supamun's Diaryland
Diary
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ippt gold
Call me boastful, but I have to blog about my IPPT gold. To me, it is a significant event in my NS life, and will have effects more far-reaching than I care to disclose to the masses. But far more importantly, it is about professionalism, honor and the mighty triumph of unyielding determination, insatiable hunger and dogged perseverence, the exhorcism of your inner demons which threaten to derail you from success in all your challenging endeavors.
Having just finished a gruelling 3 day 2 night trench digging exercise, aptly named exerrcise earthworm, in the outskirts of the run down military instalation called sembawang airbase, where we spent all our free time clutching a spade, changcoal or pickaxe trying to dig through earth as old as the planet, and unbudging slude caused by rain infiltrating moist sand, we were scarcely given time to recuperate as 2 days later, we were called to the frontline again to battle the monster that is IPPT.
I had wanted to do the bare minimum for each of the 4 stations to get a gold incentive standard, but unfortunately, I did 2 more extra for my pull-up and caused a tinge of pain on my inflamed finger tendon, an old injury, because of consistent egging by my sgts. Gary was damn good. I reckon I could have equalled his achievements in most of the stations, but my priority then was to secure the ippt gold, which i wasn't even sure I had in me, as opposed to getting ethe company best PT.
So on to the run. I had a slight scare when the PTI announced we might be split into 2 groups, and this would place me in the group without joseph seah and ben chan, people i was planning to pace ( not so much ben chan but jose), but it proved to be a false alarm. At the start, I was alredy finding keeping up with joseph to be an extremely tiring job, although I stuck with it, but after overtaking him by a hair's breadth for a few seconds, I gave up, and eventually gary saravanan and raymond also got in front of me. At the reverse point, my watch read 5:15, which caused a slight stir in me, because I knew that I was slightly behind time. I pondered of giving up, having a weak mental disposition, but i steeled my resolve as I knew that I had a good shot at the gold if i continued, as my timing was still within the buffer zone. As I came round the bend, I could see the finishing line in sight, but it being not the first time I was running the route, I was not fooled by the seemingly near finish point, and I was proved dead right. With 2 minutes to go, I experienced increasing fatigue, but I still continued to make steady progress, inching my way, a painful step each time, closer to the end. But my buffewr was wearing thin. With 45 seconds left befor emy gold was stripped from me, I knew I had to do something drastic if I were to achieve the incentive standard. I quickened my pace, from a canter, to a gallop, and finally embarked on an all- out lung-bursting sprint, dragging my battered, sweaty and aching body past the finishing line with 4 seconds to spare. I was the last man to get the gold timing. REJOICE! I have to thank god for this achievement. The 2 weeks before, he blessed me with conjunctivitis, which earned me 4 days attend C, which I used to train my running at home.
9:25 p.m. - 2006-09-01
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