The TRI-Factor Series – Asian Championship 2017/2018 is a four-legged mass participation sports series that consists of an individual swim, bike and run event, and culminating in a finale triathlon.

According to the event organisers, the four legs of the event will allow swimmers, cyclists or runners to participate throughout the year to hone their skills and confidence, possibly eventually progressing to the triathlon.

Tenth anniversary edition this year

Debuting at the 2018 edition of the TRI-Factor Series, which had also marked the tenth anniversary of the event this year, was the Long distance which is a 2.25km Swim, a 42km Bike Ride and a 15km Run.

As well, the Standard, Sprint and Freshman distances were also available too in order to cater to triathletes of all abilities.

Took part in the Sprint Triathlon 

Thanks to Astavita, who are one of the sponsors and the Official Sports Supplement of the event, I took part in the TRI-Factor Triathlon (Sprint Distance) which consisted of a 750-metre swim, an 18km Bike Ride and a 5km Run.

The flag-off time for my Sprint event had been at 9.40am this morning.

Did not get much sleep

I admit that I did not get much sleep last night though, because I had been busy at the National Stadium, watching and covering the Paris Saint-Germain VS Arsenal football match and as a result of this, I did not manage to get my forty-winks till the wee hours of the morning. 

But then again, how could I possibly forego the chance to watch my favourite football team live in action?

Heading down to Angsana Green – the starting point 

I was up at about 7.30am again to get changed and to prepare my stuff for my Sprint Triathlon, which was taking place at Angsana Green, East Coast Park. Then I cycled down to Angsana Green. This was roughly about 4.5km away from my home so it was an easy warm-up ride for me.

I reached Angsana Green at about 9am, which gave me plenty of time to do my body markings, lay my things out in the transition area and then head over to the various sponsor booths to see what was available.

Astavita Booth

Astavita, where I have been an ambassador for the past year, had a booth there, and they were giving out free strawberry ice cream to participants.

A supplement company, Astavita are the world’s leading producers of Astaxanthin – a unique and powerful antioxidant that is found in nature – and which can provide a myriad of benefits such as muscle endurance and recovery, and improvement of eye, skin and brain health.

And as I had guessed that it may already be late by the time I finished my Sprint Triathlon, I decided to get one of the ice creams before my event began. This had turned out to be a good choice on my part.

As I had not eaten breakfast prior to heading down to Angsana Green, the ice cream had tasted refreshing and gave me a good sugar rush too, before my event.

With about 20 minutes left to go till my flag-off, I headed down to the Start Line to catch the earlier waves flagging off. 

Apparently because it had been low tide this morning, many of the earlier waves had to begin their race inside the water rather than at the Start Line on the sand.

Entering the Start Pen

But soon enough though, 9.40am rolled around and it was my time to enter the start pen. Mine had been one of the first few waves to begin from the official Start Line, so perhaps that was a good thing.

As we had been waiting to start, the emcee was great in hyping up the mood and the atmosphere with his funny and witty comments. 

For example, my wave was the Ladies Sprint wave and the emcee had taken the chance to joke about how he was surrounded by so many lovely ladies, which made me laugh a little.

Said Sabrina Rizzo-Cervenka, 38, a Stay-at-home Mum, “I liked the energy and the vibe. The emcee did a great job and everyone was in a good mood as we were all here this morning for the same purpose.”

The emcee also recognised me and when he had spotted me inside the start pen, he said, “Oh, and Pris Chew… she is here too.” It was quite funny but it had brought a smile to my face.

I have to point out though, that while my wave had started on time, earlier waves had actually been delayed because of the choppy conditions of the water. 

But the organisers had managed to make up for all the lost time though, by speeding things up. So this meant that my wave was punctual.

Swim was a real challenge 

However the swim leg was very challenging though. There was quite a lot of current and I will be honest in saying that I had struggled with this leg. 

As well, there was also one point in time during the swim when I had to stop for several minutes to catch my breath because I was panicking, no thanks to the current which kept threatening to sweep me further and further away from the lane rope. 

Also, the waves were quite high and went up over my head on numerous occasions, so there were times when I could not see where I was going, either, and this did not really help with my swimming. The last thing I had wanted was to go off-course and thus clock extra distance as a result.

But I was not alone with my thoughts. Other triathletes at the event had also felt that the swim leg was quite tough. 

Said Glenn Prunster, 35, a Chartering Manager in the Shipping industry, “The swim was tough. This was my first triathlon so I did not really know what to expect.” 

He continued, “There was a lot of current, so this made it very hard to work out which way you were going and everyone was also on top of one another, kicking each other.”

And agreed Sabrina, “Oh the swim was tough. We were trying to swim against the current and it kept on sweeping us to the right. We also could not see where we were going and we had to keep on swimming back.”

Regardless, I had thought the swim leg was quite well organised. There had been boats in the water all along the swimming course to ensure the safety of all the participants. 

As well, if anyone had been in trouble, they could simply signal to the nearest boat for help or else to be fetched out of the water.

After swimming for what had felt like forever, it was a relief – when I finally spotted the shore up ahead. So I picked up the pace and swam a little faster. 

This is because it had meant that the swim leg was finishing and that I would be able to hop onto the bike, possibly the easiest leg of the triathlon for me.

Bike leg was easy and relaxing 

And as for the bike, I would say that I had definitely enjoyed this particular leg, which had been three loops consisting of six kilometres each. 

It was definitely a breath of fresh air for me, after the challenging swim. 

Though the sun had come out by now, the weather when I was on the bike was still not too hot yet, and there was a cool breeze blowing when I was cycling.

The bike course was also flat enough, with some gentle slopes but nothing challenging. We cycled from Angsana Green towards Area G of East Coast Park and back to complete each loop.

However as I was riding though, I spotted a couple of other participants walking back and wheeling their bikes in the opposite direction. 

Apparently these had been amongst several participants who had crashed on the bike leg but I’m not sure what the reason for the crashes could have been.

Other triathletes had enjoyed the bike leg. Said Glenn, “The bike was good. It was easier than expected although there were a lot of crashes at one part when we come down. I was quite surprised at the crashes because it had been quite an open road.”

And added Camine Bouzerot, 28, a Consultant in a Firm, “The Bike was good. But a lot of people fell. I’m not sure why either. Perhaps the course was slippery at some point. But I was fine and I hope that people were not injured by their fall.”

Run Leg was Hot

However it was quite late by the time I was done with the bike leg and had progressed to the running leg. 

A couple of hundred metres into the running leg, I spotted Ben Pulham – the founder of heart-rate training programme Coached – who has been my running coach for the past couple of years now. Ben spied me too, and he cheered me on, shouting my name.

I must say that had been quite motivating to see him there and supporting the Coached athletes and I was surprised but happy that he had dropped by the TRI-Factor Triathlon event site.

As for the running route, this had been one 5km loop which took us from Angsana Green towards Area C of East Coast Park and back. This is the area where the old Burger King outlet used to be, before it was closed down to renovate the area.

Running is usually my strongest leg, but as I was running, I felt like I was suffocating, no thanks to the heat. I was secretly hoping for a drizzle to cool me down.

Other participants had also felt that the run was hot. Said Sabrina, “The run was tough because it was so hot by then. It may have helped if the organiser had started the triathlon earlier, say at 7am.”

And added Glenn, “The run was torture. When I began running, it was 10.30am and really hot by this stage. The sun was high in the sky and shade was hard to come by. I am normally a runner, but this time it was just too hot for me.”

So as a result, I had to slow down in order to keep my heart rate under control, in the Steady Zone. Due to body fatigue combined with a lack of sleep, I felt that it was not advisable for me to push my body too hard.

More Hydration Points 

Due to the heat, it would have been helpful if there were more hydration points along the way. For the 5km running route, there were two hydration stations, due to the out-and-back course.

And added Glenn, “It would be good if there had been more hydration points because of the intense heat during the run.”

But I thought that these aid stations were not really well managed though, and there was also an occasion when there were no hydration cups at the first hydration point, so this meant that participants had to stop and fill up their own cups themselves, which would waste time for those who were still on target for a personal best.

Said Camine, “A few of the hydration points were missing water, especially the one at the roundabout towards the end of the race. Maybe there could have been more people at the water stations to manage these better.”

Direction Signages

But at least the direction signages had been quite clear and idiot-proof though, with large markings to indicate for example, when to u-turn and when to continue on straight. 

The course was already easy enough to navigate, but there were marshals too, to show the triathletes the way, in case anyone was not sure. I had thought that this was quite good. 

Said Glenn, “The directions were clear and the layout of the route was very easy and clear too. Overall the run was well-organised and well-executed.”

And agreed Camine, “The directions were good and there were enough people to show us where to go.”

On the way out, it had been a bit hard to motivate myself to run, but when I had reached the u-turn marker, I told myself that there was just 2.5km of running left between me and the finish line, in order to spur me on to complete the Sprint Triathlon. 

Finishing

In the last 100-metres of my run, I saw the Oakley 100-Metre Dash signage on the ground, and this gave me the incentive to speed up and cross the finish line strongly, despite all my earlier struggles in fighting sleep throughout.

Sports sunglasses manufacturers Oakley had also been one of the sponsors of the TRI-Factor Triathlon and they too, had a booth at the event.

The moment that I had crossed the finishing line and the finisher medal was placed around my neck, I must admit that I felt more of relief rather than anything else. 

It had not been easy and my timings had been quite slow I must say, but I had proved to myself that it was still possible to complete a Sprint Triathlon with barely any sleep. 

Throughout the race though, I think that I was possibly swimming, cycling and running on adrenaline, still feeling the high of having witnessed my football team winning 5-1 last night.

Soon after finishing my event, I was also pleasantly surprised when the event’s camera crew had approached me for an interview, to ask me for a few quick comments about the TRI-Factor Triathlon’s tenth year anniversary this morning.

My mind had still been all over the place at this stage, but fortunately for me though, the questions were easy enough and luckily I didn’t really get tongue-tied answering any of them.

Catching ups with Friends and the Astavita Team

Upon completing my Sprint Triathlon, I took the chance to catch up with several friends who had also been participating at the event, including Serene Cheong and her hubby Jeremy Lee as well as another friend Desmond Loh, amongst others.

As well, I also met up again with the rest of the Astavita team. From Astavita, both Vincent Wood, the President, as well as fellow ambassador Bert Grobben were supposed to have been participating in the Triathlon as well.

But because they were both coming down with the flu, they had unfortunately decided to drop out of the event, and turned up to support the Triathlon as cheerleaders instead. 

Nevertheless, it had been nice to see them again though, and we had a great catch-up and post-race meeting over some catered food in the Tricators cum Astavita tent, where we had also celebrated the birthday of one of their members too. The Tricators triathlon team are also sponsored by Astavita.

And I also made sure that I took a few photos with some of the event banners at the race site for my social media profiles, too.

The Lucky Draw

As well, I also tried my chances at the lucky draw where the grand prize had been a brand new bike. For the lucky draw, we were supposed to walk around to the various booths available at the race village and perform tasks in exchange for collecting stamps. 

Some of the sponsor booths on-site that had been giving out the stamps had included the Astavita one, as well as wellness-oriented health center Chiropractic Studio, low-carb snack company BenBanter as well as cycling equipment company Bikes N Bites.

And once we had picked up at least five stamps, we could enter the lucky draw. The tasks were quite easy, for example, requiring us to take a photo and post it on Facebook accompanied by specific hashtags. 

Unfortunately for my efforts though, luck was not with me and I did not pick up any of the prizes. I must say that I had been eyeing the bike though!

Apparently it had seemed as though the lucky draw had been rather competitive though because quite a lot of people had actually stayed behind to wait for this.

But at least there had been quite a lot of different things to see and do over at the triathlon race village, so I would say that all the time had passed by, fairly quickly.

The event had been well organised as a whole

Overall despite the challenges with the swim, which had certainly been the toughest leg for me, I still definitely had lots of fun at the tenth anniversary edition of the TRI-Factor Triathlon this year and I am happy with the way that everything had gone down at the event.

So I think that organisers Orange Room can probably be pleased with their latest iteration of the TRI-Factor Triathlon Singapore.

And agreed Sabrina, “As a whole, the event was really nicely done, and the race site was spacious too. The course was really good and the organisers were on-the-ball in keeping athletes informed of the latest information and developments by email.”

She continued, “Nothing much could be done with the current in the swim though; that was just the way that it was. But despite that, everything had worked out quite well.”

Thanks Astavita for sponsoring my race slot. 

Use the promo code ‘prislovestorun’ to get 20% off every purchase of Astavita products at https://astavita.sg. Delivery to any Singapore address is FREE.