Came back from Bintan 2 weeks ago. Doesnt seem that long ago since everything is still fresh in my head. Left for Bintan on Friday the 23rd of May. Woke up late for Napfa that day and while driving saw Melvin's msg about not being able to find his passport. HAHAHHAHA.. So upon arriving at HIPS, which btw stands for Holy Innocents Pri Sch. (Yea i wished my sch had such a cool acronym too. Students there can call themselves Hipsters or Hippies or Hippos or wateva. So cool!!) Anyway, i started msging ppl to go in Melvin's place so as not to let the accomodation and ferry ticket go to waste. Din expect anybody to agree though since we were leaving on that day itself. Thankfully Melvin managed to get a temp pass.
Arrived and checked into our Dormitory at Nirwana Gardens. We din managed to get a room at the resort cos we booked too late. And the living conditions at the dorm were quite bad. Imagine a recruit's bunk at Tekong, now imagine twice the number of beds, and all double decker. Luckily the showers werent dirty. And being the nite b4 race day, lots of competitive triathletes were already slping so we couldnt make any noise. Cacausians are easily pissed off man. Twice we were told off to stop talking. Our race was in the afternoon so we didnt slp that early. And Jian Xue only slps at 5 on normal days, so apparently he was woken up jus when he fell aslp that nite. Hahahhaa. But the dorms werent that bad cos we made some frens there too. Fellow Singapore triathletes. Nice people.
Woke up for breakfast at the resort. Shiok buffet breakfast. Ate more so we didnt have to eat lunch since lunch wasnt provided for. This was the first race where i didnt have to start preparing for the moment i woke up. After breakfast, we still had a lot of time b4 the race so we hanged out at the pool bar and chilled. Bintan is a place to chill. Everything else is too expensive. 50 bucks to jet ski for 15 mins?? Crazy. I think i save the money and buy my own jet ski.
Woo race time. Started raining 15 mins b4 the race started. It was like frezzing cold. But just b4 the swim started the rain stopped. And so the race started with the 1.5km swim. Stayed at the back to avoid getting kicked in the face. Still managed to get muscled into the boundary line. I mean if u're swimming alongside me you would already have lost like the 100th position alrd, still wanna push me for wat..
Transition. Took my time to wear my clothes. Hahahah. Then i noticed Jian Xue and Melvin's bikes were alrd gone, so shit. I put on my shoes faster. Feels like CPFT all over again man. The familar feeling of putting on ur shoes when ur whole body is wet from the swim. Everything ON!! Push bike to start line. And started the bike leg for the triathlon. I think swimming is a great way to warm up. My legs always feel stronger after a swim. No explanations.
My bicycle chain came out 2 times during the race. Wasted time trying to put back the chain. And to top it off, the screw for the gear lever came lose so i had to screw it back while cycling, which resulted in my nails being chipped off. Luckily i had a brainwave, and used my watch buckle to tighten the screw. Den i had to stop to pin my number tag. Dunno how one side of the tag came lose. Terrible cycling experience. I'm gonna get a new bike if i'm ever to run a triathlon again.
After 42km, i finally get off the bike and nearing the transition area i take off my helmet.
"Hey you, ken shuong, put on ur helmet nw. STOP!! Put on ur helmet. Don't make me give u a penalty." ZZZzzzzz. I was like 20 metres away from my transition spot and i alrd got off the bike after 42km of torturous cycling and i gt to stop and put on my helmet to walk 20 metres before taking if off again. WTH. Not like i'm going for 1st prize.
Alright man. Finally the run started. My swimming isnt fantastic and i was cycling an ancient bike. Finally something that i could chiong. 100 metres still going strong. No strain on my lungs. ARGHHH. CRAMP. Ahhh crap. There goes my best segment of the race. Couldnt run even if i wanted to. My legs jus don't work. New experience for me. Nothing like tt has happened b4. But I walked like 40% of it and still managed a 1 hr timing. Weiqi runs 10km in 1hr 20mins. Either she's damn slow, or the triathlon route wasnt 10km. I think she's damn slow. Hahahaha.
Finally completed it. Just before it started raining again. Really quite lucky man. The rain stopped just for the race. Nothing much for the awards dinner later that nite. The mc was pretty guai lan. After the dinner the party moved to the beach club nearby. Melvin and Jianxue drank quite a lot it was embarrassing when they entered the dorm talking quite loudly and burping equally loudly. OMG damn pai seh. I wished i was drunk too.
Spent the next day chilling at the beach bar again. We were staying an additional night since cos we wanted a holiday too. Checked out the sea sports and realised it was not worth the money. Then we met a guide and he offered to bring us to the local kelong to eat at nite. The food was fantastic man. Especially the black pepper crabs. And there was another grp having a party there so we were entertained by their attempts to sing and dance. Left for a nearby KTV after dinner. The place was empty and we didnt know how did we end up inside but we tot it wouldnt be nice to leave jus afer the boss had turned on everything for us. So there we were, 3 chinese guys and 2 indonesian guys singing in an empty KTV pub. To make things worse, we didnt noe half the songs they provided. All the oldies from long b4 our time in the southern province of China. I was like murmuring the words cos they were in fan ti. Then the 2 guides picked their own indonesian songs and we were jumping ard to a song we didnt understand jus so we could liven up the atmosphere. Gosh.. Wat a long nite.
Finally went back to our resort room. Oh btw, we got ourselves a resort room by jus paying 18 bucks more on the 3rd nite. Hahaha. Shiok. This is getting too long. To cut the long story short, we slpt, woke up, ate breakfast, chilled at beach bar. Oohh and we caught 300 on the tv. Cool show.
Arrived in spore and Melvin and I cycled to east coast for dinner. Coming home was good. Bintan is too relaxing for me. I need to surf in Bali.
