The date was 5 December 2005 morning, I can still remember the incident as clear as yesterday. This was the 3rd full marathon I was attempting and it was HOT and humid.I had my arranged supporter, Kannan, from Malaysia who had come all the way from Malacca to help supply me the Gatorade drinks and Powergels. We had arranged that he meet me at specially designated locations to hand me the "life savers" as I estimated there would be a thousand runners in front of me, and probably many thousands behind me. This was the MOST dramatic ending to my marathon runs which I am not going to forget soon.
The race started at 6.00 am, it was smooth sailing for me for the first 10km or so, I was near the faster runners - not the elites, nor the chasing bunch, but somewhere in the first 25% or so. I had been pacing myself and had trained religiously for this run which I thought would be a managable distance,as I had run it 2 times previously, once in Penang (2003) and once in Singapore 2004.
I WAS SO WRONG.
The first 10 to 14km was the stretch from the Esplanade Bridge right down Shenton Way to all around Marina Bay area and back before looping back to Robinson Road and head towards the Padang and the Esplanade Drive and down to Raffles Avenue.
The race was carried out on a hot morning, and by the 23km mark, I had a cramp on my right calf. This occured somewhere around the 6 km mark at East Coast Park. "Oh Oh", I thought, "Not Good and so early into the run." By this time, at 8.20am or so, the first Kenyan runner finshed the race. I was only half-way through !!
I managed to squeeze some Counter Pain Gel on my leg and carried on. At around the 30km mark, I had a another muscle strain, this time on my left calf. Again I stopped and applied some stretching and some muscle cream. The time was about 9.30 am and I had met Kannan once but had missed seeing him on the 20 km segment, as there were just too many runners passing by for him to spot me and I was probably bunched up with my eye on my leg rather than people or supporters.
By the 32km, I was pouring water down my head to douse myself and try to ignore the ache. BAD MOVE. The water trickled down to my legs and seeped into my running shoes. As I was hot, I intitally felt relieved with the water energising me.So I started drinking a bit more and pouring plain water down my head. My shoes by this time were squishing in water and I was literally running in SQUISHY SHOES.
Finally, the end point could be seen, 40km, just 2km more to go. I was preparing myself for the photo opportunity and with the thousands of spectators cheering us on, it was a massive boost to my very tired limbs. With 100m left to go, I thought to myself "Go for it buddy, break the 5 hour mark !". So I started to accelerate with about 80m left to go.
The exhilaration was with me, I was taking the cheering and shouting and started to move faster.60m, 50m,40m, ..... then WHAM !
My left hamstring tightened so very tightly that I pulled up and stopped totally. I was in extreme pain and lost my balance, and fell flat in front of thousands of cheering spectators !! The announcer who was announcing the numbers started shouting my Bib number and by sheer willpower, I tried to get up. I was blocking the other runners who were making their way to the 'chute'.
Another runner stopped by to help me back to my feet,but he let go of me after 10 seconds and I was practically 'legless', my legs were all rubbery and I could not even stand let alone run.
I fell back again on the road, and the announcer and the people were going crazy. I was doing a crazy stand up and fall down routine and runners were passing me and I almost knocked one down. Finally, a quick thinking medic ran to me and together we ran across the finish line which was probably 20m away.
I had slaps on my back and strangers coming up to shake my hand, all I wanted to do was sit down and I sat down with my aching body for 45 minutes and drank about 2 bottles of 100+. I had never felt so awful and relieved after a run in my whole life !
Finally when my body recovered, I was able to pull myself up,get my medal and find a taxi home. REAL DRAMA. RESPECT THE DISTANCE.
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