Esplanade-ECP Run on 15 Oct`06 (Sun)

On Saturday, went down to Tanjong Pagar area to check the public lockers @ Robinson Post Office(thanks to tiwazz n JT for the leads) – to my dismay, the lockers were out of order. Haiz, we would not have a place to keep our change of clothes for Sunday Heat Flat Run. Remembered tktan mentioned abt a good beef noodle stall @ Amoy Street Food Centre – so went down to give it a try. Beef slices were tender and the noodles were cooked juz nice – though the sauce was a tad sweet to my liking. Still prefer the beef noodles @ Changi Village :)


Most SgRunners were taking part in the NIE overnite race and needed a rest on Sunday. So, only tktan joined me for the run. We met @ City Hall MRT at 6.45am and walked to the outdoor theatre @ Esplanade. We had hope that the haze would miraculously disappear like last weekend -- haiz, the horizon was a blur. Well, now we could only hope the sea breeze would help to diffuse the haze somewhat. After a quick warm up, we set off @ 7.10am towards Indoor Stadium via Marina Promonade and Kallang Riverside Park. This was tktan's first time running this route. Maybe due to the haze, our usual chitchatting pace became a bit breathless for me (erhm, later found out that we were doing a faster than normal pace). Due to the massive construction work in the vicinity, we made a couple of detour while trying to find the bridge to Tanjong Rhu. Happy to reach the first milestone 8km @ East Coast Park(ECP) -- time check was 42min @ 5:15min/km pace! From here, we could set to auto-cruise mode along this 9km flat road to National Sailing Centre. Majority were runners, with a handful of cyclists and bladers. Safra runners were everywhere! The sun was a red glow behind the haze and weather was VERY hot and humid -- felt the oppressed heat building up in my body. We took our first break @ toilet before seafood centre at 13km -- refuel with powergel/Gu gel. tktan stretched his stiff left arm and tried Gu gel (banana blitz w/o caffine) for the first time -- hmm, tasted SWEET. Oh, not sure whether it was the effect of Gu gel, he had to sidetrack a couple of times to "let out gas" -- good thing he was not running in front of me!! Saw DO & DR ran passed -- they were taking part in the Nike Runaholics Run. As we continued our run, we met more SgRunners such as BR, cosmic_wind, alvo, meteor and bee -- oh, loneshark and gentle whisked by on their bikes. At National Sailing Club, we took a cool down break before making our U-turn -- time check was 1hr 34min @ 5:32min/km pace. At Carpark F2, we saw the tent set up for Runaholics and stopped for a chat with DO, DR and cosmic_wind -- they had completed their run and cheering on the other runners. DR mentioned about the bad weather and advised us to cut short the distance if we feel any discomfort. By now there was no wind and my body began heating up -- now I understand what tktan meant when he said his CPU became overheated! Our third break @ the toilet after seafood centre was much needed to cool down -- time check 1hr 55min @ 5:29min/km pace. We decided to push on another 5km to Fort Rd - my body felt like burning! Made another stop after Big Splash -- boy, this toilet was so far off. Started to have slight running nose (juz read in the papers that this was one of the side effects of haze) but persisted till Fort Rd -- time check was 2hr 23min @ 5:30min/km pace.

We took a walk break to the Indoor Stadium via Tanjong Rhu and bought an ice cold drink from 7-Eleven -- wow, tasted like HEAVEN! Decided to call it a day and did our warm down stretch. Think we sat there chitchatting for an hour (felt like rooted to the ground) before taking the bus to Suntec City for lunch -- I had a veggie ban mian and tktan had salmon noodle. Then we round off the meal with fruit sago (nothing compared to KL's) and cut fruit (rock melon, green apple, watermelon n papaya). On our way back, we stopped by Nike store and I tried out their foot analysis. First time running barefooted on a treadmill -- was showned a video clip of my foot landing. My foot was mild flat foot and supinate. Maybe due to my sprained right ankle, my right leg was heel strike while my left leg was midfoot strike -- boy, need to re-train my right leg to midfoot strike! Thanks to tktan for going thru this tough run with me -- sorry for being mentally weak and didn't push on to complete my intended 30-34km run.


Route : Start from outdoor theatre @ Esplanade -> Marina Promonade -> Kallang Water Sports Club -> Kallang Riverside Park -> Cross Sir Arthur Bridge -> Stadium Rd -> Indoor Stadium -> Cross bridge to Tanjong Rhu -> Fort Rd -> East Coast Park -> Lagoon Food Centre (14km) -> Carpark F2 (15km) -> National Sailing Centre (17km) -> U-turn and end @ Fort Rd

Distance : 26km
Time : 2hr 23min
Avg pace : 5:30min/km (first 8km @ 5:15min/km pace!)