Embarking on a ‘Fat to Fit’ journey with the KL Standard Chartered Marathon as my target race of 2019, I successfully completed the 10km race in 80 minutes!

Well within my target of 90 minutes, this was my first KL Standard Chartered Marathon race, marking my comeback to fitness journey since having my newborn 14 months ago. During the race, I distracted myself by chatting and taking photos along the route, keeping a comfortable pace. Right until the 8km mark, I seemed to have a harnessed a lot of energy along the way, so I increased the pace.

In the last 500 meters, I told myself: “I’m doing this for my firstborn”, and launched a full on attack across the Finish Line!

As with most new mothers, we all miss the shadow of our former selves, most importantly, our fitness. Our bodies go through tremendous changes to carry a new life to term, and some parts don’t quite regain their former shape.

As depression and low self esteem set in, I knew I had to find the right motivation to regain my fitness and confidence.

Believe it or not, the One Punch Man fitness craze gave me a jump start on my ‘fat to fit’ journey and got me running in March 2019. I chose a modest 3km and struggled to complete it on alternate days. I was still breastfeeding until a little over 1 year, so that was an added challenge to exercising too.

I couldn’t run for 1km continuously, so I ran for 3 minutes, and walked for 2 minutes. That’s how unfit I was.

There was a whole list of things which I couldn’t do: squat, lunge, sit-ups and push-ups. Slowly but surely, I progressed through the repetitions and movements and regained a little bit of fitness. Joined running clubs – Adidas Runners and ASICS Running Club for some runs, but found it hard to join them regularly as I was the main caregiver of my firstborn.

Back to the drawing board, so I took my firstborn out on short 3km runs in our neighbourhood in the stroller whenever I could in the evenings or mornings. She must’ve thought, ‘my mum has lost her mind!’

Over the months, I also read up on how to lose weight (read: fat) as I was severely overweight for my height due to pregnancy. Intermittent Fasting was the rage, so I coupled that with cutting back on carbohydrates and that seemed to be the perfect solution for me.

Even when I couldn’t exercise for 2-3 weeks, I focused on maintaining good eating habits. The hardest time to maintain this diet was during the durian season!

All in all, over 14 months, I’ve successfully lost 8kg, 6% body fat, and gone down from L to S!

I was apprehensive to be dressed up in Under Armour’s latest UA Rush collection, and the size was S, so that was an added motivation for me to slim down. Lo and behold, powered by Celliant technology the t-shirt and compression tights certainly did keep me energised throughout the run. As your body emits energy, the mineral-infused fabric absorbs and reflects it back into tissues and muscles, improving endurance and strength.

Indeed the Celliant technology works, I’ve used this UA Rush collection on a few long runs. I still feel fresh and not fatigued despite putting in the effort.

The tights feel soft and snug, I also love that it doesn’t move about as I run. I also noticed that the tights absorbed all my sweat to wick it away from my body, and kept my socks completely dry!

Don’t worry if you don’t have or forget your GPS running watch, the UA HOVR Velociti 2 is quite an amazing pair of shoes, with a bluetooth GPS chip embedded in it to track your runs. You can track your pace, distance, cadence and other metrics to improve on your runs, when you sync with the MapMyRun smartphone application.

I love the flexibility, cushioning & versatility and it’s lightweight too. The compression mesh Energy Web contains & molds UA HOVR™ foam to give back the energy you put in, no wonder I really don’t feel tired especially when combined with the UA Rush collection.

My ‘Fat to Fit’ journey has only just begun, and I shall continue to power through with renewed gusto!

In the main race, Victor Kipchirchir from Kenya, won the Full Marathon Men’s Open category in a time of 2:19:41 to take home USD17,500 in his debut appearance at KLSCM. The Full Marathon Women’s Open category was won by Gladys Jepkemoi Chemweno from Kenya in a time of 2:36:45 also earning USD17,500 in the process.

In the Full Marathon Malaysian Men’s category, Muhaizar bin Mohamad narrowly edged his compatriot in the Armed Forces Nik Fakaruddin bin Ismail, to defend his title for an astonishing fifth consecutive time. Local favourite, Loh Chooi Fern successfully defended her Full Marathon Malaysian Women’s title too in a time of 3:21:33.

More about the author Jyn Yeow loves exploring new ways to gain the adrenaline rush, covering places and meeting new people. #adrenalinejunkie Follow Jyn on Facebook.