Standard Chartered KL Marathon 2009

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Ah, yesterday was a milestone event: my maiden marathon! Okay okay, technically, it wasn’t a marathon cos I signed up for the 10K, so I’ll call it my maiden 10K run. But then again, some parts of the route did coincide with those running the full 42K, so I’ll call it my Maiden 10K Marathon. There you go.

Got to Dataran Merdeka at 6pm (newbies ma, so excited la). Being typical girls, our first stop was the portable loo. The line was long and there was no flush so you can imagine what a grand welcome that was.

I didn’t bring anything with me cos I didn’t want to have to line up like crazy to collect my stuff after the run (little did I know that I’d have to do that whether I deposited stuff or not).

It was 6-something in the morning and still dark, so we spent a few minutes camwhoring. This is an important pre-run activity; it’s my duty as a Maiden 10K Marathoner.

You might be wondering why I’m being anti-Reebok by wearing Nike. First of all, I like Nike apparel. Second of all, I’d read some well-meaning article which said that wearing the official marathon tee is a dead newbie giveaway. Of course I didn’t want people to think I was a newbie *shudder*, so I decided to wear my own baju. Mana tahu when I went there, almost everyone was wearing the official tee. I was misguided. To make myself feel better, I wore the tee out to the dim sum restaurant for breakfast after the run and for the rest of the day – haha.

Everyone began lining up and I found a spot somewhere in the middle of the pack. That same well-meaning article also said to stay towards the back if you plan to tortoise your way through the run. Don’t go up front cos you’ll just annoy people who are like, real runners and are running to win (unlike me who’s running to not pass out).

Soon, it was 7am. The brass band started playing and balloons were released into the deep purple sky – yup, all five of them … or maybe there were six or seven, who knows. All I know is, if you’re going to release helium balloons at a big event like the KL Marathon, for pete’s sake, get more than six!! But I had no time to dwell on this tragedy as the run had started.

It was a great sight – the road was overflowing with people who looked like a huge army of tiny ants from afar. A sea of heads bobbing up and down, a mixture of dark-haired heads and colourful caps. One side of the road was closed to traffic for us; all the cars were on the other side. Almost felt an air of superiority waft over me. Look at us, busting our butts here. We’re so healthy and so fit. And look at you drivers in your air-cond cars, wolfing down your morning sandwich, pudgy elbows rested on your swollen belly, warm asses practically moulded into the car seat. Hah.

3km … ah, the first water stop came up. That same well-meaning article I’d read advised me to be courteous – line up, get your water and sincerely thank the volunteers. But that was not to be. Everybody simply charged up to the wooden tables and started grabbing paper cups and shoving them into the volunteers’ faces. Pour here! Pour here! The poor volunteers were working out of fear – we did look rather crazed and dehydrated. They cincai poured the water all over the place and I swear more water ended up on the road than in our cups.

5km … the run was pretty smooth. Everyone was chugging along nicely and nothing terribly exciting happened. But since you’re reading my blog, I feel I owe it to you to say something interesting, so here it is: I saw a lady with a rainbow-coloured wig, some scrawny dude in an ill-fitting spidey suit and a couple of Malay tudung-clad girls along the way, huddled together by the roadside. I think they were supposed to be cheerleaders (and I use the word ‘cheerleaders’ very loosely).

7km … I find it funny that some people say it’s surreal to be running on the same road you’re used to driving on. They say things look different when you’re on foot, compared to when you’re in the car. I don’t know about that. Everything looks the same to me, except much much s-l-o-w-e-r.

8km … somewhere between the second and third water stations, I began to get a little sluggish. This was when thoughts of the Penang Marathon crept in – thoughts like omg, what possessed you to sign up for the half-marathon, you siau or what, you won’t make it, 10K also like this, 21K sure die, blah blah blah. Just as I was about to entertain the thought of ffk-ing the Penang Marathon, it dawned on me that hey, we were nearing Dataran Merdeka! I let out a silent whoop-dee-do. Yay! So fast going to reach already; faster than I’d expected! But instead of turning right to Dataran, we were  directed left to Sogo and Pertama Complex, which meant we had to make one rather big loop before getting back to the Finish line. Tiny groan.

10km … as Dataran came into view, I picked up my pace. Can’t be seen dragging my sorry butt to the finish line now, can I? That would be mortifying. Ran past the finish line and got tagged with what looked like a mozzie swatter. I did it! I’m officially a Maiden 10K Marathoner!!

The nice feeling lasted for about fifteen seconds until I saw the horrifically long line of people queuing up to collect their medals. The queue looked merciless, snaking its way from the tents at one corner of the field down to the road. I got in line and we inched our way to the tents.

Got to the tents only to see hordes of people shoving and pushing, flinging their numbers at the volunteers and the volunteers simply exchanging the numbers with medals. They were so blasé about it too (and by they, I mean the volunteers), like they were giving out soda crackers. There was no verification. No checking. No nothing. How did they know if you even ran in the marathon, much less finished it? Didn’t it matter whether you finished within the qualifying time? What if I were some evil marathon medal collector who went around collecting medals so I could lie and show off to impress unsuspecting people? What then??? What would the world come to then???

To make matters worse (or better, depending on how you look at it), I spoke to a friend of mine today who claimed that the 10K was actually a 12K. Holy moly. Apparently, her friend had one of those training watches and it calculated 12K. I was so happy – it was like discovering you’re actually two years younger than you thought. But then, I went to google map and the route calculation is 10.62km. Eeesh. So much for being two years younger.

Anyway, here we are with our medals.

All in all, I’m glad I went and finished within the qualifying time. While the event itself did fall short in some areas (not enough fanfare, not enough oomph, lousy goodie bag, disorganised bag/medal collection, etc), it was a lot of fun and definitely something I will do again … which is perfect since I’d signed up for the coming Shape Run next month

All pics by Susan Ng

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Tags: 10K, running, Standard Chartered KL Marathon 2009