Ride to Manjung : Powerman lumut 2009

Mainly road are straight and flat.

At Kuala Selangor


I think this is just after the left turn heading towards Lumut. Go straight and you'll reach Teluk Intan



Didn't know they would have rice fields here..



Pic by Tanjung Nana...




With friends doing the powerman lumut this year, I thought a ride to Manjung (lumut) would be nice. Not knowing that place well, I googled up the direction that have to be taken using the shortest path. Map says it's around 200km starting from Damansara Perdana to lumut.

I was going to travel light so I just brought a pair of clothing, since I've no need to race.

Got started out at 7:40am, and headed towards Damansara Perdana. This would be an additional 20km plus. There's also another group cycling northwards (KK, Lisar, Ghani and Randy) but I think they left much earlier.

Well, the route was not much of a scenery on the path towards kuala selangor. Not that much flat either. But after Kuala Selangor, it was all the way flat and straight. Now, if I had brought my TT bike, I would be flying, but on the roadie, I could only sustain 36kmh.

And the heat was getting hotter. Almost no clouds and mostly sunshine. I had to stopped for a few times to quench on some cool drinks.

I couldn't really remember the small towns I've passed, but I think they were Sekinchan, Sg Besar, Sabak Bernam and countless others. Not that the route was memorable anyway, except nearing Teluk intan, where there were fields of rice, and coconut plantations.

At the last 15km, I had to stopped for another coconut drink, when Raymond's car stopped for a chat. Well, the last few miles was pretty slow, but when I noticed my avg was hovering around 29.9, that had me pushing the speed.

I reached Manjung around 4plus with an avg of 29.7 but that was because of the traffics into the town. Distance is 219km.

Glad to meet friends at the registration hall, and I was just glad I wasn't going to do the race tomorrow...or so I thought.

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Now, Victor Loh had an unfortunate crash on the same morning. Tony called and asked if I could take his place. I thought it's possible, but I wouldn't be in the best shape to race. I've just got my road bike, and more than 8 hours on the road with the heat and all.

Well, why not. Raymond Ng and Michelle was gracious to lend their tri gears.

However, it was only in the morning I noticed the back wheel had a puncture. Did a quick change for the tube, and hope for the best. Anyway, I still had a feeling it would puncture again.

The race started at 7:30am, and I found myself running on the streets of Manjung. I saw Raymond Ng way in front, so I thought it would be a good idea to see if I could reach him. Then saw Emma, then Sam. Yes, I was pushing it, but not to the point of exhaustion, because there's still a bike race and another run. Somehow, the cycling legs and running legs are mutually exclusive...I managed to clocked 46:58 (11km) as I reached the transition.

Now for the bike, that's another story. I didn't pushed so hard, just mainly focusing on cadence. Saw Emma cruising pass in high gears. Well the view was kind of nice when reaching the 2nd bridge. Not much of a climb on that one.

The only notable experience was racing with a guy in an orange Trek TTX with a disc wheel at the back. He was... on the slow side. Perhaps 31, 32kmh, which is not how you should ride one. With this kind of ride, you should go as fast as 35 at least to gain the most out of it. Managed to pass him a few times, and then...the dreadful puncture happened at 26km mark.

Well, I didn't actually wanted to do this, so I guess everything else is a bonus. So I had a van ride back.

Then, met with CK and Jaja, and we chatted while looking at the athletes went pass for their 2nd run. It was only when Roger came at 10:30 that I decided to suffer as well. Tried to asked him to match my pace, but he was in some kind of back pain. Oh well...then, I saw Razani way in front. So that's my carrot.

I chased him down and managed to caught up with him. Actually I just wanted to see how fast he was running, so I maintained the pace. It was his 2nd lap actually. At the pace we're running, we are zooming the rest of the field.

Then on the 2nd loop, saw Keat Seong and Mich. I noticed KS could do a sub 4 hour, so I goaded with to come with me. He did managed to score a sub 4, while I just detour from the finishing line. It would be nice to cross it, but it's not proper to celebrate the whole thing if you didn't complete it.

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Would I do a Powerman next year? Probably yes...but of course not cycling there.