Singapore Press Holdings Relays 2011

The Singapore Press Holdings Relay was held in Bukit Gombak Stadium over the weekend, 26th and 27th of Mar. It has been a disappointing weekend for the ACSi sprints relay. We managed to get a bronze in the 'C' Division 4 x 200m and gold medal for the 'A' boys 4 x 800m.



However we got disqualified for the A, B, C Div 4 x 100m. We had 2 weeks to practice the relay and the team also has a mixture of sprinters and jumpers. Our sprints team was not as strong although Haikel ran 11.3s. We therefore needed some of the jumpers to help us in the relays. It is due to the lack of practice and the coach's poor judgment that caused mistakes like these to happen.



Sengkang secondary on the other surprised us with a bronze medal in the 4 x 100m B boys. However the team consisted of all sprinters and had the same amount of practice as ACSi. Shawn was the only one running under 12s. Sengkang also took part in the 4 x 200m for B boys and C div- Boys and Girls.



I feel that this is a fantastic race right before the National Schools Competition and these relay competitions would also psych up ACSi sprints team and motivate them to do more practices for the upcoming events. They need to focus on being healthy and get as much rest as possible until the Nationals - which is in 2 weeks time.

All the best to all schools for their preparation to the Nationals!

For results and information,
Please visit : http://www.singaporeathletics.org.sg/sph-school-relays-championships-2011
For Photos :
Day 1 (part 1)
Day 1 (part 2)
Day 2 (part 1)
Day 2 (part 2)

Read More

Nanyang Polytechnic Invitation Race - 16th March 2011

It was a great turn out for the first ever invitation race organized by Nanyang Polytechnic to secondary schools to encourage participation of the B division athletes. There were 15 secondary schools in total whom registered for the event. Out of the 15 schools, I was in-charge of 2 schools - ACSi and SengKang Sec Sprints team. We took part in most sprints events and managed to get medals for the short sprints.

Haikel won the 100m with the time of 11.36s - 0.3s off his PB, which he clocked one month ago. Shawn came in 2nd following very closely behind Haikel with the time of 11.58s. This is also a PB by Shawn who started training with the team for about 2 months and managed to clock a PB 0.2s faster than his previous time. Catholic high sprinter settled for the 3rd place, 0.01s behind Shawn.

Chen Shan from Sengkang sec came in 1st for the 100m finals with the time of 13.7s. She had a lead of 5m to the 2nd runner and managed to run close to her PB. However, the senior athletes had not been training consistently due to the busy schedule of academic work they have to handle in school. The following are the pictures of athletes, who took part in the event.

Doris from SengKang Sec came in 2nd in the 1500m.


Aisha came in 2nd for the 400m, SengKang Sec.

Clyde Tan ran a good race and managed to fight till the end, to settle for a 3rd position. He was initially showed resistance to change to a proposed race plan that I've been trying to explain for the past few months. He did quite a bad time during the heats with his old race plan. However he came in 1s faster in the finals after using the race plan I've been coaching since months. His willingness to try new race tactic in the finals pleased me, especially during a training competition like this.


TEAM ACSi


Team Sky Track (SengKang Sec)

The Swift meet will be the next competition - SengKang Sec will not be taking part. Shawn Poh will be representing Singapore in the WALA competition in Perth. The next big competition will be the Nationals School, which is what everyone has been training for.

All thanks to organizers, coaches and teacher in charge, who made this event a success. NYP provided free T-shirts for all participants! I feel that this invitation races should be more often, and other schools should start to initiate invitation races to encourage more participants.

Till then..

Read More

Monitoring (internal load) of Aerobic Training (extensive interval)

We planned a lactate monitoring session on the 3rd March, 3rd microcycle of the phase. Gunter Lange advised us to work at 110% load of the maximum aerobic effort (30mins). To work at this range, the lactate measurement should be at 4-8mmol window. In order to identify that, we engaged Physiquezone to help us to do the testing. It was held at SJI and 9 of our athletes took the test. It was mainly athletes from Mr Melvin Tan's training group and our Reactiv athletes. We found quite a few interesting readings and the test results were sent to Gunter for simple analysis.

The Objective is to find the targeted time for the given distance workload and this is to facilitate the planning of the extensive intervals.

Ding Yifei from Physiquezone collecting data.


Jensen taking blood sample from Lance Tan who took part in the testing.

We were glad to have Yifei and Jensen to assist us in the testing. We will have testings like these to monitor our training loads and the next one should be done most probably in the next phase.

Read More

37th National Junior 2011: 5-6 Mar, Bishan Stadium

The weather was not forgiving at all. Under the scorching hot sun were the athletes who qualified for the 37th National Junior 2011. Most prefered to warm up indoors at Bishan Stadium because of the heat. The 2 day event drained the coaches, teachers, officials and the athletes. Competing under such high temperature, hydration was the number one issue to tackle. However, nearing the end of the event on Day 1, the meet was stopped abruptly by the lightning warning.



The schools are using these competitions to get their athletes ready for the coming National School Championships. From the results of the sprints, it is clear cut who are the performing schools. I'm not surprised by the competitive results, and in fact waiting for more impressive PB from the athletes. The Sports School athletes are sweeping most of the sprints events in all categories, boys and girls.

There were a few ACSi sprinters selected for the competition. Chern Hwee represented in the women 100m hurdles U20, came in 3rd with the time of 18.89s. Jonathan Wong came in 1st with a PB of 2.05.24 in the 800m U18 boys. Ariff in the same race but different fate, came in 2nd last with the time of 2.17.54. Ariff competed in the school sports day the day before and therefore the inconsistency of race result.


Haikel 2nd from the left

Haikel suffered from a headache and only managed to run 11.54s for the heats and 11.55s in the finals. Brian Foong ran the 400m U15 and managed to do a PB of 60.94s, but not good enough to squeeze into the finals. In the boy U18 400m race, Jonathan Wong did a 55.05s in the heats and 54.33s in the finals. And Jianjie ran the U20 400m with a time of 52.45s in the heats and 52.30s in the finals, fighting through the race to dip for the 3rd position, behind Zaki and Chin Hui - 2nd and 1st respectively.


Men U20 400m

The bulk of the participants were from secondary schools and JC, only 2 polytechnics took part, Singapore Poly and Republic poly. Zaki from Republic poly came in 1st in the 400m Hurdles with the time of 55.76s, giving a big lead to the 2nd man following behind him with the time of 63.00s

The next big thing coming up is the SPH relays. I will do my selection for the boys and girls to decide on the 6 runners for SPH.

For results and information,
Please visit : http://www.singaporeathletics.org.sg/37th-singapore-junior-athletic-championships-2011
For Photos :
Day 1
Day 2
For Videos :
Stay Tuned

Pictures and Videos courtesy of Singapore Athletic Association

Read More