The Hong Kong 10k race - My story

The alarm went off very early this morning, but actually I was already awake by then with Linnea who had been complaining about an ear ache and had trouble settling.
Suited up and packed the last few things into our bag, and off we went at 03.30 this morning, down to the MTR.
It was such a cool feeling to be in the MTR this morning, since everybody else who was on the train were also going to the race. There was race t-shirts, sneakers, time chips and power bars galore on the train! Ha ha! Probably the only time nobody cared if there was eating going on on the train, something that normally is against the law here in HK.

We got up to the start area rather early, and since Nathan was with us we didn't need to go and use the drop-bag service. Instead we used the porta-loos (!) quite a few times!
The start was on the high way, on top of a big rise. We were early so we saw the first group set off, and got first in line for our start. We had signed up in the group "Can complete 10k in 1h10-1h20".

And - off we went, under some fireworks and by lots of cheering! It was still dark outside (the start was at 05.40), and actually for most of the race. We ran along the highway and could see the mist lift off the sea, it was quite a sight.
The first kilometer I ran like the wind, trying to create some space for myself at the same time as I was concentrating on not getting run over. The 2nd to 4th kilometer were probably the worst, and then there was the first water station and a turn point.

Starting to run back made slightly perkier, but not much... I experienced some groin pain which made it painful to go especially down-hill (yes, there were hills!), and as fast as I would've wanted.
At 8k we passed the starting point so after that it was unknown route. Just before the finish it was one last, big hill and then I tried a big sprint into goal! I'm not sure what the official timing will be, but my watch stopped at 1h05:45!
The fastest 10k I've done yet - and I nearly met my goal of under 1h05.

At the finish I stood waiting for Vicky for quite a while. I thought she was behind me since I hadn't seen her go past, but she had (sneaky!) already at 4k! She came in on 1h01! Well done!
After the confusion we finally met up, got our goodie bags with water, bananas and müesli bars etc - and found Nathan too.

Imagine the masses though - there was 37 000 participants, in just the 10k race! 37 000!!!
And at least two of them were very happy with their efforts!