The Crawlies, Jason & Angry Bird

The recent episode of an uninvited guest to the “well” as reported here has an effect on Mia. And of course, it has an effect on me too—I don’t think I will ever see my toilet the same way again. You see, we are not big fans of crawly creatures, especially lizards and snakes. It doesn’t help that we’re both paranoid people.

Anyway, Mia is now beginning to wonder if the fact that the back of our house, beyond the fence, which is basically still a “jungle”, had something to do with the recent crawly visitor above. I bet if we were to conduct a thorough search at our backyard, we are bound to find many of those crawlies there!

View of the "jungle" outside our rear fence, as seen from a window on the upper floor.

In the end, we decided perhaps it’s time to do something about the “jungle”. If we could just clear the thick undergrowth and trees up to, say, 10ft or 20 ft away from our boundary, maybe that could help a bit?

We came up with an ambitious plan to carry out the project ourselves. Instead of spending our weekends using our energy running or doing other sports, perhaps we can do something more productive like slashing the thick undergrowth in our backyard. As for the bigger and taller trees, we can always borrow a chainsaw from our neighbour. Well, OK, to be honest I don’t know for sure if our neighbour has a chainsaw, but since he appears very Jason-like, I reckon that he should logically have a chainsaw in his collection?

But then after I have cut down the trees and slashed the undergrowth, there is still the problem of removing the debris. I would need help. I don’t think Jason would be keen. And my other neighbour probably has his hands full with his forsaken cats. Besides, even if he’s not, judging from his demeanor—he has a striking resemblance with Angry Bird, you see—I don’t think he’s keen to help too. After all, we would still need a truck to carry the debris away to the dumping ground which is quite far away in Kayu Madang.

In the end, looks like we don’t have a choice but to hire a contractor who has proper tools and manpower for the job. Before moving to this house a little over a year ago, we had also hired a contractor to cut down some trees in our compound. I think it was a mistake not to cut those trees outside our rear fence too then. But we have since lost the contact. I suppose Mia will spend a bit of time to locate where she kept the phone contact of the contractor. She’s extremely good with keeping things; but not so good in remembering where they are when we need them, you see. In that sense, she is very much like the squirrels, y’know. But I have faith in her—I’m confident that she’d find it somehow by the end of this year.

In the mean time, it’s not very amusing having to fix my eyes to the bottom of my toilet every time I’m sitting on it!

Harvests Of The Blog

Long before 2007 some of my close friends have tried very hard to encourage me to start blogging. I don't have a formal training as a writer, so I was rather reluctant to start my own blog. It probably had something to do with the fear of getting my posts criticized or ridiculed by others.

I have a peculiar dry sense of humour that I can't quite explain. Sometimes ideas just come to me from who knows where! My friends had suggested that I shouldn't waste such a "talent"; that I could put it to good use by giving others a good laugh every now and then. At first, I was doubtful, but in the end, I reckoned that there was no harm to give it a go with a few posts. And if it didn't work out well, I could always end it there and then. After all, if indeed I can make others happy by entertaining them with my posts, why, then I would have done my small part in making this world a better place! That would be a good return for the time and efforts invested in my blog. So I finally spent those few minutes in 2007, putting my fingers to the keyboard, and started blogging. That, then, was how this blog came about.

It has also been suggested to me that when and if my blog ever becomes famous, I can actually make money out of it! But, y'know, I don't consider myself a very lucky person. I have missed my opportunity years ago when I practically threw away my big fortune as reported here. So from the very beginning I never envisioned this blog to be a money-making venture.

Some years have elapsed since I started this blog; and I have since posted so many articles of wide-ranging topics. I happen to know for a fact that I have won quite a fair number of loyal readers who keep coming back here over the years for their regular doses of laughter. But that is not all that I have gained from this blog—I have also found new friends who wouldn't have known me if not for this blog!

Beyond that, I'm also energized when people tell me that they're inspired by some of my posts. The thought that my posts can actually help to make profound changes for the better in other people's lives is very rewarding to me. I have often bumped into total strangers in the street, apparently regular readers of this blog, and was congratulated for having this blog. Such was the case last Sunday morning when I was out running. A stranger I met on the bridge near Yayasan Sabah said he had started running—and hoped to keep running as a routine—having been inspired by the articles in this blog!

Those were the reasons why I'm still blogging up to now, albeit less regularly than before. I thought it can't get any better; but well, I was wrong.

A little over a month ago, I joined a 100km ultra trail marathon, The Most Beautiful Thing (TMBT), which was held in Kundasang. Regular readers of this blog would know that whenever I join races, as a norm I would post articles in this blog to share the experience with my readers. But for this particular event, there was a contest where blog reviews were eligible for prizes. Well, as I had said above, I have thrown away my good fortune years ago, but since I have written the article anyway, there was no harm to just submit it for the contest.

That's why I was pleasantly surprised when I received an email from the organiser recently, informing me that I had won one of the 3 prizes for the contest, i.e. a Salomon backpack which, I was given to understand, is an expensive item. For someone who hardly ever win anything from contests—not even lucky draw prizes at an annual dinner where almost everybody can win something—winning the Salomon backpack is quite a big thing! 

Truth be told, I'm still quite lost on the excitement that the prize is a Salomon bag (I guess sooner or later I will find out why it is a sought-after bag). The many, many pockets and compartments found in the bag can be quite mind-boggling, to say the least. But I'm sure I will find some uses for them in due course. But right now I'm more excited that I had actually won something—the worth of that something regardless!

So I have harvested quite a lot of benefits and satisfaction from this blog over the years, but this is the first time I've actually won a prize for an article! I won't mind if this could be a routine too!

Surviving A Heart Attack

I've always been active in sports since my school days. In fact, I'm getting increasingly into sports in recent years. Since I started running road marathons a few years ago, I've expanded my scope to running ultra trail marathons of up to 100km; and more recently I've gone into triathlons too. For the most part, I'm doing all these sports as a hobby, but I also join races for the excitement of the competition.

Although I don't have it in me to win races, I try my best to perform reasonably well—the idea of joining a race merely for the sake of finishing it is not very appealing to me. I can always run, say, a full marathon on a Sunday, for example, at my own slow pace; there is really no need to join races if the aim is just to finish. However, the thing about joining a race to race—as opposed to just finish—is that one has to train seriously for it. Otherwise, one is bound to end up with poor performance during the race day.

Nevertheless, sometimes there will be days when the body simply refuses to cooperate. That is perhaps a cue to take one step back to relax for a bit; maybe even take a few days' break so that the body can start fresh again.

In two weeks' time, I'm gonna attempt a duathlon in Putrajaya—The Malakoff Powerman Asian Duathlon Championship 2012—for the first time. Yesterday morning, I joined some friends for a short ride of about 50km. It was meant to be a "slow and easy" workout. But during the tail end of that workout, it suddenly became a race!

Then this morning, I went for my usual long run. It wasn't a very long run, really; just a 21km workout. But I felt very tired somehow. Even during the first few kilometres of the run, I could feel the exhaustion in my quads. By the time that I'd finished the run, I was totally spent. I arrived home feeling very weak in my legs; thinking that I'd just have a quick shower and deliberate toilet, and then probably spend the whole day in bed recuperating...

INTERMISSION 

(insert commercial break here)

Elsewhere in the world, a baby monitor lizard (biawak) of perhaps 8 inches long was roaming around a nice grassy compound. And as fate would have it, the poor little fellow found its way into a cozy septic tank in the ground. It proceeded along the drain pipe (what was it thinking?), much the same way how Andy Dufresne crawled his way to freedom in The Shawshank Redemption. 

But instead of crawling its way to freedom, the lizard ended up in the toilet of the master bedroom. Arriving at the S-trap of the pipe, it dove through the shallow murky water and emerged on the other side. It was a different world—it was in fact the bottom of a well with smooth and slippery porcelain wall. There was a naked male human sitting on top of that well with a curious object dangling from his bottom! Apparently, he was engrossed in a flat rectangular electronic device in his hands. But after a while, the human noticed the lizard at the bottom of the well. They stared at each other—the human apparently unsure what was that thing at the bottom of the well. A few seconds later, the lizard moved its eyes, and the human whose legs were supposedly weak and exhausted from extensive workouts, suddenly found the strength to spring up from the well; heart racing like crazy. Although it was a tiny little creature, it is not very often that you'd see something alive in the well, you know.

It was unclear if that was a heart attack; but it felt very much like one! A quick action resulted in water rushing down the well, thus washing away the lizard down the pipe.

A strange encounter no doubt, but it had a happy ending—the human survived the heart attack, and the lizard is back to the septic tank where it will hopefully find its way out onto the grassy compound again, and then perhaps proceed to the nearby drain by the roadside...

Or is it still in the pipe, contemplating another visit to the well?

Miri International Triathlon 2012

It's been about a year since I first attempted the sprint event in the Miri International Triathlon in October last year. It was a short race of an approximate 750m swim, 20km bike, and 5km run. I wasn't really seriously keen on doing a triathlon then, but I did it mainly for a friend.

I meant to attempt an Olympic Distance (OD) triathlon earlier this year, but I somehow couldn't find the right time to do it. I had quite a packed sports calendar this year—during the first half of this year, I have done a 100km ultra trail marathon, a half marathon in Brunei, a full marathon in Singapore, and a full marathon in KL. I was tempted to join some friends at the Port Dickson Triathlon, at least just to finish the distance, but in the end I decided against it because, firstly, I hardly ever joined an event merely just to "finish the race"; and secondly, I had to start training for another 100km ultra trail marathon (TMBT) of which I was aiming for a faster finish this year.

Although I haven't done an OD triathlon, I told some friends that I reckoned that to finish an OD shouldn't be harder than, say, running a full marathon. But I was ridiculed by my friends; and I was duly reminded that I haven't even conquered the OD yet! A friend, Teo, regularly reminded me that I wasn't even entitled to call myself a triathlete yet, as a sprint event is not quite up to the mark. In fact, he instructed me to remove my profile photo on facebook, because according to him, people (especially women) might just mistake me for a triathlete! That photo seemed to annoy him immensely somehow. By the way, that photo wasn't a fake—it was really taken during the sprint event in Miri last year, and I made no claim that I have done an OD triathlon before.

Anyway, sooner or later it was time to walk the talk; I had to prove that I could do an OD. And the closest event after TMBT was the Miri International Triathlon. Unfortunately, this year somehow the organiser decided to modify the distance a little longer than an OD—2km swim, 60km bike, and 15km run. But I have made up my mind to attempt a triathlon this year, so I registered for Miri.

I wasn't really worried about the bike and run, but I was rather concerned about the swim. You see, I'm not a good swimmer. 2km seemed to me like an extremely long distance in the water. I was training for TMBT, but I was able to throw in 2 swimming sessions per week as recovery between my runs. Each session was about 500m average. I had never swam anywhere near 2km in the open water.

The night before the race last Sunday, I had trouble sleeping. I kept waking up thinking about all the things that could go wrong while swimming; hell, even drowning!

Well, I woke up early and ate some egg sandwich which I packed the night before. Then I got into my triathlon outfit and went down to the transition area and secured a nice spot for my bike. Soon, the rest of my friends appeared one by one. After setting up our bikes and other stuff, we made our way to the beach where the swim was to start. There, we took some photos to pass the time.

From left: Paul, me, Ahmadul, Teo

Paul was all pumped up for the race. But Teo opted not to do the individual event because of an injury. Instead he decided to do a mixed relay—Janna would swim, Doug would cycle, and Teo would run. Ahmadul, of course is not new to this sport; he has been doing it for many, many years.

There were a few of us from Sabah. And the main attraction were of course Amelia and her daughter, Janna, in the foreground for obvious reason.

I was lucky that it was low tide that morning, and we could wade a little further into the sea, resulting in a shorter swim distance. I had estimated that I'd finish swimming 2km in about an hour, but I came out of the water after 2 loops in about 32mins. The moment I was out of the water, I felt a big relief. My biggest phobia was over, and I could focus fully on the bike and run.

The first thing I did when I arrived at my bike was to eat an energy gel and chased it down with a gulp of water. This was in anticipation of an impending climb shortly after the start of the bike leg. Then a quick mechanical procedure of putting on my helmet, my sunglasses, my bib around my waist, grabbing 2 packets of energy gels, I took my bike off the rack and started pushing it up a short wooden ramp. Anslem and Doug were already there. As soon as I passed the white line, I mounted my bike and started pedalling. Only when I was already on my bike, according to my plan, I started to relax and catch my breath. While moving slowly I put my feet into my shoes. Doug came passing by a few seconds later, and I told him to go ahead while I spend a few minutes to relax.

About 3 minutes later, it was time to work hard again. As I made the loop after the traffic lights, I started to build up speed. I had by now gotten used to the aerobar on my bike. I maintained an approximate 32km/h until I got to the hill. There I pushed a little; even out of my saddle to gain a bit of lost time. It wasn't a particularly tough climb. And once I reached the top, it was a pleasant downhill ride on the other side, even reaching almost 60km/h down that stretch. After that it was mainly flat for many km and I maintained between 33-35km/h. There were several riders tailing me from behind, but I did not mind the work. All the while I felt strong and perhaps I could go a little faster, but I kept reminding myself that there's still the run to reckon with after this!

Well, I was wrong; it was perhaps 25km into the ride, I started feeling a little tired. I ate an energy gel and the rest started to overtake one by one. I tailed them for a while until I realised that they were only doing 30km/h. So I overtook again and went into the leading position for that pack.

As we approached the turning point, the power couple, Anslem and Amelia, caught up from behind. I had expected that they would catch up around midway during the bike leg. I was kinda a little tired then, but although I could go faster, I decided to follow from behind. Anslem tried to do the work for Amelia, but he was too far in front for the most part. There was a good dose of undulating hills, but it was OK for my legs. A little tired but bearable.

Looking at my speedometer, I took another gel at about 50km, as I was expecting another hardwork to climb the hill as we approach the end of the bike leg. When we finally arrived at that hill, Anslem suddenly increased his speed. Getting out of my saddle, I increased my speed too, thus leaving Amelia and the rest behind. But halfway up the hill, I could feel my quads beginning to complain. I decided not to push too hard, but I maintained my pace to the top of the hill. Then the long way down the hill, passing the roundabout, and as I was approaching the final stretch before the junction to the transition again, I unstrapped my shoes—feet out and ready for the transition.

A few minutes earlier, Doug had arrived at the end of the bike leg—I fancy his aero helmet must have caused something of a stir.

I arrived at the transition again just a few seconds after Anslem. There wasn't much time to waste. First, the helmet came off, thus correcting my mistake a year ago, when I started running with my helmet on! Then I grabbed my last energy gel. Gulped a bit of water, and started running.

Paul was already some minutes ahead of me.

And so was Teo in his trademark full-accessories outfit.

I had trouble moving my feet, and I had to focus really hard. It was like trying to learn how to run! The sun was already high up in the sky, and I could feel my skin slowly roasting.

The power couple were not very far behind me, Anslem was still escorting Amelia.

It was probably a good idea to run together with Amelia, as I might have been able to forget about my exhaustion just seeing her outfit—or the lack of it—but I was also a bit concerned about getting last in my category!

This is kinda embarrassing, but I was so tired that I was only able to run a 6mins/km pace under the hot sun. The last few km was a struggle. I was reduced to a walk several times, but as I approached the final stretch along the beach, I knew that I had my first triathlon in the bag. 

My homestretch run wasn't a sprint as I would have liked it to be...

But I was happy to cross the finish line in 3:44. And now I wonder—it might be possible to shave a few minutes off that time. Now I need to come back next year to improve a little bit.

Pets & Names

It's been like a hundred years ago since my school days when life revolved around memorizing the periodic table, or math formulas; perhaps coupled with frequent nightmares of my teachers casting a spell on me, thus transforming me into Buku Matematik Gunaan. Oh! those were the days. 

It's rather strange when I come to think of it, but back then my Bahasa Malaysia (Malay language) was much better than my English! In fact, to a certain extent, sometimes I think my Malay is still better than my English today! But only sometimes—at other times, I feel my knowledge in Bahasa Malaysia is way too outdated. 

I'm not sure what has happened to the language over the last few decades since I left school. Perhaps it went through a kind of modernization process; or maybe there was some sort of mind shift in the way those who consider themselves as experts in the language, but I find the questions that they ask in the exams these days are quite outrageous; and I'm trying my best to be nice here. Consider this question which is found in my daughter's workbook (she is in Primary 4)—click on the photo to get a better view:

The task is to fill in the blank with the best answer (paling sesuai) from the 4 given choices, A to D. Now, before choosing the answer, one must first understand what the whole thing is about. The question tells the reader that "Siti is crying because ________ died after [it] was knocked down by a car." 

What was it that was knocked down by the car? Well, it can be anything at all—it might have been a person or an animal that Siti liked so much. But in this case, it's quite likely that the question is about a pet. The reason that it's most probably a pet is because the available choices for answer are not likely names for people!

While I was thinking about pets in general, I suddenly thought about my friend, Eric. I have of course posted about Eric in the past, although not relating to pets. Eric has a curious inclination whenever it comes to pets. While most people would keep, say, a gold fish as a pet, he would rather keep an ikan toman. Instead of keeping say a cat, he'd keep an iguana as a pet. I dare say he likes exotic pets, you see.

So anyway, it occurred to me that Siti's pet might have been anything ranging from an iguana to a hamster, to a python; hell! even a mouse named Ben. I once had a pet dog named Boomer. A friend of mine had a pet dog too; he named him Nitro. Yet another friend had a pet cat that had stripes, and he named that cat Tiger. Some years ago, my sister, Bridget, had a pet dog which she named Samy Vellu; and another named Rafidah Aziz. But of course admittedly Bridget is weird in her own special way. You see, when it comes to names for pets, it can be almost anything at all. If, for example, my pet is an iguana, maybe I would name it Sang Rangkak, and less likely Pak Belang. But if it's a cat that had stripes on its body like a tiger, then I might name it Pak Belang. On the other hand, if it's a dog or cat that had black spots on its body, then I might name it Si Tompok.

I'm thinking this kind of question is really a no-brainer, and I'm not sure what it's trying to achieve with the students, really. I'm hoping perhaps some of the readers of this blog can suggest a good reason or purpose of this question, please?

The Most Beautiful Thing (TMBT) 2012

I was trekking up the Kipouvo-Kokol route with my friend, Pamela Fletcher, a couple a weeks ago as part of our training programme for The Most Beautiful Thing (TMBT), and I was telling her that the easiest part of an endurance event such as a road marathon or the ultra trail marathon is the race itself. Pam was rather taken aback, but I hastened to explain my statement. You see, the hardest thing about an endurance event is in the training, not so much the event itself. A race may take a few hours to finish; perhaps up to 30 hours for an ultra trail marathon (100km) like the TMBT; whereas a decent training programme may take up to months of regular workout—running becomes almost a daily routine; and almost the entire weekends are used up for long workouts on secluded village roads in the hills.

Training requires a lot of discipline and quite often a lot of sacrifice. Such was the case when we were preparing for TMBT. This year a lot of my close friends had opted to attempt the 100km category of TMBT, although some of us were doing it for the second time.

I was chatting with a friend, Esther Sim, via Whatsapp one day, and she said she's aiming to finish the 100km in 20 hours, and I almost fell off my chair! I have gone trekking with Esther to Terian last year, and she did not seem to be an extremely strong and fast trail runner to me. So it must have meant that she's improved by leaps and bounds since then.

I was also impressed by another lady friend, Hana Harun, by her strength during training. She demonstrated her ability to sprint up a steep slope after trekking for several hours. I'm able to run uphill too, but I very rarely do so during training. I'm always approaching the endurance training the old-fashioned way—no sprinting business. Another friend, Claire, has been training almost entirely out of sight for months. Anyway, these ladies really made me think that I'm getting too old for this sort of event; they kept me on my toes! And I was, like, "I'm not even a ballerina!"

Last Saturday morning, we found ourselves at the starting line in Kundasang town. It was a fairly cold and windy morning. There were a number of familiar faces in the crowd.

Mia was all smiles together with her ex-classmate, Pam, and her friends, Jennifer, Georgina and Esther.

Then I took the opportunity to take a photo with the girls too. But I had to make it a very quick pose, just in case if Mia would want to twist my ears.

My other friends were also there; among them were Erwan, Darren and Bob, my running buddy.

Hana was also there in her outstanding outfit; and of course not forgetting Claire the creature with a pair of long sexy legs.

It was a strange start—we were still busy chit-chatting when suddenly there was a whistle, and everybody started running. We were not even aware of the countdown. A short climb to the road, and then it was a pleasant downhill stretch. I turned to Bob and suggested that we do a slow jog down the slope as a warm up; and while we were at it, I watched in amazement Esther Sim surging ahead. Others in the group—Boyd, Eric and Jonas were also among the front pack.

At the bottom of that road, we came to a sudden turn to the left and up a steep concrete driveway. Not long after that, I caught up with Mia, and I was, like, where did she come from; how did she sneak ahead of me? But by then Bob was lagging behind a bit.

I had planned from the beginning to briskwalk uphill and try to jog downhill. It's a very effective strategy which I've adopted in Vibram HK 100. About an hour later, I began to overtake some of my friends; I overtook Esther and Frankie, then later I overtook Cynthia Gan shortly after WS1. But by WS2 Bob had caught up with me again. He seemed determined not to waste too much time at the water station. There was a commotion as Dr Pui San was somewhat doubtful to go to the nearby bush to take a leak.

We proceeded up to the Mesilau golf course and then turning to a gravel road on the right. Later that morning, Darren had the opportunity to take a picture with Claire along that road.

Perhaps because of those pair of painfully long legs beside him, Darren decided to strike a pose as if trying to pick a fight with other participants. Amazing what a pair of sexy legs can do to men!

And of course Esther and her bodyguards were still going strong along the same road [Courtesy of Rudy Boyou]

Later on we went through several vegetable farms with magnificent views of the majestic Mt Kinabalu in the background [Courtesy of Rabani Ayub]

The view of the mountain was simply awesome on a clear sunny morning.

After making a big loop across several vegetable farms, we made our way back to WS1, which was now known as WS3. As Bob and I were filling our water bottles, Dr Pui San and her friend, Agnes, were also there. Agnes was telling Pui San to run along with her, but Pui San said she'd take a short break. So Agnes said she'll walk slowly so that Pui San could catch up with her. Then off she went in a jiffy. Just about then, Bob and I, too, got up to continue with the race. And several metres ahead, we could see Agnes. Of course as soon as she was out of sight of WS3, she began running again—so much for walking slowly. Bob turned to me and remarked that Agnes was supposed to walk slowly; and I replied, did he really think that she'd do that? We laughed out loud together.

We went through some rugged terrains, and I soon realised that Bob was becoming increasingly fast. I had no problem to run fast at that stage, but it did not accord well with my plan. Eventually, we were going down a long slope and from far away we could see an impending climb to WS4 [Courtesy of Dr Dev Sidhu]

 

I shifted gear to briskwalking mode all the way down the slope, and I timed a short pause to eat a donut and a power gel a few minutes before the climb. Just about then, I was surprised to see Pui San passing by. The sun was hot then, and the climb was quite a challenge. So many of the participants stopped several times on the slope. Slow and steady briskwalk, and finally we arrived at WS4, which was also the finish line for the 25km cagetory.

We spent a few minutes for inventory check, filled up our bottles and then continued our way to WS5. A short climb from WS4 brought us to the main Ranau road, and crossing that road, we went to the southern valley. At first it was a pleasant asphalt road. As we turned the corner, Bob was close on my heels. Then I started my briskwalk again. As in Hong Kong, Bob had to jog to keep up with my briskwalk. I remained focused, and as the asphalt road broke off to a gravel road once again, I kept my pace going the entire way down a slope all the way to a small stream. But by then, Bob was nowhere in sight. Crossing the stream, I embarked on what turned out to be a long climb. In the hot sun, it seemed unending. Up and up and up. And then from afar, I was surprised to see a man sitting on the ground. As I approached the man, I was surprised to see it was Boyd, the super hill climber. As usual, he had pushed too hard at the beginning and burnt out too soon. He said he vomited 3 times so far. Slowly, I passed him and caught up with some other participants.

Many minutes later, I arrived at WS5. Bob has long gone out of sight, so after filling up my bottles, I decided to wait up for Bob. But 10 minutes later, Bob still did not show. It suddenly occurred to me that WS6, the 50km point, was only 4km away from WS5. I thought it would make more sense to wait for Bob there as I could eat while waiting. Hence I continued walking again.

Well, as I was approaching WS6, I saw Yim leaving the ground to proceed to WS7. I was thinking aloud, that he was supposed to race in a sarong. But he said his sarong has been blown off by the strong wind. I duly arrived at WS6, had an early dinner, then replenished my supply of chocolates, back up torchlight, and some other items. I waited for a little over half an hour before Bob finally arrived. He looked totally bonked by then. I thought of waiting for him to eat, but he said he wanted a longer rest, and told me to go ahead. I was doubtful at first, but in the end, I reluctantly had to proceed alone.

A short way out of WS6, it was a long way downhill, and I took the opportunity to jog for the most part of that road. But then at the end of that descent, after crossing a small bridge, I came to a sudden steep climb. A horrifyingly steep climb—it's ridiculous, really! And it felt like there was no end to that climb too! A winding concrete driveway of several kilometres up, which later broke off to a gravel road. More climbs ahead. In the failing daylight, I took out my headlamp.

I finally caught up with some friends from Singapore and KL. We stuck together for a while and then later another friend, Deo, walking briskly from behind caught up with us too. Soon after that, we arrived at WS7. There we met up with some other friends. After a short break, we decided to walk together. Somewhere along that dark road, though, Philip, the Perakian friend who's working in Singapore, suddenly came running back from upfront, as if he has seen a warewolf. Took us all by surprise he did. But it soon became clear that all he saw were 3 cows with green reflective eyes. I merely said there's no need to fear—there's only cause for concern if those eyes were red. We were careful not to provoke the animals though, as we were not in the mood to play matadors at that stage of the race.

Also somewhere on that slope it began to drizzle for a bit. But we were all prepared with our raincoats. The night wore off gradually, and as I began to become sleepy I had unclear memories of the water stations. It was increasingly difficult to keep track of the WS, but when we arrived at WS8, we were welcomed with hot tea by friendly marshals. A short while later, 2 white men arrived, and one of them was asking about the pizza that he had ordered—apparently a clear case of gradual transition from mental strength to mental case due to exhaustion. We had quite a number of standup comedians on the course, you see. But from WS8, we still had to survive another punishing mother-of-em-all climb up a steep hill till kingdom come. The white man made an impressive announcement that he had ordered a pair of fresh legs waiting for  him at the top of the hill.

As we passed midnight and encroached into the wee hours of the morning, I could feel my heavy eyelids and couldn't stop yawning.That went on and on for a while until we arrived at WS10, where we stopped for a longer break. Like a famous magician, George pulled a 3-in-1 tongkat ali kopi from his bag. Half a pack of that helped to keep the sleepiness at bay for a bit. It's kinda funny how we got quite well along with each other, gossiping about people, discussing about practically any topic we could think off.

I'm not sure if it's the exhaustion, but I somehow felt that the last 12.5km of the course was extremely tough. The climb up the Bundu Tuhan road was at snail's pace. Then off to a gravel road again. Undulating in nature and seemingly unending before finally breaking off to a sharp downhill concrete driveway, eventually arriving at WS12, which was just a pickup truck with a marshal holding a clipboard; his friend sleeping soundly in the truck. From that point, we had only about 5km to the finish line. But what an amazing 5km!

First the steep downhill walk through a vegetable farm. So steep was the terrain that George was mainly moving on his butt on the ground. After a long way down, we came to a gravel road. More hills to come. And then even more until finally we emerged at the main Ranau road once again. It was just about sunrise then, and although I could feel the surge of excitement, I could also feel the sudden drop in energy.

The rest of them said they wanted to finish together, but I told them to go ahead, as I was gonna be slow. We finally arrived at the final turn to the road leading to the finish point, which was the same school wherein WS6 was located. I couldn't quite remember how much further to the school, but although I promised myself not to ask the villagers, I lost my cool. Hence I asked a man how much further to the school. He answered impressively, that it's very close!

And then a little further down the road, I met an old woman, and again I asked her how much further to the school. She looked at me for a while from head to toe, as if seeing a mad fellow hiking in the wee hours of the morning, before answering me. She made a dramatic gesture pointing with her finger, and twitching her mouth, and spoke in the best of Dusun accent, that the school was just around the corner. And as I was walking away, she was still explaining the exact location of the school, perhaps about to give me the coordinates of the finish point up to a 3m margin of error. But I had no patience to wait for all those. I merely thanked her and continued walking while she was still yapping away in the background.

Turning a corner at the top of the slope, I could see the school from afar. Excitement mounted, and I suddenly felt invincible and found myself jogging again! As I was trotting my way down that slope, Aman, the race director, came passing by in his truck. I ran all the way—would you believe it—till I turn into the school compound and was so relieved to see the finish point. It seemed like so long ago since the flag off at the Kundasang town, but actually it's been less than 24 hours ago!

The rest of my friends were already there. A lady marshal put a medal around my neck, and then gestured me to reveal my bib number which was then hidden under my jacket. I fancy there was a moment's suspense as I unzipped my jacket, and as I parted it open, I thought we were gonna see a capital letter S there. But no, it wasn't a capital letter S after all—just the same number, 386.

I waited for a bit, before the organiser arranged for a transport to send me back to my hotel. I had a quick shower and caught about 2.5hours' sleep before getting a call from Claire, announcing that Mia was approaching the finish line. I jumped out of bed and drove to the finish line just in time to witness Mia making the epic finish.

Earlier, Hana, too made a dramatic finish in fifth place in 24 hours 52 mins.

And somewhere out there on the course, Pam was still struggling on the hills. But she, too, made it to the finish line in the end in 31 hours 42 mins.

So we had happy endings. All the hardwork; months of torture, culminating in this mighty medal!

And a bragging right that we have conquered TMBT 2012.

In the end, I finished in 22 hours 46 mins. Mia did it in 28 hours 29 mins. Esther finished strong but missed her target by about 5.5 hours. All the doctors, Felice, Helen and Liaw made it too. Boyd continued after a long break at WS6, and eventually finished in a little over 24 hours. Bob finished in 25 hours 16 minutes. It was mainly happy ending for all.

I was there also in its first edition last year, but there's no question that the organiser had improved the organization of the event substantially. It is no easy feat to organise an event of this magnitude, of course, and to blend the beautiful views of the course, the challenge of the slopes, and the delegation of so many tasks throughout the route. It is all too easy to fall in love with this event, and ultra trail lovers should absolutely make it a point not to miss it in 2013!

The Formats, The Strategists & The Audience

It is often the case that in a huge sporting event like the Olympic games, there will be many stages of the competition before the final battle for the medals. There will be many athletes representing the many countries of the world, and those preliminary stages are meant to select only the best of the best would fight it out in the final round. What usually happens is that from each preliminary round, only the top few performers will be selected to compete in the next round; the rest will end their medal quest at that round.

I find it quite interesting that, for example, in say the 100m sprint event, the elite runners don't normally go all out to win the race. They run fast—yes—but they merely run as fast as to ensure that they get into the next round of the competition. And then in the next round, they will adopt the same approach, i.e. running only as fast as to ensure their eligibility to continue competing in the next round. They will eventually run to the best of their ability in the final round of the competition.

In other sports such as swimming, we tend to see the same attitude from the athletes. I'm not sure if there is really a significant effect of saving that little bit of energy by running or swimming a fraction of a second slower during the earlier stages, but since so many athletes are doing the same thing, I suppose there must be a difference!

But imagine what would happen if the format of the race is such that each round is a knockout round; meaning only the winner of each round gets to continue to compete in the next round. I think in that case, all the athletes will run or swim as fast as they can to win. Losing is then not an option! Getting second place means the end!

When these athletes don't run or swim to the best of their ability to win in the earlier stages of the competition, are they not competing in the spirit of the game?

The reality is that the Olympics is a unique event because it only happens once in every four years. Some of these athletes spend their entire life training to win the Olympic medals. And apart from years and years of hard training, they go about trying to win by proper planning. They come up with strategies. They are entrusted to deliver medals to their respective countries. The medals, no matter how you look at it, become the primary targets! However, there are those preliminary rounds that they will have to go through first. The strategy is that at each round, the focus is to get to the next round, and then the next—until they get to the final round.

I can still remember how disappointed I was in 1984 when Carl Lewis, having made his first jump in the long jump event, and knowing that that was enough to secure the gold medal, decided not to try to break the record. He did that because going to the Olympics that year, he had the mission of capturing 4 gold medals. He decided not to risk injury and opted to save himself for the other events.

Athletes play by the rules and formats of the sports. They come up with strategies and try to take advantage in whatever way they can, but within the parameters of the formats of the sports. The ultimate focus is to win medals—not just win the preliminary rounds.

That is why I don't quite agree with the disqualification of 4 pairs of badminton teams for trying to throw away their games. They had played the earlier rounds according to the format of the game. They had cleared their respective hurdles into the next round. Winning at that stage was no longer necessary. They took full advantage of the format. Yet they were disqualified "because they did not try their best to win."

Well, as far as I'm concerned, they did try their best to win. But they tried to win medals, not necessarily every single match!

Unfortunately, the audience that paid to watch the games did not find that very amusing; far from it, they felt cheated! And the Olympics bigshots had to act; and regretfully they arrived at the decision to disqualify the players who played the game, relying on the format.

I think if there is any party at fault here, it must be those who came up with the format in the first place. You can't fault Usain Bolt for not running his best in the earlier rounds of the sprinting event; you can't fault Carl Lewis for not trying to jump even farther then he already did; and you can't fault the badminton players for not trying to win a particular game. The point is that they had a mission to win the medals. How they get to the medal rounds doesn't really matter, as long as they obey the rules and formats of their respective sports. If it's really important to please the audience; that these athletes must win every single game, then change the format to ensure that they do exactly that.