GE Run 2009 For Ladies Only

Last year this time, Winnie participated in GE 2008 5km run for the first time and in this year's event, she ran the competitive 10 km. This year is GE 4th consecutive time and for Winnie, her second.

Got up this morning at about 0530 hrs, picked up Winnie at about 0600 hrs and we arrived at the start point near Esplanade at about 0630 hrs. Admittedly, I was quite concerned Winnie may not last the gruelling 10 km run as she had not been training quite regularly for a while. The last 10 km run she did was in May, the PAssion Run where I did 15 km and since then, she had intermittent training.

Did the usual routine as last year, she had to go to the toilet at Esplanade en-route (there are many mobile toilets near the Padang but she still chose the toilet at Esplanade for obvious reason) before heading to the start point.

Flagged-off at 0700 hrs by Her Excellency, the Ambassador from the Philippines, there were some 14,000 female runners as announced by the gregarious MC on the air.

I did not expect her to do better than the one we did in March this year where she clocked a creditable 1 hour 4 mins plus, 1 hour 10 min under would be more realistic this time around. But I was proven wrong in my 'guesstimation' (I am more than happy to be proven wrong), the gun time showed 1 hr 6 mins something when I saw her making a final dash to the finishing line. About 2 mins to be taken off as she had started quite far back (need to verify her final timing when result is finalised in a couple of days), I'm sure she clocked some 1 hr 4 mins plus and boy, I must admit this is a fantastic result for her. Had she put in more training, she could have come in under 1 hour.

Winnie, I congratulate you for a good effort in this GE event and I shall look forward to another good result in your last event of the year, the 10 km Stanchart Marathon. Keep up the running spirit, never say die. Cheers!