RL Run on 4 Jan`07 (Thu)

Had a great ski holiday over Xmas n New Year in Hokkaido, Japan -- pure joy to spend the days juz eat, sleep, ski n onsen :) After 3 weeks of zero mileage, I was looking forward to my first run of year 2007. RL was having a promo of 1-for-1 socks promo for the runners and that attracted a few rare guests from SgRunners (or were they tempted by the mention of me bringing some Japanese goodies?!) Haiz, at 5.30pm -- it started to pour pigs n elephants EVERYWHERE! Took a lift from my colleague to Tanjong Pagar -- the rain was still heavy. Sms-ed to tktan that we should skip the run and go makan! To our surprise, the rain reduced to a drizzle when we reached City Hall -- no chance to slack! A group of runners already gathered at RL when I got out of the changing room -- among them were Eddie, DO, Terence, Ayin, ronnie, cfred and SV. The RVP gals came but decided not to run due to the impending rain. After some delay, we went ahead with the run -- did our warm up outside RL. The route was Esplanade -- suit me juz fine as I needed an easy n flat run :) Started the run in the drizzle. Surged ahead as I lost my sense of pace -- maybe I had rested for too long and my legs were too eager to run :P The guys caught up @ Marina Promenade and we were running abreast while chatting abt upcoming KL 30km race. Soon some of the guys(Eddie, Ayin, Terence, DO, tktan etc) picked up speed n sped ahead. cfred overtook me at end of Marina Promenade and I tailgated him to Kallang Riverside Park. After the U-turn point, I started to have stitch and slowed down to control my breathing. No sign of relieving the pain but mid-way at Marina Promenade, the stitch juz disappeared! Widen my strike and finished the 10km run @ 53min (forgot how to use my stop watch and registered unbeliveable timing of 39min! A check with cfred on his timing -- he did 50min+, so I should be 2-3 mins more)

After a quick change of clothes, DO, SV, cfred, tktan n me met up with George n fennel @ City Hall before proceeding to Marche @ Suntec for dinner -- to celebrate George's bday. In place of a cake, we had dorayaki for George -- with a lit candle. Everyone got a taste of dorayaki (doraemon's favorite food with red beans and chestnut filling) -- specially handcarry from Otaru, Hokkaido.

P.S. It felt good to be running again! Could feel the strain on my right shoulder (from a bad fall while skiing) and didn't push hard -- juz enjoy the run. Good to know that my pace was still 5:15-5:30min/km :) Gotta go for another calibration run to get back my sense of pace.

Distance : 10km
Time : 53min
Avg pace : 5:18min/km