.... the jackal rides and run....

Yes! Finally outdid my March 2011 PR of 33.5km/h that was done on aero wheels! 33.8km/h ....... 0.3km/h improvement on the average speed for this personal training route. Average HR shot high but I felt ok and could maintain for quite some time even at 175bpm. I had a bit of tail wind helping me towards the u-turn (33.6km/h average achieved at halfway point) but going back the same route means it would be the same find that I need to fight against. Managed to keep and improve a bit towards the end. Lost a fair bit average speed due to the u-turn and drinking my water...ave dropped to 33.3km/h. Luckily legs and cardio were good enough to gain me back some speed. All this on my conventional alloy FRZ wheelset! Passed a couple of guys at service road and they promptly chased up and passed me. I was not interested in playing with them so I just maintained at my 34km/h average at that point. Sure enough, they lost steam after about 500m and I just passed them with no resistance offered....

Tapering down at the moment and eating well (too well at times, I fear!). Only did a 10km on Saturday morning which was strangely a very lethargic run for some reason unknown. Legs felt lazy and heavy. Nothing noteworthy from this run. Managed a 12km barefoot run with good speed (a 10km barefoot PB of 57:22). Legs always feel more alive without shoes and in general, always happier after a barefoot bout. Could be also due to the excellent foot massage I had yesterday (and dinner buffet). I was doing sub 6 until the 9km point where I turned it up. I was running on the road park road centre-line which is 'smoother' to relieve the tender soles at this point. A guy in huaraches-like shoes passed me a quite a fast pace and he led a good 80m or so before I decided to turn it up and made him a target pacer from afar. Managed to catch up and eventually passed him right after the old Macs and of course, my end-run point as well. No blisters thankfully but soles felt tender....only afte...

I reserved Saturday for my long distance run. Initially the plan was the run at night but my forays the previous night on the bike just proved to be exhausting and I needed the sleep. Fortunately, no disturbances from the kids and managed to catch 6+ hours of sleep. Started the run at about 5.50am from ECP. The route is the same as my first 30km loop...basically to run towards SAFRA, coastal straight until Changi beach park and u-turn back after refilling water. As usual, the stomach was not friendly to me...had to take a quick dump. Location confidential, had to go primal on this one. Yet again, the body goes straight into long distance mode....at about 6+min/km (did not check the speed until Coastal straight). The sky was getting brighter so Coastal was not scary at all....but its still a challenging path to take mentally as one cannot see the end of that straight road until the final 1km or so. Refilled at the u-turn point vending machine (15km)...they had no decent drinks so I we...

Monday was an off day for me and managed to do a 21km run. Woke up a bit late for this but even so, only had a lousy 4+ hours of sleep....maybe too much rest over the weekend! I should stop napping in the afternoon perhaps! After some tough decision-making, I went with the Puma H-Streets (a good decision). I just ignored my pace and garmin for the first 10km or so and went on a pace comfortable to me. At the halfway mark, average pace was about 5:53min/km. Went about 2km into the coastal straight...it was dawn by then so not creepy at all :) Pace dropped going into ECP and average became 5:58min/km at one point. With 5km to go, I upped my pace a bit and was determined to do better than my last 21km PB. With 3km left to go, the rain started and it was pretty heavy. The shoes were rather slippery under such conditions and could not really do any sprint. Nevertheless managed decent under 6 min/km pace and finished with 5:53min/km average pace. For 21km, this is a minute+ better than my...

10km PB Decided to go for a 10km 'go for it' run! After some weeks of not doing speed training (eg. trying to better my 10k), I went for it today. Took (reluctantly) the Kinvara's out as I feel its the right shoe for the occasion or I just being pussy and needed the pads below my feet. Let's just see if my speed has suffered after all these long distances. On the go, I just went at the fastest I could do 'comfortably' ...... stride was lengthened a bit, focus on a natural relaxed forefoot strike, which I do anyway. Strangely, the Kinvara did not feel as squishy as before...perhaps after 100km it has broken in (?). Managed to keep good pace till 5km. No niggles on the legs as well...they felt ok throughout. Breathing was consistent and HR was steadily moving up, as expected, over the distance. At 5km point, it was not even the best time but its still under 26m and I felt relatively better compared to other attempts....the 2nd 5km was only slightly worse and t...

Ah, what a good 3 days.... Certainly 2 highlights was 1) Run350 with my Wife 2) Both my kids can ride the 2-wheel bike! On Saturday, to give my legs from the Faber torture the previous day, I opted to go for the 'an hour or less of moving time challenge to Siglap kopitiam" something Ryo and me cooked up while riding at those ungodly early hours just to kill the boredom. This was to be the last time I will use the MotoACTV (until they clean up their act on the website and the TCX export). The best time for this was done in January with Ryo where as a team we averaged 33.1km/h to cover that 32km of start and stops (with some slopes). I set the virtual partner on MotoACTV for 32km distance and 1hr time. This time out I was solo and did not expect much from this ride except, just do it. Started out ok at the service road and just managed to pip the VP but lost out again at the park area leading to the coastal road...however at Coastal, I turned it on and went to 35km/h avera...