So I write a lot of drafts for my blog, and sometimes I forget they were there and they get paginated to page 2 and 3! Found this jewel of a post from June 2007! Oh how I miss my mountain bike.

I wrote an entry on the pre-race setup, but somehow didn’t post this one for the actual race.

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We were awake before dawn to set up registration, get the prizes dressed and ice into the eskies.

After getting all set up, the crowd started streaming in, and soon there were close to 200 people at Echo Valley. My stomach was starting to churn, and I could feel my throat closing up. I just had to keep telling myself to keep calm, start the race, and enjoy it.

While waiting for the horn to blow, I took a quick glance around, trying to spot him. Ah.. there he was, camera in hand, and smiling at me. He was my #1 fan.

Race started, I tried to speed ahead of the rest of the girls, knowing there was this climb ahead, and the worse thing would be getting caught behind them all. The trail loop was approximately 7km, so we had to do two laps of that.

I felt pretty okay throughout the ride, and didn’t feel like i was going to keel over and die. I paced myself

Crossing the finish line.

With Janice & Rebecca.

2nd place in the Women’s Open.

Nick and Luke.

Best shot of the day taken by Rohan on the 200m.

In the video:
application on the Sony Ericsson Xperia X8, an Android phone which I’ve been trying out. Wanted to try a new platform and see how the apps were on this baby.

Was trying out the Endomo application which can be downloaded from the Android Marketplace. There’s a cycling mode which has real-time GPS tracking of time, distance, speed & calories. It works with the Polar Wearlink® + transmitter with Bluetooth®. Haven’t used all the functions but it looks cool.

Above taken from Sony Ericsson Website

Key highlights of the Phone
- Lightweight
- Very Social (i.e. Facebook, Twitter widgets)
- Touchscreen controls
- 3.2mp camera
- PlayNow™ to download music and games
- They have a similar app to soundhound but free
- including all the other bell and whistles you’d get with a normal phone

I reckon the biggest pull for this phone is the apps in the Android Market place. Keep you posted if I find anything else cool about this phone.

Another post which was lost in the drafts. Bear in mind this was written in 2008 when I was still with Wayne and still DH-ing! Both not the case anymore.

Everyone knows there aren’t any mountains to climb in Singapore, all we’ve got is Bukit Timah Hill, just 164m above sea water! sadface.

Not that I don’t enjoy it, I do, but sometimes you need to throw something different into the mix. To get that fix, Wayne, Leon, Lai, Ian and I headed up to Kiara KL, again.

This is the most we’ve ever travelled for mountain biking, think it has been four trips.

This time round, we brought up the Turner RFX for me to use, because I should start getting used to the bike if I was going to go slightly harder.

After this trip, I have to confess I have a problem. I’m scared.

Ever since I endovered the last time at Kiara, it’s never been the same. I’m constantly filled with apprehension and anxiety. All of which spells disaster if you’re carrying that fear.

The thing about doing drops and berms, you’ve got to be mentally prepped, unfortunately I’m having a lot of trouble conquering that mental block.

It’s been months since I last did any downhill riding, and I fear I’ve lost the “Gung-Ho-ness” after that spill.

Is this the end?

The two crazy boys Ian and Ben make everything look damn easy.

Leon’s first trip to Kiara.

At Angel drop, Kiara.

My best shot of Wayne, taken with the Canon SLR.

Note: If you’re going to Kiara, wear something you bought in Singapore. Possibility of wearing same shirt as your friend from Kiara: HIGH.

Half way through the afternoon, I was so ready to sleep.

Just a couple of clips and a good tune.

Great to be cycling again after the back sprain and knee pains. Am slowly easing back into my exercise routine.

Went on a Vesak day ride with Andrew and Janice in the afternoon just to find our legs again. Ja hasn’t ridden in awhile too, so we both felt completely n00b and uncertain. After a couple of climbs and downhills, we definitely got back into the groove. Had a great time chatting and reminiscing our old-er cycling days.

Will have to cycle this route more often these few months. Soon I’ll be moving out of the hood, ,and Bukit Timah won’t be as close as it is now.

Am looking forward to another ride this Sunday! Who’s in?

Lizard count is back below. Did see another baby snake on the trail, but a dead one. Black body with a red/orange head. Anyone know what species that is?

Late last year, I decided to take part in another Adventure Race. The memory of pain from the previous race in Penang had diminished, so I signed myself up for another round of torture in January earlier this year.

The SAFRA AVventura is an adventure race consisting of multiple disciplines ranging from trail biking, running, kayaking, rope ascend, abseiling, navigation and mystery tests all rolled into one exhilarating race to fully challenge those with a passion for adventure.
Taken from the SAFRA website

This year, my race buddy was Andrew (ickle’s hubby), who is an adventure racing veteran and possibly 10X fitter than me. And without his help and motivation, I probably wouldn’t have completed it. Again, I jumped into another race without training and survived. Was stoked that I finished it, although we had to miss the abseil because there were just too many people in the queue. Nonetheless, chuffed.

I love my mummy. She left this message in the kitchen table so I’d see it in the morning on race day.

For this year’s SAFRA AVventura, Some 274 adventure racers took part, which was a larger group than I had expected. We were told that the total distance would be approximately 51km. In hopes to keep things competitive, we weren’t given information on the combination of activities. We had no idea how far we had to run or how long we had to ride.

Post event reports say we had run 17km, cycled 26km, kayaked 4km and finished off with a biathlon of 4km. And besides physical endurance, they also threw in few mental challenges at several points in the race.

If I remember correctly, we had to solve a word puzzle after a bike leg, thank goodness it wasn’t Sudoku. Second obstacle after another bike leg was to inflate and deflate bike tyres. Andrew was pro at that and got us in and out of that challenge in good time. And the last one was to move a potato across 20 metres by striking it using another potato hung by a string tied around your waist.

Other obstacles included crossing a swinging bridge, monkey bars, Jacob’s ladder and army crawls. All this in unbearable morning and mid-afternoon sun, heat exhaustion would have definitely been the #1 cause of casualties.

On the last run leg of the race, our race support crew Janice and Chris were waiting by the road with ice lollies from 7-11!!! When you’ve been racing for 8hours, anything and everything tastes so good.

It’s really a test of your mental and physical endurance. By the end of the race I was broken, and so were my adidas trail shoes. Looking forward to doing another adventure race soon.

Still loads of past blog posts which are now starting to resurface. Realise I have lots from Hong Kong still sitting in drafts! And after clicking through a few pages, I found this one back from early 2009 at the Eneloop Mountain Bike Carnival.

The Bike Carnival was held on 28 February 2009 at the Tampines Mountain Bike trail organised by DirTraction. The highlight of the carnival was the inaugural 100km night race. Besides the main event, there were additional categories such as Super Downhill and Dirty Duathlon.

I put down my name for the Super Downhill only to find out that I was the only girl who signed up?! So no category for girls

After looking at the Super Downhill track conditions, I’m kinda glad I wasn’t taking part. Right at the bottom of the route was a massive pool of mud which was almost impossible to avoid. Look at the photo above to see what I mean!

The main race was the 100km inaugural night race, aimed at pushing body to its limits, cycling 10 laps of the 10km loop of the Tampines trail…at NIGHT!

You can either go solo or as a team of 4, and with my fitness at a all time low then, I opted to join Ming, Josh and Ben as a 3 person team.

Overall the race was Okay. Transition areas were chaotic with lanes being narrow and many mud clogged bikes taking up space at team tents. In the end, no one finished the 100km because we got rained out really bad at around 10pm. Race officials made the call because the lightning posed too much of a danger for the riders.

We were absolutely drenched.

Was good to see familiar faces, including my cousin Eureka who came down from KL Malaysia for this race.

Here are two videos with footage from the actual race I found on YouTube (done by someone else) to give you an idea of what went down.

Race Date: This Sunday, 24 January 2010

Safra AVventura is an adventure race consisting of multiple disciplines ranging from trail biking, running, kayaking, rope ascend, abseiling, navigation and mystery tests all rolled into one exhilarating race to fully challenge those with a passion for adventure.

My last adventure race was the Penang Eco-Challenge a couple of years back. We did some training prior, but this time round, a BIG FAT ZERO. Read the post HERE to read how it all goes down in an adventure race.

EgaD! This Sunday!!! Wish me luck! Hope I’m still standing for The Killers later that evening!

From left: Janice & Grace.

It’s wonderful to see familiar faces at the finishing line cheering you on! Pain and suffering replaced with joy, gladness and sense of accomplishment.

It’s that time of the year where we make our yearly pilgrimage up Penang Hill for the Kayuh Lasak Penang Jamboree. Last year, the organisers took a break. So we were all pretty psyched when we heard it’d be back this year.

Day 1 was spent doing the necessary such as race registration, breakfast shopping and preparing for the big ride on Sunday. It was Jo & Grace’s first time to Penang, so we made sure to cover the famous makan spots around town on Saturday too. That is a separate blog post all together.

Day 2 – Race Day!
5:45am: Wake up, shower, wiggle into cycling shorts, get water bag out of freezer, breakfast, pump tyres, check bike, spray lube, check I have all supplies in bag: spare tubes, tool kit, hand pump, energy gels, happy food.

And we’re all set to go!

We stayed quite close to race central, so it was a 15min warm up cycle to the start point. Met up with the rest of the crew and before you knew it, start horn begun our several hours of torture.

This is the first year I was doing the Penang Jamboree without Wayne, and I did feel anxious knowing there was no one but myself to rely on. For the past couple of Jamborees, it was always comforting to know that he was just a phone call away. This year, I spent most of the ride solo.

It was Me Vs Penang Hill.

As usual, if you don’t manage to get in the front pack, you quickly get bottle-necked at the climbs. What you will see are hundreds of people pushing their bike up 30 degree tarmac climbs with the hope that every hairpin turn would reveal a flatter gradient or downhill section.

Here’s an elevation map from Ming’s bike computer.

At every checkpoint, marshals will give you a little sticker on your race plate to indicate completion of that section. And only if you complete the whole route do you get to be entitled for the grand lucky draw.

A few picturesque highlights of the ride would be at the top of Tiger Hill. There was one point of the ride I just stopped and watched the fog roll in between the hill peaks, nature’s air-con at work.

I finished the race broken and humbled. Clearly my inactivity was showing at my poor performance especially on the climbs. As usual, the hill claimed many victims; riders with cramped legs were sprawled in pools of mud, scattered on the side of the trails like litter. And every now and then, you can hear screams of pain and agony in the distance. Ah, another cramper!

For me, I went home with chaffed inner thighs – friction from my cycling shorts. It’s not pretty and definitely not comfortable especially in the shower when water touches the raw skin.

Again, as I say every year, I’ll be back Penang!