Men's Health All-Terrain Sta Rosa Laguna

Do you want to run in a place where no one has ever ran before? If so, I'm pretty excited in the upcoming Men's Health All-Terrain race this coming June 21. It will be held in Sta Rosa laguna. The venue is a newly opened trail and it a once in a lifetime experience to join this one.

You can register at R.O.X. Bonifacio High Street. The event categories involve 5K, 10K and 15K.

See you there. Now I need a new trail running shoe. :)

Mizuno Infinity Run 2009

It was a last minute registration for me when I signed up to join the 15K of the Mizuno Infinity Run event. The reason is that I wasn't sure I wanted to race specially when I thought the weather won't cooperate (at which that time I thought it won't). But I decided to join the race anyway.

At the starting line I saw Levy where we had a tiny chat about the upcoming Animo Sprint Tri (I'm still to decide if I'll join this one). I also saw Totoy at the starting line and deep inside my competitive nature wanted to take the challenge of beating him at the race. But I knew for runners with the likes of Totoy would be very hard to beat.

As expected, the race started early. My goal was to maintain a pace of 4:25 for as long as I can throughout the race. The first 10KM was pretty relax, but beyond that point I could feel heaviness in my breathing. So I had to slow down a bit and prepare for the final bridge assault, which to my experience has always been the most dreadful part of any race that includes the Buendia flyover. After conquering the Buendia Fly over I could now see someone far in front wearing a black singlet. I was wondering who could it be, so slowly I tried to increase my pace hoping to reach this runner. As I reached Net One building I was slowly gaining until I was pretty surprised to recognize the runner with the black singlet: It was Totoy! Around 900 meters left to the finish line and there he is. I tried to increase my pace even harder until we got to meet at the road between Serendra and Bonifacio High Street. We were ready to turn left and race to the finish when the marshall told us to still run straight and make another u-turn. Totoy said he was gone, but I was tired also. A few hundred meters to the finish line I was ahead by a couple of meters from Totoy. I thought I could beat him, but the guy had a sprint arsenal left. Totoy won and I was a second or two behind him. I give my congratulations to Totoy Santos, specially for winning his age category. I clocked 1:08:05 according to my Garmin with a total distance of 15.18KM.

I was so glad I joined the race. It was a perfect weather and It was a fantastic race for me. :)

After the race, met up with some friends and had some photo ops. :) Unfortunately, I'm still waiting to grab some of my friends photos. I didn't had any camera with me during the race.

The results are out and I'm happy to be the 20th guy in the list:
Race Results

Earth Run Results

The Earth Run 2009 results are out for the 16K and 3K. The 5K hasn't been posted yet. You can find the results at the www.adevents.com.ph website.

For easy access, here are the links of the results:
16K Overall Results
3K Overall Results

Alleycat Race 2009

This has been a week overdue. Me and my partner Glenn joined the Alleycat Race last Saturday, the day before the Earth Run race. Its the 2nd Alleycat race, and we won the executive category last year, so we were pretty much excited to join this race again. We didn't know that we were in for a great treat this year. The race points are filled with more challenging tasks which includes mental and physical activities.

To those who aren't familiar with the race, it is similar to Amazing Race except that you move from one point to another using your bikes. The goal is to earn as many points as you can by visiting designated points and completing the different tasks. There is a cut off time of 1 hour and 45minutes, so within the alloted time frame, you need to collect as many points as you can.

The challenges involved some whacky challenges such as shooting a football in a goal while the person to kick is blind foolded. There are all sorts of puzzles and tasks that involved mathematical skills.

It was really a great experience. For this year though, we didn't win 1st place, but we won 6th place overall and got 2 thousand cash and gift packs from Columbia.

Can't wait for the next Alleycat Race!

Men's Health All Terrain Race 2009

If your up for another trail running experience, we have one who's race date is closer than you think.

This is the Men's Health All Terrain! This is organized by Coach Rio and Vince Mendoza of Finish Line, so expect a great racing event. :)

Earth Run 2009

I had seconds thoughts leaving the house to go to the race venue since it was raining really hard. I was unsure if the race organizers are planning to cancel the race event. But since I made a promise to kuya Melvin that I'll be assisting in pacing the event, I needed to go to the race venue. I prepared my things and headed to the venue.

I was suprised that amidst the rain, packs of people went to the place. Now it was clear that whatever happens, the race will push through. I got the pace flag, and got myself ready for the start of the race.

When the gun sounded I started running at a comfortable pace just a little bit faster than 5min/km to compensate with the hilly terrains of the course. My friend Teddy tagged along for the first 1 or 2 kilometers. But since he was planning to only do 5:30min/km so he told me to move along. At the 3rd kilometer marker I saw my officemate Narod and his girlfriend.

The road was wet and drizzles of rain was falling, but it was quite a blessing because it made the run a lot more relaxing. The only problem was my shoe was filled with water and it was quite uncomfortable and heavy. But it was a fun experience for me. You don't get to run in the rain that often. :)

I finished the race a little bit faster than the desired pace flag though. I also got a hold of the Earth Run shirt!

To think that the weather did not cooperate, but the organizers were able to pull off a great race.

PROS:
- Enough water supply
- Clear race direction markers
- Lot of race Marshalls
- Great freebies after the race
- There were race pacers during the race (hehehe i'm one of them)

CONS:
- There was an incident of Robbery in the area
- All race category all started at the same time that caused some traffic.

But overall the race was really well organized.

16K Trial Run

It has been a while since I ran longer than 10K and since I've volunteered to pace this Sunday for the Earth Run, I decided to do a trial 16K run with the same speed as to what I'll be pacing this Sunday.

I ran side by side with my running buddy Regie where we started at Bonifacio High Street near Honda. We passed by Mckinley road up to Mabini Road then to TESDA. Then from TESDA we went back to Bayani road and down to Heritage where we took a U-turn at C5. We headed back to Mckinley Road and went down to Mckinley Hills, then back again as we headed back to Bonifacio High Street. We logged 16K as I stopped right after my Garmin hit the 16K marker. We finished the run in 1:19:12 with a pace of 4:57min/km. We pretty much did an accurate pace thanks to my friend Alvin who told me that using the Garmin's average pace is much useful than displaying the eratic pace.

It wasn't a hard run, but it wasn't an easy one either. My average heart rate was in the aerobic zone but it was a beat lower to my anaerobic zone. I never felt this great for months. I'm now putting back base mileages and hopefully be running a half marathon soon. Thanks to my pacing buddy Reggie once again for running beside me this morning.

See you guys at the Earth Run!