Energizer Night Race - The First and The Last

Energizer Night Race 2011 to be held on 16.4.2011 would be my first night race and my first half marathon in year 2011. The participation in ENR was overwhelming. Almost everyone that I know who is into running (or not) signed up for ENR. It was also going to be John Chuah, John Ong, Jo, Liza, Noor, James’ virgin 21km run. On top of that, it was also Shearling and PooiChing’s first official run. As for the few of us who just came back from 2XU Compression Run a week ago we were still riding on the high of the run and couldn’t wait to rock the tracks at Sepang F1 Tracks!!! Yes, we were going to run on the Formula One Sepang Tracks, which were freshly rolled on and roared by the GrandPix racers exactly a week ago.

A day before the ENR, a pandemic fear and pre-run anxiety pervaded the runners’ circle. A glance through the Facebook newsfeeds revealed that every one was having butterflies in the stomach, in a more or less degree. The anxiety heightened when it started to pour like cats and dogs on the faithful Saturday morning and continued for another 5 hours or so. The weather looked gloomy but the rain had sort of cooled the temperature down hence we were looking at a bright chance of running in breezy weather instead of the hot and humid night air as feared by most runners.

I went for French class in the morning and couldn’t concentrate in the class at all. Suddenly, I failed to understand French despite 5 semesters of learning. My mind was wandered far away and I was very worried about my ankle and knee. I haven’t fully recovered from my ankle sprain (and straining it here and there through running and bootcamping didn’t help at all) and I suffered a new knee injury after Wednesday’s bootcamp session. My left knee was swollen and I was limping since Wednesday. I endured two painful sessions with Daniel, my Maiki masseuse (who is also a martial art instructor) attempting to ease the damage. After two hours of French, I couldn’t take it anymore and decided to ask for leave to retire earlier. I tried to sleep but of no avail as my heart was beating fast.

At 5.15 p.m, we set off from my house with Jo, Noor, John (bestie) and Elliot in my car. We then met up with Yam, James, Derek and Shearling at the bootcamp field. To our surprise, Unlce John Chuah was there too. If I recalled correctly, he said he won’t be bothered to depart early and would only leave around 6 p.m. I guessed his kiasuness got the better of him and he probably had conducted a risk analysis and decided that better be early than sorry.

Hence, a convoy of three cars sped along the highway heading to Sepang. The journey was long and seemed never ending. The talk in the car relating to the run didn’t help to ease anyone’s anxiety. Worried looks were imprinted on everyone’s face. When we reached Sepang, a jam was already building up and to our dismay, we were asked to pay RM10.00 as parking fee. There was queue at the toilets and more queue to get into F1 tracks. The collection for the headlamps was not really a collection at all but more of a ‘heist’ by the eager runners. A box was dropped on the floor and everyone just pushed and squeezed in to grab the headlamps and it was lucky that no stampede occurred. More queue at the baggage deposit area and it seemed that we spent an hour or so on queuing itself and there was not enough time to do warm up at all. The only light moment came when Jo fell in the passage leading to the stadium. It was kind of hilarious and it lightened up everyone’s mood.

Before we knew it, and before we even had the time to camwhore, we were asked to gather at the starting line. Then, there were some cheerleaders' dance and stunt which, if truth be told, did not bemuse any of the runners as everyone was too eager to run. When the run was flagged off, Liza, James, Armin, Joe were sprinting and speeding away and ahead of me like a whiz of smoke. A guy fell down due to the pushing from the runners behind and I felt so sorry for him but I couldn’t stop to cross over and help him as the runners behind me were pushing me ahead. 

I was running with good pace for the first 5km. The roads were so dark I was carefully paying heeds to watch out for pebble stones to avoid another episode of ankle sprain. When I finished the Outer Loop (running on the highways outside F1 tracks), I thought it should be at least 10km but when I looked at the teeny weeny white cardboard it was written 8.5km. Then we turned into the stadium itself. Approximately when I reached 14km, I began to feel excruciating pain on my left ankle. At one point, it was so painful that I had cold sweat and I was at the verge of crying and giving up. I just want to pick up my mobile phone and called for help and gave up. But then, pride and honour got the better of me and I began a ‘table talk’ with my feet. I was having a negotiation with my feet that I promised them ample rest after ENR in exchange for the tenacity to last through ENR in one piece. It was really tough running on a painful ankle. My pace slowed down and I had to stop for about 7-8 times to stretch my ankle. On top of this, the organization and the handling of the whole event was very bad. First, there was no visible distance marker except the 8.5km. We were supposed to do two inner loops on the race tracks itself but there were no marshal to guide us and tell us where to go. There was only one water station in the stadium which means one water station for every 5.5km. There were so many runners who cut across the lawn as a matter of short cuts and there was no one to stop them. I mean, seriously, running, just like any other sports, is an honourable affair. You could limp, walk, or even crawl back to the finish line and all other runners would still cheer for you and feel proud of you but if you dishonour the race by taking short cuts and therefore shorten the distance it is an utmost disgrace. You brought the running affair into disrepute, seriously. I mean, I was in pain and I was running with a sprained ankle and I was at the verge of breaking down but I would never, ever allow myself or lower myself to such low so as to do the short cuts. Sportsmanship, honour and pride are more important aspects in a run than the timing itself.

The Birthday Boy and the Belated Birthday Gal

I did my last inner loop in a turtle-slow pace but I continued running. I didn’t have any physical strength left at that moment and it was more of a mind over matter affair. I even shut my eyes and ran. I also had a thug of war imaginary conversations with myself – “No, it’s not pain, it’s just discomfort”, “Okay, fine, it’s pain, but just bear with it for a little more”, “It’s going to be fine, it will be fine by tomorrow”, “Just go, few more kilometers away, you can rest after that” and so on. But I must say, despite all exhaustion, frustration at the lack of (or absence of) distance marker and the perturbing and throbbing pain, I felt happy. I felt happy that I was running and I was going to finish it. At 2km before the finish line (the only marker which spelled ‘2km away’), I gulped down mouthful of water to quench my thirst and I poured the remaining on my head to cool myself down. I then decided I was ready to sprint the last 2km. Just when I was making a mental note “Fuck it, now, Lils, run run run!” to myself and lifted my feet for a sprinting pose, I stepped on an empty Mountain Dew can and sprained my ankle AGAIN! Yes, I couldn’t help but shrieked “Fuck”. I decided to do a limp sprinting anyway. At this point, I heard someone calling my name. I turned around and saw Nana (who just did a full marathon at Paris a week ago) and YKK (birthday boy who dressed in a striking yellow outfit complete with a lion king wig). They were so relaxed and happy and shouting words of encouragement. Thanks to their uplifting spirit and encouraging words, I managed to sprint to the finish line and all four of us – YKK, Nana, Lilly and me crossed the finish line together – HOLDING HANDS! I was so touched. Nana and YKK were fast runners and I am sure they slowed their pace to encourage Lilly. These are commendable gestures! This is what we called sportsmanship! You may be a fast runner, but it is not the speed that made you a great runner, it’s one’s own caliber, charisma and characters that made one a great runner!

When I arrived at the finish line I realized that there was a chaotic tumult close to a physical brawl going on at the medals collection counters. It seemed that the handing out of finishers tee and medals were distastefully handled and the organizer had shut down the place and stopped all giving out of medals. Announcement was made that medals and goodies bags would be mailed out to participants instead. This was seriously a joke. I have never been in a run/race (unless it has been made clear earlier that there is no finishers’ medals) whereby medals were withheld! Come on, I ran a freaking 21km in pain and I couldn’t at least have a piece of cold metal hanging around my neck as comfort? You must be kidding me!! Ridiculously it was true. The supervision of the whole run was so badly managed that I didn’t feel the excitement when crossing the finish line and everyone was busy booing and not even a single personnel awaited me at the finish line to utter at least a decent ‘Well done’. If it was not the runners’ bond, the runners would have come back to the finish line to nothingness, as one of the runner put it on TRAFFFF.  It is indeed a shame, ENR has all factors in favour of them - perfect weather, perfect tracks and perfect participants turn up and they still managed to screw it all up and put an abrupt and anti-climax full stop to an otherwise memorable and outstanding running event of the year. It provoked an instant and universal anti-ENR sentiment around the virtual world and too many nasty things have been said that I personally do not think ENR would ever stand up from this shameful pit anytime soon. To me, I would put it simply as this: ENR: My first and my last!

Of course, all is not lost when you have the strong bondage amongst runners. It felt good to be congratulated and surrounded by fellow runners. Jun King, my downline who participated in the 11KM run witnessed the tumult when it happened and just when the organizer announced that they were going to shut down the place he managed to grab some finishers’ medals for us (knowing how meaningful it would be for us). Again, I was so touched with his thoughtfulness. Of course it was not right to grab the medals just like that but given the havoc and the confusion, he did what he thought was right at that time with our interests' in mind. At the end of the day, all the finishers' medals which he grabbed were distributed to runners for the 21km category who finished the run in good time within the qualifying 3 hours. 

To sum it up, notwithstanding the miserable backdrop and doleful ending to the whole event, we had an enjoyable run. It was a memorable run, and I would always remember ENR in the forms of great friendship and great bonding. The rest, is history.


p/s: there are some post ENR sidelights but that would be for another day in another write-up.