Established in 2014 and organised by Melaka’s Skyhawk Marathon Club, the Skyhawk Nature Run is a boutique 22km road run that brings runners through the picturesque countrysides and kampongs of Melaka.

Heading to Melaka

With the race taking place early on Sunday, my friends and I reached Melaka on Saturday morning, taking the bus down from Singapore with the MacRitchie Runners 25 running club. We stopped in Yong Peng in Johor along the way for a local hawker breakfast of egg and noodles.

Race Pack Collection

After breakfast, we headed down to the race venue upon reaching Melaka, which was at Rumah Melaka to collect our race packs. 

This was a fuss-free and small-scale affair and as there was no queue, I was in and out within five minutes with my race tee and running bib.

Apart from a few photo opportunities, there had been a few booths selling items such as energy gels, running sandals and race merchandise on-site. 

As it was an outdoor collection venue, it was quite warm though, with the sun pretty much out in full force.

Then after checking in at our accommodation, the rest of my Saturday was then spent doing a bit of exploring and sightseeing, before heading for an early group dinner followed by a quick round of drinks at the Hard Rock Cafe nearby.

Race Morning

I dragged myself out of my comfortable hotel bed at 4am on Sunday morning for my pre-race morning ritual to prepare myself for the 6am race flag-off. It was still early and even though I was feeling rather groggy, there was absolutely no way that I was not going to make it on time for the race.

We met up at the hotel lobby at about 4:40am and took a bus to the race starting point after a quick pre-race group photo. The bus ride from the hotel took about 15 minutes.

Soon after arriving at the race site, there was a warm-up Zumba session prior to the race, but I didn’t take part in this, because I didn’t want to exhaust myself unnecessarily.

As I hung around the starting point to wait for the race to begin, I wondered whether I was at a running event in Singapore or Malaysia; this is because there were so many familiar faces whom I recognised from the Singapore running community. In fact, it had seemed as though every running club in Singapore had a group of runners participating in this race.

The Race Start

The run itself started punctually at 6am, with runners divided into two waves, A and B, based on our estimated finish times. I was in the first wave.

I started running at about 6 minute kilometres, which is mostly a pretty steady pace for me.

First Half Was Dark

During the first half of the race, it was still dark so I didn’t get to see much along the way. The weather felt slightly breezy, and it started raining about 4km into my run.

At first, it had been a moderate rainfall, but it lightened into a drizzle, which had made it perfect weather for running.

Running on Country Roads

The countryside nature of the run and the trees around us, also cooled down the temperature a bit, so it was not as warm as a run in the city centre would usually be.

And despite the roads not being fully closed, the run felt quite safe as we were running on the small country roads for most of the distance.

And for the larger roads, there had been cones to cordon off the running paths and the motorists who were plying the roads at the time seemed to be respectful and careful of runners.

The quality of the roads were also quite good for countryside roads. Throughout the route, the roads were paved and smooth, with barely any portholes or uneven segments in sight, similar to the streets in Singapore.

As well, the marshals were very attentive and did a great job in terms of taking care of runners’ safety and directing the runners where to go so that we did not get lost.

Also, I soon realised that the terrain was pretty hilly, with constant upslopes and downslopes throughout the whole course.

Aid Stations

There had been aid stations at regular intervals, about 3 to 5km apart, which were serving water, isotonic, and Red Bull. As well, a couple of them also served fruits such as watermelons and bananas. So I have to say that the runners were being looked after very well.

The biggest aid station was definitely the one at the halfway point and it felt like a giant party there, complete with ladies dressed up in Nyonya costumes. I stopped there to munch on some of the fruits and took plenty of photos.

I did not see kilometre markings at every kilometre along the route. There were some markings, but these were quite sporadic. The ones I did see, though, had been accurately positioned, when measured against my own GPS watch.

Melaka’s Kampong Life

I got my first glimpse of the sights and sounds of kampong life in Melaka when the sun came out, at about 12km into my race. There were the sounds of roosters crowing as well as fruit trees and oil palm plantations surrounding me on both sides.

It was rustic, beautiful and mesmerising and completely unlike anything that I have ever seen in urbanised Singapore. 

And from that point onwards, I found myself enjoying the run thoroughly. I really couldn’t help myself but whip out my phone to take some photos along the way.

At one point during my run too, I also saw a couple of young kids from one the kampong houses standing at their doorstep, watching the race take place and clapping as the runners passed by. It would have been nice to see more of the villagers cheering us on, but I guess that the timing was too early for most of them to be awake. Nonetheless, I still really loved every minute of it.

Funny Signages

As well, the organisers also had a nice sense of humour, because along the way, I saw funny yet educational signs plastered onto the trees, for example, “I am mangosteen tree. This is my family.” These brought a small smile to my face as I ran along.

It had been about 15km into my race when I saw another runner dressed up as a beer bottle running in front of me; it took about a kilometre of pushing harder, to finally manage to catch up to him. I then took a selfie with him before overtaking him.

My heart rate started to climb a bit by this stage of the race, and I had to back off the pace a little to try and keep it within the steady zone. This was not a key race for me, after all.

For the last few kilometres of the run, I allowed myself to cruise towards the finish line, whilst thoroughly soaking up the amazing sights and sounds all around me.

Finishing The Run

My mind began to play tricks on me at the 21km point. Though I already knew that this was a 22km and not a 21km race, I had to try and psych myself up to finish off that final kilometre.

I crossed the finish line in an official time of 2 hours 12 minutes 49 seconds. It is a time that I am quite happy with. We were able to get our result the moment we had finished, which I think should be the case for every running event.

Goodie Bag and Food Buffet

Besides our finisher medal and t-shirt, we received a goodie bag containing a few product samples from the various sponsors, including a gigantic can of milk powder as well as some instant coffee.

The finish area turned out to be a buffet party filled with all sorts of local and international delicacies. We had potong ice cream, putu piring, curry puff, spring rolls, sandwiches, kuih, milo van, instant coffee, breakfast cereals, packaged bread rolls and much more.

I could probably have eaten my breakfast right here and then – if I did not have another round of breakfast buffet waiting at the hotel for me.

Nonetheless, I still tried some of the items mostly because I can’t resist food. The putu piring was a nice touch, but my favourite was probably still the ice-cold Milo. After all, nothing can ever beat the Milo van, in my opinion.

As well, I caught up with several of my running friends after finishing and we shared about how we had enjoyed the race, while waiting for our bus to take us back to the hotel at about 9:45am.

It began to get rather warm while we were hanging around the race village, so perhaps it was a good thing, after all, that the race start time had been quite early, in order to avoid the searing tropical heat.

I had a great time

As a whole, I have to say that I really enjoyed my experience at the Melaka Skyhawk Nature Run, and that this is a race that I would most definitely take part in again. 

In fact, I have to admit that I’m already looking forward to participating in the next edition of this boutique running event. When can I sign up?