If you’re a cheapskate like me and you would like to score free race kit on road races, try the following scheme:

1. Start a Blog
Yup, be a blogger. A runner-blogger to be more specific. And if you should blog, try to make sense from your blog and not just post a bunch of race ads and running related products whose aim is to sell something and nothing more ( I see a few of them actually )

2. Make friends with people
From your blog, you will eventually meet a lot of people, runners,non-runners,race organizers, coaches etc. This will open pandora’s box and it’s up to you how to make use of your connections. I see some runners eventually starting to make money (from other runners) from organizing races, starting magazines, coaching etc. This is good, as it keeps the economy running…and puts money on people’s pockets. Meeting other runners also helps you to be more motivated in your efforts. I remember joining a bunch of people from takbo.ph for that Biggest Loser contest (first edition) where I won 3rd place (133lbs) and together with all other runners, we all lose an average of more than 10lbs. If my memory served me right, I lose 19 lbs in 2 months. Don’t ask me what’s my weight now. Clue: 152lbs Read the rest of this entry »

This week saw me going back to DLSU-D for my regular runs. As I’ve already mentioned from previous post that my car was busted and still undergoing maintenance, I have to jog from my house all the way to DLSU-D oval track. Thats about 3km which is actually good as my warm-up run. Before, I used to go to the school using my car but it looks like the 3km warm-up run is something I’ll keep up even if I get back my car.

So I was running along Congressional road here in Dasma and I was surprised that there were runners/joggers already running as early as 5am. As I was doing my easy run (6:30ish), I saw this guy on the other side of the road looking at me and obviously using me as his pace mate. I would try to increase my pace and so he would do the same. At one point near the front of  De La Salle Health Science Campus , he would look at me as if “challenging” me and just sped of. I don’t know what hit me that day, but I didn’t turn down the challenge and so I followed his pace for about 3 minutes (we were already running 5:30ish) and then I did look at him and left his ass by speeding all the way. He stopped as I reached gate 1 of DLSU-D. And looking at him from about 500 meters from me, he couldn’t stare back at me. I hope he learns his lesson.

As I reached oval track, two obese guys (obviously student, not sure if they’re into bromance) were walking in the first lap of the track. As it was my part of my training plan that day to do 1600m,1200m,800m and 400m speed run to speed up my fitness level, I have to devise a way how to tell them to continue their “walk” outside lane 1. Suplado ako pag umaga eh,  I have no time/no chance to talk when I do my speed training so I thought I would just run in between of them since there’s a half meter gap. And so I ran between them once and when I reached them again for the second time, as if they’ve already planned it for some time, they started running and obviously following me. I was already doing the 400m run which require me to run all out and after figuring out they’re out to embarrass me, I gave them what they were looking for and run as fast as I could. Alas one of them shouted “Grabe ayoko na!”. They left as I was about to approach them the 3rd time around.

Lesson learned: its not really a good idea to do these “challenge” game during runs, it can be exciting but can also be frustrating especially if you’ve challenge the wrong guy.

Confession: I actually did this several times when I was a newbie runner participating on almost all road races, I ended up flat on my ass most of the time.

I almost forgot to update this blog. Well, a series of unfortunate events did it. After that Run To Read race, I simply got bored of running. I promised myself to use that race to break my old PR for 10km (52 minutes), instead I got 1h:04m:32s (according to my watch). Chasing after a PR after all is tiring, and when you don’t achieve it, you get frustrated. Thats what hit me. I walked a lot in that race (probably more than a kilometer!), because I went too fast on the first three kilometers and lost steam on the remaining distance. The race I joined 2 weeks before this race was even better at 54 minutes! So at the end of the day, I thought running with JUST the primary aim of breaking a PR can be pointless. But then I realize, life is a challenge. Life becomes an exciting journey when you have a goal. Doing ways to achieve that goal, is exciting too and when you do achieve your goal, damn that would be sweet! Read the rest of this entry »