A 41-Year-Old National Record Broken

Last month, a 41-year-old national running record was broken.

This was the 10,000m track record set by PC Suppiah in 1973 – with a time of 31 minutes and 19.0 seconds. But Soh Rui Yong, recently broke it, by running the same distance at the USA’s Portland Track and Field Festival – in 31 minutes and 15.95 seconds.

Training for the race

To train for the race, Soh, a student currently based in the USA, gradually increased his total mileage and clocked up his runs on a mixture of trail, road and track. This is because running on the same surface puts too much pressure on the joints, thus increasing the risk of injuries, according to the runner.

Confident of breaking the record

Soh, 22, had been quite confident that he could break the record. This was because he had done plenty of training. Despite being injured in the lead-up to race day, he still felt that a good run would bring him under the mark and get him the record.

Soh’s Race Strategy

To put it in a nutshell, Soh’s race strategy was to run 75 seconds per lap consistently throughout the whole race.

But it was made more difficult, by the fact that he had to pace himself.

Most challenging part of the race

The most challenging part of the race for Soh, was the fact that this record had eluded runners for a massive 41 years. As a result, some doubted his ability to succeed in what many others had failed to do – for four decades.

But his coach had faith in him, and in the end, this had paid off tremendously.

Eyeing the marathon record

Now that he already has the 10,000m record firmly in the bag, Soh is secretly eyeing the marathon record (2 hours 24 minutes and 22 seconds), set by Murugiah Rameshon in the 1995 South East Asian Games.

To read an interview with Soh about his record-breaking attempt, click here.

And well… it was okay. Didn’t achieve my targeted finishing time, but still a good run nonetheless.

This year’s route had a new twist: the organisers added the climbing up and down of the Sheares bridge. It was indeed challenging, by the 34th km, I was already doing a walkathon, so I could only walk up the bridge slowly. For me, the rain at 20km was a welcome one! It chased the humidity away, and it was rather refreshing.

There were a few things that I didn’t like about this year’s race, one of it is definitely the need to stop traffic (and vice versa) in order to continue the race. This literally breaks any momentum and for a event this big, I simply feel that it is wrong. I did not experience any water stations running out of juice, but there were complains of water running out at certain hydration points. It’s a repeat every year, the organisers really need to look into it. I also didn’t like the other gimmicks like the glow zones (which in my opinion, is a complete joke!), and how in the world did 2,000 runners gets their results lost in technology? Small but critical thing… hopefully they can only get better.

Well, this one is done and dusted, I’ll be looking forward to the next 42km, and hopefully to achieve a new personal best the next time.

Cover photo credit: Running Shots

Sundown Marathon Winners: Russell Ericksen and Alex Ong

Singapore-based American marathoner Russell Ericksen emerged as champion, with a timing of 3 hours and 3 seconds, in the 42km category of the recently concluded Sundown Marathon.

Singaporean Alex Ong followed closely behind, in second place, with a time of 3:00:50.

Third-placed Thomas Greene, from Britain, clocked 3:03:59.

I recently interviewed the two top Sundown Marathon podium finishers. Here is what went on in their minds, during the race.

Thought Alex would overtake him

Russell admitted that he had thought Alex would overtake him in the last 10 kilometres of the race. But he managed to hold off the competition to take the title.

Bridge not a problem

For both runners, the Benjamin Sheares Bridge, termed as Heartbreak Bridge by a lot of marathon runners in Singapore, was not too much of a problem even though Russell thought the Singapore bridge was comparable to some of the toughest hills he has done overseas.

And Alex wasn’t too bothered by the climb either. He thought that he could compensate for the loss of time during the downslope.

The bridge portion of the route was introduced this year – to partly challenge the participants and to showcase the city skyline.

Their Strategy

For Russell, he was more concerned about not going too fast, keeping to a 4:05 to 4:10 pace.

And for Alex, he didn’t want to inflict more damage on an earlier calf strain – so he didn’t really think too much about strategy.

About the climb

Both of these elite runners thought that the Sundown Marathon was particularly challenging though – but for different reasons.

In Alex’s case, it was the dark sections of the route, particularly at East Coast Park, that made him wonder why he was running at that ungodly hour and not sleeping.

But for Russell, the weather and humidity of the Singapore night almost got the better of him as he still gets exhausted more easily, compared to racing in cooler and less humid climates, such as America or Australia.

Click here to read an interview with Russell on his winning run.

Click here to see what Alex said of his podium finish.