Back To Marathon Training

Having worked over the weekend, I was super tired and needed a break. So I took Wednesday and Thursday off.

Decided to train for my upcoming Standard Chartered Marathon Singapore full marathon.

Went to jog at ECP early in the morning after sending my son to school.

I hadn't jogged for two weeks till this jog.

So it was pretty tough.

To make matters a lot worse, there were holes in my well worn running tights.

A 90 min run to clock maybe 11km ended up giving me very unforgiving thigh abrasions very near my groin.

Ended up throwing the tights away, look at those holes in them!

Need to head to Decathlon this weekend!

Fatherhood Reflections LV - Big Boy

At 8 years of age, he is such a big boy now.

Boy I love him so much.

Indoor Golf

Found some free time after the IFTA 2018 Conference.

Played a round of 9 holes at the KL Mandarin Oriental Indoor Golf Simulator. Was pretty fun.

And in spite of a single hole which I clocked 18 shots (the simulation was screwed up!), still managed to win.

31st IFTA Conference 2018 Kuala Lumpur

My company was one of the Gold sponsors of the 31st IFTA Conference 2018, held in Kuala Lumpur over last weekend.

IFTA stands for International Federation of Technical Analysts.

The event was so high profile, it was graced by Malaysian Prime Minister, Dr Mahathir Mohamad himself.

It was nice to have a sponsors' photo opportunity with him.

Some very good speakers and I was glad to be a part of this.

Online Mobile Gaming Weekend

It has been that kind of lazy weekend, when I have been quite preoccupied with all my online mobile games.

These are the games I play currently.

Clash Of Clans
I've played this for a good 3-4 years now and we have a corporate clan that's been going quite strong.
At TH11, this account is a 'no defence' base, which specifically has minimal defences so as to have as low a war match-up rating as I can. This base is currently below a TH9 base. TH12 has been released and now it requires all structures to be built in order to progress, so I guess this base is stuck here for good. Just upgrading the walls and heroes that's all.

Pokemon GO
Still one of my favourite games. Partly the fun of collecting all the different Pokemons, and partly the competitiveness of leveling up as high as possible. I am close to the top level of 40. It also happened to be the Beldum/Metang/Metagross community day event today.

Fantasy Premier League (FPL)
This is more of an office thing, based on the English Premier League, that so many of us are fans of. We have a common pool going on and it is rather competitive. Note that last year I came in 2nd. Right now 9 games in I'm lying at 11th spot. So I better up my game.

Chelsea 2 Manchester United 2

Wow this really felt like a loss!

Ross Barkley's goal in the 96' really hurt.

Yet again this was a tale of two halves. The first half we were absolutely abysmal. Then in the second half we were so good.

Martial scored both goals and they were good goals.

Ashley Young had Hazard in his back pocket so much so that I thought he deserve MOTM.

Pogba again for me is the problem child. He seems to only want to play when he feels like it.

Also it might be about time to stop starting Lukaku. He's really lumbering around with less contribution that many in the team.

Anyway onwards and upwards, looks unlikely that Mourinho will get the sack after this performance.

If we continue our performances like the second half of today's game, I think will easily wrap up the UCL spots. But can we? That is the question.

GGMU!!!

Fatherhood Reflections LIV - Table Tennis

These days we are absolutely maxing out the facilities in our condo.

Tennis.

Squash.

Swimming.

Football.

Basketball.

Gym.

Table-tennis.

Here's the boy playing with one of his classmates who lives here too!

Battleship

Absolutely crushed my son in his first ever game of Battleship.

He was so traumatised that he cried.

Hopefully I have scared him off the game completely.

Celebrating 12 Years

12 years with one single company is a really long time.

We celebrated by having lunch at Luke's Oyster Bar & Chop House.

There are only three of us left.

The week before a lot of the employees past and present came together for a drink at our regular watering hole. We all drank till our hearts' content. What wonderful memories we made all these years, through the good times and the bad.

Wonder who will be next to go? Who will be the last man standing?

Who knows?

It has been a good ride thus far, and for that there is much to be grateful for.

In any case, here's a picture of Luke's famous Shrimp Salad Martini.

Slurp!!!

Lousy Decathlon Boots

So my old football boots finally gave way and where else than my favourite sports store to buy my new pair of football boots?

I chose the cheapest pair available at $19.90.

Last night I got the chance to try them out at Turf City.

Boy were then lousy.

Somehow the fit wasn't there, and there was a tendency to scrap the turf ever so slightly all too often.

Let's give it a few more games and see how it goes.

Training For Standard Chartered Marathon Singapore 2018

With less than 60 days to go, this is the tunnel I always take to East Coast Park for my jogs.

I am worried I will fail to complete it.

If I turn left, I clock 8km by looping the East Coast Sailing Club.

If I turn right, I clock 14km by turning once I see the Marina Bay Reservoir at Gardens By The Bay East.

Fatherhood Reflections LIII - Jogging & Cycling With My Son

Last Monday I left straight home after work to pick my son early.

The wifey would normally do so but she needed to stay late for work.

After picking him I asked what he felt like doing and he said he wanted to go cycling.

So we decided to let him cycle as far as he wanted over at East Coast Park, while I ran alongside him for as far as I could.

As you can see, we made it all the way to Bedok Jetty.

Which is quite a feat.

Both for him and for me.

The running route to Bedok Jetty vs the cycling is slightly different, a wee bit longer as it snakes around the Lagoon food centre.

Then we headed back to Lagoon and ate my favourite duck rice and had sugar cane juice for dinner.

Absolutely lovely!

A nice evening out for father and son.

Beach Road Prawn Mee

This is the wifey's fav along East Coast Road.

It is the usual fare. One big plate of ngoh hiang, 4 bowls of prawn mee, and 3 drinks.

What is unusual though, is that the place ran our of $8.80 bowls so we tried the $11.80 ones, and you can see the prawns are enormous!!!

Delicious!

Super Sports Day Saturday

For the first time, I decided to drag the wifey out for a marathon of sports.

We went to jog 8km in ECP together. It was the usual left route to the sailing club.

Right after that we go on to play tennis for a full hour. Nice to play more seriously once in a while.

Then on Sunday morning we play football with the kids.

Phew, it was tiring but quite fulfilling.

What I'm really training is my endurance to run/jog/walk the 6-7hrs needed for my StanChart Marathon later this year.

Hopefully I will survive that real marathon.

Manchester United 3 Newcastle 2

What a comeback!

We conceded two very early goals to Newcastle at home! And believe me everyone Man United fan was super upset.

Not sure who to blame. The build up for this game labelled it as Mourinho's last game.

The players were terrible. Mou's tactic's were terrible. Must have been the Board's fault.

Come second half. The right players came in (Mata, Fellaini, Sanchez), the tactics changed.

Mata scored a beautiful free-kick.

Martial combined with Pogba for a very beautiful second goal.

Sanchez scores in the 89th minute to comeplete the beautiful comeback.

Question is why aren't we playing like this week in week out?

Which team will come on in the next game against Chelsea?

Is Mourinho safe? I still would like him out.

But for the time being, what a comeback win to savour for a week or two.

GGMU!!!