Training was at Keat Hong camp on Tuesday, the officier team was training there too & our teammate PTI Richard got us up for a friendly competitive run against them. It would be about 10+teams of 5 people each for the mock 1.44km route relay. The officers started stunningly fast at the start, putting their fastest runner’s first, very good overtaking first impression though. But that changed after midrace, where we specs, have an opposite strategy- having the fastest runners last, & we caught up with them & with one of the spec teams finishing 1st & smashing all opposition in the end. Kenvin, our fastest runner did it again with his impressive speed, our trimph card too. Overall, it was a good race, a first taste of competition on the actual route too. Though I felt that I didn’t run my best, as I was still recovering from the 9km I ran the day before. My timing was still sub 5mins though, hoping to hit sub 4mins soon.

Worked myself silly a the gym on Monday. Gassed myself with Tear Gas at the PLC gas camber on Tuesday. Went on a Bell UH-1 live helicopter joyride on Wednesday with an LTC & CPT as my pilots. Oh well, its just another week of training. I saw physical training from monday to friday too, in other words.. EVERYDAY… The last week ended with me running 5.13s for 1.44km on the latest of the ARR trails. It was selection too & only 15 out of 25+ usual teammates are in the team. Sad to see the rest go, we have been training so hard for months & selections, the day of choosen… would glad to see team spirit & see the “declined” turn up for training as a “morale booster” & hey I got myself into the team too. Duh! Reserved runner? haha.

As the day to the holiday draws closer, the excitement builds up, partly because I am some poor peep who haven’t or say, didn’t get the privilege to travel since he enlisted into the Army, pathetic peeps like us. Anyway, being a theme park freak, did some coaster research & hey, these are some of the “MUST RIDE” at Genting & KL’s Cosmoworld @ Berjaya Times Square, where I would be staying. Shortlisted:

Ride Highlights for the upcoming holiday

GENTING- First World Theme Park
Euro Express (Indoor roller)
Motion Master (Movie simulator)

GENTING- Outdoor Theme Park
Corkscrew Coaster (Standard corkscrew)
Flying Coaster (Lie down coaster)
Space Shot (Free fall tower)
Rolling Thunder Mine Train (Simple mine train)
Cyclone (
Flying Dragon (Simple coaster)

Downtown KL- Times Square Galaxystation
SUPERSONIC ODYSSEY (looping indoor roller)
SPINNING ORBIT (Elevated flat ride)
SPACE ATTACK (Inverter flat ride)
DNA MIXER (”Wipeout like” flat ride)

Misc Rides, OOORT’S EXPRESS, DIZZY IZZY

The last week saw a highlight of a 5km hill run at yishun park. Clocked in at 19mins 50s in total for the ARR training time trail. Not a bad timing below 20mins I say. Next week would be chemical defence at early week, together with live heli task on wednesday. Would be an interesting week, esp for the video camera!

5mins 50s for 1.5km road relay & 9mins 32s on a 2.okm leisure run, these are my current training timings for the armour route relay (ARR) coming 13th May 05. The 1.5km saw a lag of 5s from my previous 5mins 45s. ARR is an event where various army armour formations compete each other on Baton based relays 1.5km per runner. My team had been training for few months now & its about 1 more month till the event. Would see to that, together with further improvement of timings! Just so addicted to running now, guess I should go into cross country or track & field in college or so. Just like most runners, I am aiming to bring my BMI to 20 from 21+ presently, more lean muscle + less fat = faster speed + lower timings due to lower weight resistance.

& hey on a different note, I am going for a holiday! It had been about 2 years + since I’ve gone oveaseas though. Sad life in the army. Not to mention the pile of paperwork one have to go though to do so- gotta renew passport, apply oveaseas leave, apply for exit permit lah… boring… So come 29th April to 2nd May I would be in Genting & KL, Malaysia, not the best of destinations though, but the last time I’ve been to Genting/KL was ummm, in primary school? Would like to see how greatly things have changed there now. Interesting spots would be the Genting theme park itself, both indoor & outdoor, not to mention the new shopping centers. I would be staying in Berjaya TimesSquare in KL on the 2nd phase of the tour, spotting an indoor theme park & coaster… whee would see myself bombarding myself with endless loops on the coasters with my camera, coaster cam here we go!