2008 Aviva Ironman 70.3 Singapore Triathlon

Helped out at the event yesterday! Wanted to write this post yesterday night but was too tired and fell asleep.

Picture of the race route that I took from the official website:

(Click to enlarge)

I was stationed along the cycling route, and since the swimming section started first, I was quite bored initially staring at the empty stretch of road that I started taking pictures of signboards and my surroundings.

I saw this curious/ suspicious looking basket lying at the bus stop opposite:

What's in that basket? I started thinking of all those MRT advertisements. Lol! I didn't walk over to check though. Haha.

The cycling route itself is already 89km, you say. So why is it called the 70.3 Triathlon for those who are confused?

Heh. 'Cause the 70.3 is in miles. This Ironman event was founded way back in 1978 (before I was born!). According to the website, a debate ensued among competitors about who was the fittest among them all, swimmers, cyclists or runners. In the end, someone suggested that the 3 events be combined, and the champion shall thus be named the Ironman.

Wow.

If I had continued playing basketball til today, I might have been a fitness fanatic and I would have actually taken all these sport events seriously.

But, nah. I'm too lazy. Lol.

I only like the cycling part. Swimming and running... Err.. Don't think so.

Anyways coming back to yesterday's event, the physically challenged could also take part in it.

Cycling with your hands for almost 90km. That's like hand-running to me. Those 3-wheeled bikes (no idea what they were called) looked way cool to me. I wanted to try and see how it felt like hand-cycling. I think it's damn tough lah.

There was one funny thing that I learned (very mountain tortoise of me) about cycling while helping out in this event.

See the bottles lying at the side of the road? I found out cyclists will throw away their empty water bottles when they see the next water point coming up ahead. (Due to the fact their race bikes can only hold a limited number of bottles.) Alot of their water bottles looked damn new. I think the participants bought the water bottles just to be used once just for this race, and then throw it away once the contents are emptied. I'm super amazed. This is my first time helping out at a triathlon event, and now that I know nice water bottles are meant to be thrown away during a race. Haha. Why can't they use cheap plastic mineral water bottles that comes fitted with this?

Is it because these nozzles are of poor quality and harder to open with your teeth? Any race cyclists reading this do let me know :) I want to know why do you throw away nice bottles? Are they really very cheap to buy compared to mineral water or Gatorade?

Anyways, the event organisers purposely employ or appoint people to pick all these water bottles up from the road. Let's call them bottle pickers. Lol. Don't play play okay! Before the race started I saw the foreign workers being handed out with nice collared t-shirts! Nicer than my volunteer t-shirt lah. Haha.

Bottle Picker

Their job, from what I see (I may be wrong!), is just to pick up bottles lying on the road. This is to avoid cyclists running over them and falling. Sometimes I see them picking up empty energy gel sachets as well. Picking up general rubbish was not part of their job, 'cause I saw a general road sweeper doing this.

It got really funny after a while 'cause as the bikers start to swarm in, the number of bottles thrown away were overwhelming. The bottles kept flying off them bikes, some even hitting him! It was damn hilarious. Flying water bottles everywhere. We were both laughing at those flying bottles. Lol.

This is just a small number of water bottles strewn on the grass. There were lots more.

And I think he gave up. Lol!

Waterpoint

The water point was also really funny. It sounded like a wet market with people shouting.

"Water here! 100 Plus in front!"

"100 plus is here! 100 plus is here!"

"Water! Who wants water!"

"No water! I want 100 plus!"

"Water! I want water!" (After swimming and then cycling, how the participants have the strength to shout louder than the volunteers at the water point, I really don't know.)

All in all, it was tiring but eye-opener day for me. If ya ask me, would I ever participate in these kinda events? I think my answer would be a no. I don't think I can ever run 20km after a 1.9km swim in the sea, nor run even 10km after a 89km cycle. I might take a leisurely 1.9km swim. I might run 10km one day (though definitely not 20km). And though I have ever cycled from my home to Sentosa and back home again with a very sore butt, I don't think I can ever try to do an Ironwoman ;) My respect to all the participants, especially those aged 50 and above. Don't think I am even half as fit as them. So embarassing!