4:30 mission

I hereby announce the commencement of my 4:30 mission on 16th September 2013 (Hari Malaysia).

I declared it via facebook & twitter.

'Empat setengah, empat setengah.'

What the heck is 4:30? Why suddenly it becomes so important to me?

The idea of 4:30 came to mind a day after I ran Great Eastern Live Great Run.

I was analysing my official timing for running events and it got me thinking very hard.

Yes, I have a complete set of official and unofficial timing for all running events I’ve participated since 2010.

It sounds weird & too much right.

Apparently not for me. I gauge my performance based on official/unofficial timing.

From there I could see whether I did well, scored PB/PR or vice versa.

Luckily I scored PB in most of my running events & the timing table was very nice.

There’s a significant improvement from year to year.

Back to 4:30.

It’s all about timing. No, not 4hours 30mins for full marathon.

Seriously I’m not a big fan of marathon (mind you it’s 42.195km not 5-km marathon LoL).

I dislike the training commitment and suffering during the run. Dreaded.

But then only full marathon and certain half marathon events offered nice finisher tee huhuhu.

In order to get that finisher tee, I have to endure the dreaded route huhuhu.

Only crazy people will attempt to do full marathon and special crazy to do ultramarathon.

Kuchalana said any stupid can run marathon but require extra stupid to run ultramarathon.

I said this yet I’ve completed 3 full marathons with nice timing (or at least I think so hehe).

I guess only crazy marathon finishers could call other marathon finishers crazy ;)

I did my 1st FM in 5:19, 2nd FM in 4:44 and 3rd in 4:06.

So 4:30 obviously not about FM.

So what the heck is 4:30? Sigh.

Sorry to make you wasted your precious minutes before getting there hehe.

4:30 mission is my running pace target (4min 30s) for 10/12/16km (1 mile and below) distance.  

It’ll be 45min for 10km, 54min for 12km & 1hr 12min for 16km. Gulp!

It’s no surprise that I like not so long distance as it’s quicker.

My current pace (until today) is roughly 5min for 10/12/16km since April this year.

I did 59:54.45min in 12km World Kidney Day Run in Putrajaya (April).

16km Mizuno Wave Run in June, did 1:20:26.

12km Men’s Health & Shape Night Run in September, did 0:59:31

12km Great Eastern Live Great Run in September, did 0:59:41.91.

It seems like I don’t improve much.

Stuck at the same pace for 6 months.

Boring.

It’s a good thing that my body is well accustomed to 5min/km pace this year.

My pace for late last year/early this year was around 5min 18s.

But I want more. Need to step up in this game.

My long time ambition is to win a podium placing in a big running event.

Sounds almost impossible.

But I believe it is possible granted that I train well & don’t give up.

It’s gonna take years but hey I’ve been running since 2010 & it’s already 4 years.

Apalah sangat 3 tahun lagi.

But then that is a 3-year plan.

For short term plan with end of 2013 as the target, I need to achieve 4:30min/km pace.

Need to shave off 30s/km from my current pace.

Not easy huhuhu.

Buang 10s pun seksa huhuhu.

I sketched few strategies to achieve that impossible pace

1) Become thinner

Thinner means faster. Thinner ye not anorexic.

2) Change my training method

Honestly I don’t have a fixed schedule for training. Need to be serious now. Need to incorporate tempo/interval/hill etc. Also need to take out lazy from my dictionary huhuhu.

3) Eat clean (not the cleaner LoL)

Avoid junk/fast food (oh no!). Err perhaps take less ;) Eat real food, not processed. Consume more fruits, vegies etc (more smoothies?). Avoid fried food.

4) Weight lifting

My upper body is so weak, need to work more on this.

5) Strengthening core muscle

Plank and its siblings are in order.

6) Swimming

Gaya bebas, people? I’m an Aquarius but I haven’t been to swimming pool for month huhuhu.

Those strategies are not new or novel. The main real issue is the discipline (or istiqamah).

I’ll try my best to do all.

We’ll see the result at the end of this year (takutnya huhuhu).

There’s a possibility of not achieving it but that’s a risk I’m willing to take.

I pray (and hoping) that I’ll be healthy all year long.

Thanks for reading. I hope you’ll be able to achieve your coveted pace too ;)