The Marathon Today!

Today, I got at 6:10 am, caught the MRT to Eunos where I met Fd and Cosmic_Wind at 7:15 am. We took a ride in TLR's dad's car, and arrived at the 30-km mark along the marathon route in East Coast Park. whr joined us there. At about 7:30 am, as we were in the midst of setting up the table, banner, drinks and medical aid kits, there was a loud blaring announcement: "Stay off the road. Runner approaching." Gosh, the first runner had already reached the 30-km mark just 1 hr 36 minutes into the race. Amazing! It turned out to be a whole group of fast runners (Kenyans, I think). After them, the rest of the runners started passing us by. The first SgRunner to arrive at our support station was TLR. And then we received "visits" from (in no particular order) DO, Kops21, DreamRunner, IronManDreamer, Tiwazz, Skyvers, Wildcat, Cyberkinetic, Sanji, 136, Astrogirl, Alvo, Smallfoot, Commando, Cookie, Mythos, CheeryRunner, Yojanjan, Carine, Penguin, and many more, including non-SgRunners who though that we were the official drinks-cum-musclerub-cum-vaseline provision station for the marathon! :) whr did a good job in providing massage for some of these runners. ;)

It was a good run for everyone, I guess. The main complaints were the standard: hot weather and cramps. I had a good time myself, cheering the runners on, and doing my best to give them the "support" they needed. I saw quite a number of buddies on the road today, including Gary, Yeow Hin, Chairman, Ong, Derrick, Eugenia, Kok Leong, Hosea, Mark, Chung Kiat, Chris Ang, Zac, Chee Kong, Kelvin Koh and Hai Siang. :) It was great!

At about 11 am, we packed up our station, and headed back to the Padang, to the finishing line. As usual, the SgRunners did the photo-taking, chit-chatting, encouraging and all that pleasant stuff that runners do at the end of a challenging race. But I didn't join the SgRunners for lunch. I went instead to eat and drink coffee with my former DSTA running friends who had also completed the 42-km. Yingrui was there too. :) I haven't seen them in ages, and I was glad to find them in good health and in excellent spirit.

After that, I headed west to Tiong Bahru where I met up with Grace and Pong for tea. I showed Grace - trained as a doctor in the UK - the area of my thigh where a cursed insect had stung me, and she said that if the antibiotics didn't have an effect after 1-2 more days, I may want to consider to go to the hospital and ask for an intravenous antibiotic injection. Grace and Pong are getting married in April 2006, and I have been asked if I would like to be the emcee for the wedding. I'd love to! :)