Monday, September 07, 2009

IM MY Tips for Peter and Paul

Miscellaneous
  • Be careful of the huge bike bag surcharges by Air Asia.
  • Its OK to rent a car at the airport (cheap)
  • Latest to get there is Thursday mid day. Race is on Saturday.
  • Stay at Kondo Istana. Langkawi has over capacity hotels actually.
  • The carbo loading (Thursday) and prize giving (Sunday) dinners are very boring, food also finishes very quickly. The regulars don't bother going.
  • Thursday is officially the last day to do the medical check-up and collect the race numbers (you can do it on Friday if you let them know in advance).
  • TBB and other bike mechanics provide a brilliant service before, during and after the race for free.
  • Race briefing is on Friday morning at Langakasuka Hotel. The briefing will prove that you don't need anaesthetic to sleep.
  • Bike and transition bags check in is on Friday.
  • The car parks around the race start / area are open on race day.
  • No transport is provided to / from race site.
  • You can still pump your tyres etc on race morning. You can even put your bike shoes, helmet etc on the bike in the morning. Its not necessary to throw everything in the bike transition bag.
  • The bike transition bag is available to make last minute adjustments on race morning. OK, my brain's dead.

JELLY FISH

Its normally a very good idea to do a swim warm up the morning before the race. Its a very nice swim course. However Langkawi is notorious for jelly fish and every year people seem to get stung.

2009 was quite bad. Even TTH got stung and not very far from the pontoon. Ade Lim and myself, we had to get a jab from a clinic in town. The jab saved us, allowing us to have a good sleep.

They spend the whole day trawling the area with nets. In the mornings, the trawlers haven't started yet. The good thing is, the sting gets you all ready for the race.

6 comments:

peter chan said...

hi sofian. wow, thanks for the very detailed tips. paul and i are blessed. big corporations pay big bucks for advice from boys with 5 years experience. we are getting gems of tri wisdom gained over 25 years - for free !!! thanks for digging deep and coming up with those beauties, sofian.
'the briefing will prove that you dont need anaesthetic to sleep' - haha, good one.
jelly fish, jelly fish - hasnt someone come up with a concoction that keeps them away, like serai for mozzies? would be so disappointing to train for months and then be immobilised by a sting the day before the race.

Simon said...

Excellent advice Sofian, Peter and Paul can be very confident that all you have said is spot on.

You might have overplayed the Jellyfish though. I "see" one most years but have not got stung yet. I think that you have to be pretty unlucky to "catch" one.

One other point is the sealice are always there and very annoying - tiny irritating stings but nothing to worry about it's part of the race. As you say the swim is lovely and usualy out and back with rope and boys every 5 metres - it's just like a swimming pool but as it's salt water it's far more buoyant.

Looking forward to it already.

sofiantriathlete said...

Thank you Simon. See Peter and Paul, we will all pull each other through.

plee said...

Thanx Sofian! This is brilliant!Jellies usd to be my biggest concern in the sea and I have trawled the net for remedies.... Vinegar(to stop the stingers from firing further afterwards), anti histamines/inflamatories to reduce the allergic reaction(wud be illegal for pros I suppose) but nothing conclusive...

And yup Simon,Sofian....thats is the beauty of triathlons you go out battling against yourself but you are never really alone..!?!

Emma said...

One of two things may happen in the swim. Year 2007: sea lice chewed munched and made a complete breakfast, lunch and dinner of Emma. FastForward to 2008. I hugged a HUGE jelly, dealt with it (passed to to sexy chris) and had no nibbles from sea lice at all! What will be thrown at me in 2010...bugger knows...I am planning on being so bloody fast in the water the nasties won't have a cat in hells chance of catching me!!! oops...wake up!!

sofiantriathlete said...

Penang did the first Tri in Msia in 1988 and it ended in the early 90s. The last race was at Park Royal Hotel, Batu Ferringhi. Absolutely hundreds of jellies. The race leader (Martin Hager, Brit) was screaming and throwing the jellies aside. Aussie Paul Shearer came out with a jellie wrapped around him. More than half stopped (including Razani). Me and Wong Yew Kin got our highest placings ever. Now one bite at LKW and I rush off to the clinic.