Field Report - GCM 2008 - Part 1

on Saturday, July 12, 2008

Sad to say......I'm finally back to reality.....The reality of having to work, sitting in conference call, attending to 'hard-to-please' customers.....the list goes on...But that being said, that one week of break truly gives me a boost mentally and no doubt, I'm fully recharged to look forward to these "realities".

Too much to report on the 8 days trip but here it goes:

Pre- Race
Jul 4 - Checking in at Paradise Resort hotel, we proceed to the race pack collection at Southport, located approximately 3km from our hotel. Took the public bus, super expensive. $2.70 per person for a 10min ride. Collection was a breeze. No hassle at all. Spotted lots and lots of Japanese, all age, all size. We walked ard the expo and was tempted by JC to get the GCM limited edition Asics 2130. Within 10mins, both of us was succumb to the temptation. $$$ damaged done within a few minutes.



Jul 5 - Woke up at 6am as per plan to do a 6km run to 'test' out the weather condition. What a disappointment! It was raining, gloomy and windy outside. We waited and waited till 8am. The weather didn't get any better. I know someone will say there's no bad weather, only weak mind. But but but...it's only 1 day to race day, we decided not to take risk. Proceed to brekkie. The rest of the day are spent with my sis, bro-in law and nephew who also flew in from Perth to join us for the 2nd half of the holiday.

Jul 6 - Race day. Proceed to the coach pickup at the bus stop right outside the hotel at 5.10am, where we've paid for $5 per person return journey. It was cold!!! Quickly put on the gloves and waited. Slowly I see the crowd is building up at the bus stop. Slowly I see coach after coach passing by us with full loads of runners without stopping to pick us up. One by one, the coach drove pass us without stopping. It's 5.50am and we are still waiting at the bus stop with lots of runners getting a bit impatient by now. Die.....What to do now. Race start at 6.50am. Situation doesn't look optimistic at all. I decided to get back to the hotel and call my bro-in-law to send us to the start point. Wise choice indeed. Main road was close, bro drop us at the back of the main street and as soon as we alight, it was abt 6.20am by now, we ran to the baggage tent. That's probably abt 500m zig zag here and there. I'm getting a bit panic as we're running out of time. The baggage deposit is long queue. Try to act blur and cut queue, boh pian. Proceed to toilet and we're 2 mins left to start time. Jump in to the start line and within 2 min the max I reckon, the race started!! Considering if we were to wait for the coach, we would have been late!!!!

TBC......

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