absolutum dominium

and so training has started for the july race. my running is in the pits now. i can't begin to explain how much i feel like crying whenever i think of what my running has degenerated into. i run at the pace of fucking walking. i can't even keep up with the team at all anymore. when i run all i feel is pain; pain in my hamstrings, pain in my calves, pain when i breathe even, and i can't seem to will my mind to control my body.

i feel like a fucking weak loser, and i'll tell you tt honestly. sometimes i don't think i'm worthy to be in the team. i'm just not fit enough, not good enough. my running's a fucking pathetic joke. i'm a fucking senior and i need someone to run beside me to encourage me to run when i'm fucking 10 minutes behind the rest of the team and fucking old men are running faster than me.

but tt said whining and crying and feeling all upset and demoralised isn't going to change anything, nor is it going to make me a better runner, or less of a burden to anyone. i know i am a fucking big burden right now. i hold everyone back coz i'm so fucking slow tt a fast run denegerates into a long run for me. i hold back the people who run with me because they can't perform. i hold back training coz no one can get into the boat until i come back from the longest runs in my life.

so i will practice on my own. i shall run on my own. i need to correct my running technique otherwise it's going to keep hurting every fucking time. and it's not easy. it's a lot harder than i thought. i keep running on my toes, which puts too much pressure on my thighs and calves. i am trying to change, but i realise even my WALKING is on my toes, which is why the transition is so fucking minute. coz i am changing a whole life habit.

but i will do it. by july, i SHALL be a good runner. by july, i SHALL run on my heels. by july, i def SHALL be running with the team.

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in other news:

i don't know why. dragonboat is one of the most important things to me. it takes precedence over my studies, my social life, and admittedly even over my family. my parents are very unhappy tt this holiday i can't go overseas with them coz i have training. they actually wanted to meet me in penang after the penang race, but i told them i couldn't coz i had to fly home with the team for training.

but the thing is as i've said it before, i don't exactly like training. you'd have to have an iq of 0 not to already realise tt i hate running. you can tell, can't you? i'm okay with rowing, but i have a big problem with my very big biceps and towering (ok. not in height. more like in width) physique and my weight.

but i love dragonboat, because i love my team. i love the people tt i'm with, tt i train with, tt i have lunch with, tt i go on outings on. i love my big boss, people like yunshan, ah ping, cheez, geokz, and the si geena juniors (both the real si geenas and the by-the-way influenced ones). i love their idiosyncracies, their strange habits, their familiarity and most of all their company.

however, now tt the july race is 5 weeks away, i feel like something is missing. we're all there physically for training, we all push ourselves when we run and row... but somehow don't you feel an absence? maybe it's tt we haven't got tt "feeling" or chemistry yet, but i feel tt we all haven't understood the concept of rowing for each other.

dragonboat is a team sport. as the cliche goes, "there is no 'I' in 'team'." everyone is equally important, everyone has an equal part to play. as much as it is good to constantly improve yourself, to push yourself to the max, sometimes you should never forget tt you are rowing with 19 other people in the same literal boat as you. it's not just about you, it's about your teammates as well.

shouldn't it be about watching out for them as much as they watch out for you? shouldn't it be not so much about getting tt gold medal, but about rowing for them? carrying your own weight such tt they won't have to suffer carrying yours in addition to their own? carrying their weight when they get tired or they miss a stroke, because tt's just how it should be in the boat?

shouldn't it be about the spirit of the team, about taking training seriously and enthusiastically? i mean, since we all made the effort to come all the way down to kallang, shouldn't we make the best of our time here? shouldn't it be about focussing only on training? i mean, now tt we're here, no matter how many millions of problems we have, shouldn't we just leave them with our bags first until once debrief is done? what is the point of being distracted, what is the point of not putting in your 100%, what is the point of not being here completely physically and in spirit and giving your all?

aren't we all suffering together? don't we want to see each other happy at the end of all this? shouldn't we then be helping each other to improve as well, since the improvement of 1 rower alone does not a good boat make? shouldn't we be trying to encourage each other to go harder when the going gets really tough?

some people aren't used to encouraging each other verbally coz they think they might not be good enough. well, i personally think i'm not good enough, but i do it anyway coz i feel tt everyone needs encouragement and motivation, no matter what kind of a rower you are. like i said before, everyone is in the same boat. no matter how good you are, you will feel pain, you will feel suan, you will feel shortness-of-breath. and you will need motivation to continue. tt's how it should work, shouldn't it? similarly, when it comes to things like timing, strokes etc, you should never be afraid to correct others. you might not be completely correct yourself, but as long as you can accept other people's constructive criticism, you should not be afraid to give your own, junior or senior, because the objective is not to belittle any one rower, but to ensure tt everyone improves together. it's all part of looking out for each other.

i guess maybe right now there might be a sense of complacency coz july seems so far away, but now tt i think about it, 5 weeks is not a lot of time. june is going to come and go quickly, and we've barely started. we're not the best team in the world; we are up against very strong competitors.

i always thought tt the one thing tt our team had could make or break us is our heart. "one boat, one stroke, one heart". we have a boat, we have a stroke, but right now what we lack is the heart. and without the heart it doesn't matter how strong we are physically or mentally. we cannot win if we don't want to win, and we cannot win if we will not learn to row for each other.

so i hope tt we can find our heart soon; tt spirit, tt chemistry, tt produced a miracle one year ago.

let's row for each other.