The Bicol Agenda: Run, Swim, Bike

 

I always look forward to spending holidays in Bicol.  This past long weekend didn’t fall short of expectation.

It wasn’t as serious-sounding as the word ‘agenda’ in the title suggests.  All I was sure was that I had planned to treat it as real homework to stitch in some runs and bike rides in my already hectic sched for family reunions and our conservative observance of Holy Week, the latter I so appreciate by the way.

My running shoes taking the most secure space in my travel bag, I knew I was running and biking when I get home.   Accidentally pulled out my swimwear from my closet ravine (pardon the term, I just moved in to a new place), I knew I could be just as easily coaxed to take a dip by the pool.   Surprise, surprise!  — All of these, properly utilized.

(Ooops, time-check and it’s 2 minutes to 12 MN.  A pictoblog this will be then.  Well, pictures do always make better blah-blahs anyway.)

The Run Leg:   Sunny 10K run

The plan was to finish a 10K run as I missed my long run the past weekend due to the moving in hassles.  Mission accomplished! –  Slow 10K run done in 71 minutes.   Brother and I ended up all exhausted realizing for ourselves that the tough morning summer runs have come.

Before the run.  About 6:10 AM.

After the run.  Seems like there’s not much difference with the ‘Before’..

..to settle the discrepancy, here’s the real score –  sweaty and yes, dead-tired but still smiling.

The *Swim Leg

Ahem, swim (read: take a dip into the pool, get wet, and linger).

Alright, I’m a no-swimmer.  Not because I don’t like to but because I DON’T KNOW HOW.  And nobody dares tease me now as I’ve had enough already last Thursday from mi madre and mi hermano.

Younger bro is far from being an excellent swimmer too.  He could barely complete one lap of continuous swim, hahaha. So what happens when you can’t swim as in really-swim?   Go kenkoy around and enjoy the sun and water anyway.

The Bike Leg:  Reunited, at last!

I don’t need say more –  It made me really delighted to finally get the chance to ride the tall bikes again.

We biked a total distance of 30km.  I wanted to get the feel of the 30km bike leg in duathlons.  Quite a distance, yes, but I honestly felt like I could go on more.  My only problem with biking is that while I totally enjoy each ride, I usually get pissed with the ‘ngawit’ feeling on the shoulders and arms.

Brother ‘transacts’ with the kiddos at the vulcanizing shop to fix the inflation of his bike wheels.

Naks!  Happy Biker, yes.

The farthest point we reached:  Iriga City Hall, and we came all the way from West Nabua.

Nice eh!  Quick sightseeing stop at the Holy Cross Parish Church at Nabua Poblacion.

But the Most Challenging Ordeal

.. (of all these)  is playing chase runs with Ken-ken, a nephew from a cousin, and making sure I run slow enough so that he catches me and then calls me a ‘good playmate’.

Back2Bikes

Runner-friends going to Baler to surf on an Adidas KOTR race weekend made me think of this one word:  VARIETY.   And while shopping around over the net for ideas on running training programs, I encountered the word:  CROSS-TRAINING.  So much for intro.  Haha.

Being a bara-bara runner, all I’ve done in the past as regard practices is simply base training, which is running –  just running as long and as far as you can hold it.  There are plenty of merits here, nonetheless, as this is supposed to test your endurance and then, after knowing just how short a time you can so far endure continuous running, that’s when you begin to seriously work on it. 

But this weekend, I put my ‘running addiction’ on hold and decided I should give it a shot to cross-train through mountain biking.   Truth is I’m no alien to cycling as in the past, I was really a mix of jogger-cyclist.  I do just whichever I feel like doing at the moment.  This time, however, when I decided to go cycling for my cross-training during my weekend sojourn in Bicol (for the Undas), my purpose was really that: to cross-train, that is, for cycling to serve my “running career” (if ever I have one to call as such, hahaha!).

The Bike Route:  Wowowee!  This is the via Dolorosa road, farther south of Nabua town proper.

So there we biked yesterday afternoon – a total of about 15k, with a quick visit to a relative and several photo-ops in between.  I was, as usual, with my brother, Daryl, who is my fave sports buddy whenever I’m home in Bicol.  This young man though has repeatedly jokingly complained about my slowness in pedaling that by the time we were finishing off the 15K distance and I had told him that we should go slower already for our “cool down”, the boy said:  “Eh kanina pa kaya tayo nagko-cool down!… Hehe!”  (with matching evilish grin).   AYUN, sapul na naman si Ate! 

We left the house around 3:30 PM and was back after two hours.  We spanned four barangays and the route was just perfect for biking – not too many cars passing by, air was fresh like what, plenty of shade from the trees alongside the road, and nice view.   Yesterday’s biking experience, minus the “ngalay effect” in the upper body, was surely a treat to me.

 

That’s Daryl riding tall on the yellow bike.

Refreshing view.  Makes you not-wanna-go-back to Manila.

Go Ate!

Above is my trainee, who apparently is better than me. 

She’s back to biking!

‘Kala ko magaling ka?

I’ve had an extraordinarily busy weekend and start of the week.  But I wasn’t RUN-less.

Friday night, I left GCC in Ortigas quarter to seven o’clock, then hired a cab to speed off to Cubao bus terminal right in front of Ali Mall.  I was going to have that night bus trip to Bicol with my older brother and his girlfriend, who went with him so that my parents could finally meet her.  As I got my seat number and ticket, I spent 30 minutes or so roaming around Ali Mall while waiting for my travel companions to arrive.  In Ali Mall, I almost got so tempted in taking home a black Converse hooded jacket that was on sale at 50% discount.  The rational self prevailed - ‘Cathy!  You have too many hooded jackets in your closet that you barely use!’ – and I left the Converse store almost half-convinced that it was the right choice to make.   

Anyway, I was in Bicol early morning of Saturday and as I had previously planned to do my long run there, I was cooking up in mind how, when, and where I shall have it.  After attending a family affair in Naga (which was the main reason why we were in Bicol, by the way), and chitchatting with my parents and siblings, I jumped to bed around 4 PM to get a quick nap with the intention of going for a late afternoon/ early evening run around 5:30 PM.  Things went amiss as my younger bro, who was supposed to be my running buddy, was still getting his haircut when I woke up and when he finally returned, it was nearing 7 PM and my parents wouldn’t permit us to go.  And mama says, ‘this is not like in UP where it’s OK to run even on late evenings…’  (in Bicolano, of course).  Late evening?!  It was just 7PM!!!  And I usually start my runs in UP at 8:20 PM the earliest?!  OH,..  Then again, I’m not in UP.  Not even in Manila.   Where people appear to have greater tolerance for weird behaviors.  Hahaha!

So my long run was moved to Sunday morning.  My brother and I drove to an elementary school at the town proper where there’s a track oval.  I was glad to see other joggers in the area, young and old alike, sweating it out round the track oval at varying paces -  a fourth of them just doing leisurely walk.  We did basic stretching and as I recall it, I kept on giving running tips to my brother while we were warming up.  Later on, I’d be so ashamed to see him do far better in that run practice than I did. 

The track oval was probably 500M long and so I told my brother we had to complete 20 rounds of continuous running.  Shame on me!  By my eighth round, I got terrible leg cramps so I suddenly slowed down, then walked, moved to the side, and sat by the grass with my legs all stretched horizontally, hoping the pain would subside.  It did, but only after 3 minutes or so – which I found to be long as I thought the aching sensation should leave me the very moment I sit down and rest my legs.  Na-ah.  Not that easy afterall.  Then I began wondering what I did wrong.  I think I hydrated my self well and I even did some stretching before running (in past, I wouldn’t even do any!)…

I rested some more and did some stretching while I watched my brother – I was all green in envy! – go round the track oval several times, all merrily enjoying his run, and I thought to myself that he glided rather smoothly all throughout!  What a lucky boy! 

I tried to do two more rounds and then called it quits.  It wasn’t a very good day to run for me as I felt another cramp attack was on the way while I pushed for a second attempt to do continuous running. 

And I was selfish as I went on calling Daryl to stop from running already and begin cooling down as I thought it’s time to go home already.  Hehe!  Perhaps, deep inside I was kinda ‘bad trip’.  My brother enjoyed his run so much that he haggled twice that we was gonna do one more round.  In short, from the moment I prodded him to stop, I actually waited for him to finish three more rounds.  Didn’t he enjoy so so much!  ;D

And when he finally stopped running, he came to me bearing this nice comment:  “O, akala ko magaling ka?… Hihihi!…”  So I snapped back at him, “nagka-cramps ako noh!  yabang mo, hmp!”   Inside my head, I said, “Buwisit ‘tong batang to ah!”