The Boot's on the Back Foot

The moon is still up as I arrive at Padang Astaka on a cool Tuesday morning. Haven't seen the moon in a while, certainly not at this time after I wake - it's usually been while I haven't slept yet.

The moonlight barely lights up the crowd gathered for the first session of Original Bootcamp this November day. Some are seniors from previous months and some, like me, are the new recruits. Remember that word - recruits - as this is a distillation of military training and we're bound by certain disciplinary rules akin to that field.

Okay, so I thought I wanted to be in the army at one time, but being undersized saved me from that. No size restrictions here, though. Discipline aside, the programme (so says the website) takes the best of military training for civilian use in its exercises and drills.

How shall I fare, then, being super unfit, small and suffering from a bum knee? Well, there's only one way to find out.

Warmups jogs, and I'm already out of breath. Then comes the assessment. We have to run a 400m loop and then do 10 push-ups, 10 grunts (pushup position into a jump and back) and 15 sit-ups. Three times.

I'm okay with the body work, but slow right down in the run with a stitch. Finish in the slow-poke section.

Then it's a 1.6km (1 mile) run, eight laps of the marked course. By lap two my knee is hurting, so I walk it. I end up in the bottom quartile, but I'm not too bummed, as I am seriously unfit.

After the session, I head to A&W for a heavy breakfast... yummm.

Day 2, Thursday. Body aches haven't been too severe, so I'm all set. Little did I know...

In groups of three, we attack five activities in one loop, 40 seconds for each manoeuvre and 20 seconds to move to the next station:
1. Deep squats with bags of sand at chest height
2. Squat and jump
3. Squat and lift (bag of sand)
4. Push-ups
5. Jackknife with heavy pipes in lieu of "rifles".
When we finish one loop, we just go on and start another. It's almost never-ending, and I'm seriously out of breath after a short while. Time is added on for everyone owing to recruits' dawdling, not running fast enough or chucking the bags of sand and pipes.

We cheer as a break is called, but we're not done yet. Back to the stations for more loops, this time of 30-second manoeuvres, with the last 10 supposed to be of higher intensity, and 15 seconds to get to the next station. People are wheezing and decidedly whiffy, but we soldier on.

When time is called, we can't just fall about on the ground, though. A jog to cool down, and some stretches, and then we're let off the hook... until Saturday.
Day 3, it's the weekend! And I'm here at the field at 5.30am! I'm starting to think this isn't such a good idea, as I only finished work about four hours ago. I thought it would be easier not to sleep after work, attend the 5.45am session and be done by 7am, rather than try to sleep and trying even worse to get up for a 7am start. Will have to see how this pans out in the weeks ahead.

Today we do more loops. Several cones mark the stops, where we drop down to do push-ups, lie down to do sit-ups and try our best not to cheat in lunges. And run between the stops! I'm panting in a few short minutes, pretending to jog after a while and just wondering when the pain will stop...

Then it's over to the next loop for more running, jumping squats, running ladders and holding the plank position (braced on elbows and lower arm and toes, with abs off the ground).

Funny thing is, when the sessions are over, we are not completely shattered. We can walk around laughing, or skip about (me, usually), and even go off for breakfast and chat. So, obviously, the sessions do not tax us beyond our abilities. It's just that our ability to do the manoeuvres, at a certain pace and of a certain number, is being pushed (sometimes seeming mercilessly). The muscle pain is a testament to that, sure, but I'm surprised that I'm even considering continuing with a jog right after the session.

Well, thankfully that only lasted until I got near the car, as then some of us recruits got to talking, and decided to go have breakfast.

As I reach home replete with the third breakfast in a week, more than I ever get in two months, I consider the past three sessions. It's been okay, I guess. Not too great on my shoes, though, the pair that I've decided to sacrifice for the benefit of Ezanor-kind looking decidedly shabby, and just look at the state of the T-shirt! But, this is good for me, I tell myself. I vow to carry on... and we'll see how the coming weeks treat us.

The Little Devil wants to run a marathon

The Little Devil is really little, if you don't know by now. I'm "five feet in heels", something I say when people ask my height, and petite. In that sense (I'm making the excuse beforehand), I've always thought I wasn't built for long-distance running. Just look at marathon runners, and triathlon athletes - they're tall, big and bulky, with huge reserves of fat to draw from when they're "running on empty", plus huge lung capacities (my lungs are small, thus I always have extra air when scuba diving).

In school, I've only competed in sprints - the 100m dash, 200m at the most. Get me to run 400m and I'm dead halfway round the track. Running 5km would take me more than an hour.

But as old age creeps, or rather, gallops up on me, and I can't sprint in record-breaking times anymore, I thought I'd try to develop some long-distance stamina to get fit and toned. Thus the (day)dream of completing a marathon, and even a triathlon.

Tell you the truth, the dream has been ongoing for years now. And nothing much has happened towards its fulfilment. In early 2000s I ran (or walked) the charity Terry Fox Run, still taking about an hour to complete 4.5km (those hills around Lake Garden are murder!) and last week I took about 45 minutes to saunter the streets of KL for the charity Rat Race organised by my company (it felt a little less than 4km). Oh, now that I think of it, I actually registered for the Penang Bridge marathon in 1999 but didn't go (sheepish grin).

And those charity runs were only 4km. A marathon is 10 times the distance. Seems like an undoable task. The Greek soldier Pheidippides, who had been credited (in some accounts) with running from Marathon to Athens to announce that the Persians had been defeated in the Battle of Marathon, managed to run into the assembly, announced "we have won" and promptly keeled over and died. Not very inspiring, huh?

Inspiring, though, are people who have succeeded, if not in elite 2-hour and a bit times, within the set time limit for certain marathons to get a medal (pictured), or if there are no limits, before they open the streets back to traffic, at a pace of 13 minutes (or 14) per mile (1.6km).

If you don't reach a certain cut-off point, runners have to take to the sidewalks, or in cases like the Marine Corp Marathon, hop aboard the strugglers' bus. (That would definitely be me. In high school in Kuantan, when we were doing the 11km Teluk Chempedak to Balok run, my roommate and I took the strugglers' boat!).

And that's the marathon. What more the triathlon, with 3.8km of swimming, 180km cycling and a full marathon to boot in the long-distance or Ironman event. Gal-pal Debby (she of the Miz Cool moniker) says she wants to do this, too, but needs a serious kick up the nether regions to even start training.

Well, I'm afraid I've got sad news... or let's call it another excuse. I've got a bum knee. A bum knee is something which can be used in any or all instances as a reason for not doing something. Just ask some men.

This bum knee developed in 1996 when I was on holiday from uni (let's call it skipping a week before Winter holidays) and touring London with cousin Rozi, her future hubby Meri, Meri's sis Leen, cousin Ziad and Meri's friend Azreezal. I didn't know how it developed, but maybe the cold didn't help. Walking down a flight of steps, there was a sudden ache in my left knee which meant I could not bend it without grimacing.

It has come and gone since then, usually when I've exerted myself. Coming down Mount Kinabalu in 1999 was complete agony, even when favouring the knee meant crab-walking (going sideways) all the way down. In the AXN Challenge in 2005, it started hurting about an hour into the race, thus I was walking/limping/hopping for the next seven hours.

Colleague Pat (whose own knee was ruined by squash) suspects I've got cartillage damage. Thinking about it, I thought it could be from years of school sports and doing the dash, especially without stretching. Or maybe, he says, some people are more susceptible to osteo-arthritis than others.

Anyhoo, seeing as Malaysians do not have easy, or cheap, access to physiotherapists, I doubt the problem will go away, and pushing through the pain might make the problem worse. Sigh. So in the end, will the dream remain a day dream? For the time being I can only sit here, with my knee elevated to relieve the ache, and wonder.