (Swee) near the fruit station and chatted with him. He finished around 3:26 for third position in full marathon. Congrats! By the way, he qualified for Boston Marathon next month and will be running there!

I waited a while to collect my bag. Then I changed my soaking wet vest to something dry. I saw Lionel and he said he was not very well. He just recovered from flu and had a tough race towards the end.

By this time, most of the 10km runners were already back. The queue for their goody bags was getting longer and longer. I quickly got my camera and headed to the finishing line to take some photos. It was already 10:20pm then.

This time, I thought my camera flashlight was faulty or something was wrong with my camera. Most of the night-shots were under-exposed. I tried many settings to get it right, but the end results were still unsatisfactory. So I may have to dump these photos instead of publish them.

I met a lot of runner friends. Cornelius came all the way from KK. I met Lydia also. Christopher was there and finished within 5 hours in the full event.

I headed home around 11:15pm. I was already so tired. Shooting and running at the same event was really something! Especially when my body was acting up.

I will give my comments on the event in a different post later. Need to rest and recover now.

Energizer Night Race - Health & Safety Advice to Runners

Please read this before the race tonight. Every runner should receive this in mailbox. Please click for larger image.