Nestle Fitnesse Malaysia Women Marathon’s (MWM) Press Conference

I was invited to attend this Press Conference on official launching of Malaysia Women Marathon. It was an absolute honour and pleasure to support this historic inaugural event.

Congratulations to the Race Director – Karen Loh for having the audacity in making this event a reality. It will be an unforgettable Marathon i’m sure, especially for Women runners in this country.

Karen and I goes way back long before we established ourselves as Marathoner and Ultra Runner. It was my first 10km at the defunct Siemens 10km in 2010, i was happy to be able to completes that 10km race under 1 hour. I think i cried a little after crossing the finish line and thus earning the limited medal, it’s not an easy feat to achieve sub-60 minutes. Then i cried some more when i saw a lady already finished in front of me, that when i met Karen for the first time. Come to think of it, i met Kak June for the first time too  at that fateful Siemens 10km run.

Ok, enough about flashback. The PC was held at I-City Shah Alam, where the start line will be for MWM coming this April.

The idea behind this MWM is about empowerment to women, encouraging more women to run for health and happiness, especially to add more Women runners to run the Full Marathon distance which Malaysia is sadly very lack of.

I was inspired when the organizer showed us the short video clip of Katherine Switzer – i got goose bums watching that. Katherine Switzer is the first women to run Boston Marathon in 1967 which was only opened to Men runners at the time. When the Boston Marathon’s Race Director saw a women crashing that Men only event, he tried to stop her from finishing that fateful race. But her friends shielded her from that awful RD and she finished that Boston Marathon eventually. Women runners was barred from running competition soon after that. Finally after lobbying and intense campaign by Katherine Switzer and her friends, the Boston Marathon finally allowed women to run and compete in 1972, which open the door to other runs and Marathons for Women across the World.

The incident where the Boston Race Director tried to stop her running Boston Marathon.
Taken from www.katherineswitzer.com

Katherine Switzer is also the New York City Marathon 1974 champion with finishing time of 3:07:29 and her PB/PR is 2:51:37 .  She can beat many men with timing like that – me especially!

Yours truly announcing Kak Tiff running FVM at MWM. Sorry Kak Tiff, too late to back out now :p

After the PC, compulsory photo with MWM’s Race Director. Congrats Karen, a historic event for Malaysian Running Community. Proud to support and an honour to be involves with this event.

This year, we celebrates 41 years of Women running Marathon since 1972. The MWM is an historic event to celebrates this occasion, most timely as MWM and Boston Marathon will be held in the month of April.

More details on MWM (taken from Runwitme blog).

What? Malaysia Women Marathon 2013

Where? I City, Shah Alam
GPS coordinates 3.064753, 101.485391? +3° 3' 53.11", +101° 29' 7.41“

When? 7 April 2013 (Sunday)

Route:
The Route will traverse the the city of Shah Alam. This is the capital of the state of Selangor in Malaysia and is located about 25 kilometres (16 mi) west of the country's capital, Kuala Lumpur.
The Route will take you through a majestic Blue Mosque, the Sultan of Selangor palace, 2 grand stadiums, 2 beautiful lakes, an old museum and the beautiful shell shaped Royal Theater of Selangor. Not to miss on challenges, there are lots of inclines but who says women cannot live up to challenges. The route will be measured and sanctioned by a sanctioning body in Malaysia.

Special Feature of the Marathon:
We will have Katherine Switzer to flag off the event. She will be here to give inspirational talks and meet all the participants. We have a 2 days pre event program that will encompass from a women dialogue session of women in running where we have in the session, numerous women race directors who have organised runs of their own (some for which are ultras); to an award giving ceremony for a woman runner who has through her running injected some sense of empowerment and inspirational feature for other women to follow; and of course we are planning a fashion parade. Many more programs. Stay tuned.

Race Categories:
Full marathon Start Time : 430am
- Women open : age 18 – 39years old
- Women Veteran : age 40 onwards
- Couple Category - registration is done for 2 persons by the woman participant ie with 2 registration fee.
The distance for the full marathon is 42.195km and the cut off time allocated to complete the distance shall be 7 hours. Slightly challenging route but we wont be surprise to see all ladies finish before this time.
The couple category is open for women who would like a pacer who are either their husbands or their personal trainer (pacer) not being a female to run with them. She will have to register two registration under her name where her bib will be issued in a pair. There will be timing chip for both runners in this category. The male is also entitled to the race benefit other than winning prizes. They may stand a chance to win other consolidation prizes.
Half Marathon Start time : 530am
- Women open - age 16-39 years old
- Women Veteran : age 40 years old
- Couple category – registration is done for 2 persons by the woman participant ie with 2 registration fee.
The distance for the Half marathon is 21.1km and the cut off time allocated to complete this distance shall be 4 hours.
The couple category for women who would like a pacer who are either their husbands or their personal trainer (pacer) not being a female to run with them. She will register two registration under her name where her bibs will be issued in a pair. There will be timing chip for runners in this category. There will be timing chip for both runners in this category. The male is also entitled to the race benefit other than winning prizes. They may stand a chance to win other consolidation prizes.
8km fun run Start time 7am
- Women open – age 16-39 years old
- Women Veteran : age 40 years old
The Fun run distance is 8km. The runners where will be issued a bib but will not be given a timing chip. MWM will record only the top 30 runners of the 8km women open and veteran for the result list. A certificate without timing will be given at the end of the race to the runners.

Register here: MYraceonline.

So what are you waiting for? Run Sisters Run :)