Malacca River International Marathon 2014

Full Marathon in Malacca?

Yours truly just recently learned about a full marathon in Malacca. It will be held on 8th June 2014. On offer is RM120,000 worth of cash prizes. Yes, I know it just popped up out of the blue.  Who in their right mind wouldn't be suspicious? I emailed them and even got friends to ask around. The feedback wasn't promising at all from certain quarters. They were some from the town itself who were mighty suspicious of this run from previous experiences. They were those who were even willing to boycott it. They gave me their reasons, some I agreed with, and some I didn't. The organisers sent me the registration form and answered my questions. I gathered from what I got that they were still trying to get their act together. Yes there would be a running t-shirt and a medal and a cert for the full marathon finisher. Unfortunately they were still looking for sponsors for the finisher t-shirt.  However they have RM120,000 in cash prizes (?)

What I also gathered was that this is a government backed run contracted out to another party. I know next to nothing about the organisers apart from what they have told me. The early bird fee is RM75. The dateline for entries is 31st May 2014. One of my friends asked me whether I would sign up for it based on what I now know. I told them I wouldn't sign up for it because I wouldn't have recovered enough in two weeks after running the longest race in my life. Also, this marathon will be run on the same day as Beaufort 100km. My friends know how much I wanted to run it. However when it changed from 60km to 100km and they slapped a 15-hour cut-off time for a run in the blazing sun I knew it was an impossible ask for this Fat Old Man Running. Show of hands please from those who know who Heritage In Run are?  While I so wish to promote local marathons, I also want my constant runners to check up on them before signing up.

So please remember, while this post appears in my blog, I am not asking you to sign up for it. I am just telling you come 8th June 2014 there is supposed to be a full marathon in Malacca. Forgive me for my eyes are old and tired, but I read that the race kit can be collected till 7am on the actual race day. I don't know about you, but I have never started a full marathon in my entire life in sunlight. My constant readers know that I usually take six hours to finish a marathon. That would mean if I ran this I would hit the finish line at 1pm! Plus if I want to be critical the entire registration form is littered with grammatical mistakes. I am entitled to make mistakes since I am not writing a document open to legal scrutiny. However the shoddy nature of the English opens the doorway to many questions about the organiser. The fact that they do not have their own website or that registration is manual also is an eye opener.

Please don't say I am anti this run or that. It's just that I am curious how this run came to drop into our laps. I won't be the guy losing RM75 over this. That's not to say that this run won't happen. I even believe that the people behind it might be legit. However so little is known about them or the run itself to make me believe if I signed up that I would be running it come the date. With all that I have said I leave it to you my dear constant runner to decide. The forms can be found below. If you have RM75 to spare you are most welcome to run it and then email me about your experiences and also send me links to your photos. I would like to learn from your experiences. Then come next year if the same run drops from the sky again I might even consider running it. Here's me hoping that everyone goes into this with their eyes wide open. Just don't say I didn't warn you. Happy running always everyone!