Macau will once again welcome elite athletes from all around the world to compete in the 2015 Macau Galaxy Entertainment International Marathon. Taking place on December 6, the Marathon is organized by the Macau Sport Development Board and the General Association of Athletics of Macau and sponsored by Galaxy Entertainment Group. The race will start and finish inside the Olympic Sport Centre Stadium, with the starting time set for 6 a.m.
In order to allow more marathon enthusiats to join this annual sporting event, the organizers have increased the number of places this year, with 1,200 places in the Full Marathon race, 2,600 in the Half Marathon race and 4,200 in Mini Marathon race. Amazingly, even with these extra places, both Half Marathon and Mini Marathon races were declared full on the same day the application period started.
This year’s race coincides with the 10th anniversary of the inscription of “The Historic Centre of Macau” on the UNESCO World Heritage List. To commemorate this, runners will receive a special souvenir and this year’s course will pass by the heritage-listed A-Ma Temple. It will also go across to the new University of Macau (UMAC)campus on Hengqin Island, and the course route will be closed to traffic in order to provide a safe environment for the athletes to achieve a better result.
Athletes will also be able join the Parade Through Macau, Latin City that will take place on the same day at 4 p.m. Furthermore, they can upload the selfie pictures they took during the Parade and race through the mobile app “Macao International Marathon” to participate in a lucky draw. Prizes are sponsored by Galaxy Entertainment Group and include a 2-night stay at Banyan Tree Macau, Spa Treatment and UA Galaxy Cinemas movie tickets worth more than MOP40,000 in total.
The total prize of the Macau Galaxy Entertainment International Marathon this year is MOP1,496,000. And as an extra incentive, the organizers continue to offer special prizes of MOP30,000 and MOP10,000 for local athletes who are able to break the local Full Marathon and Half Marathon records respectively, in order to further encourage local athletic talent.
In addition, the organizers will host a “Pasta Party” in the early evening on December 5 for athletes who are going to participate in the Full Marathon, in order for them to relax and enjoy good food while exchanging their race tips with other athletes. The food served up will be rich in carbohydrates, to help them prepare for the race the next morning.
Among the elite local and international athletes who will be competing in this year’s Macau Galaxy Entertainment International Marathon, two are well-known to the local community and are considered some of the best competitors: Kuok Chi Wai and Chan Chong Ip.
Kuok just finished a triathlon and will be using the remaining four weeks to focus on preparing for the Macau event. Although he reckons that four weeks is not really sufficient, he still hopes to catch up for lost time.
Chan, on the other hand, says that he started training earlier than Kuok, but feels that training by himself has somehow not been so effective.
“Now that I am training with Chi Wai, my condition is improving faster. When I was training alone, it felt a little bit dry and the improvement was not that satisfying,” he says.
Nonetheless, Chan believes that he has had good preparation this year and can achieve a result similar to last year.
Full marathons are 42.195 km, which is far longer than other long-distance running events. As a result, it requires a different training method. Kuok says that the first difference between training for a marathon and other running competitions is the quantity of training.
“There is a requirement for the quantity of training. We describe it as ‘accumulating miles’. This has to be observed diligently, or else you may ‘hit the wall’ after running for 30 km, which means that your performance may drop suddenly and you can no longer pick up the pace. If this occurs, then you are basically done in the race,” Kuok explains.
He adds, “compared to those 8 to 10 km races, runners are not required to accelerate instantly in a marathon. Instead, they have to pay more attention to maintaining their speed.”
Chan agrees that although speed is a factor in a marathon, if a runner is not resilient, they may not even be able to finish the race. Therefore, speed without resilience will greatly affect the performance of a marathon runner.
In this year’s event, runners will again run across Sai Van Bridge. Kuok says that since they cannot practice on Sai Van Bridge, they can only use the Governador Nobre de Carvalho Bridge as a substitute during training.
However, he points out that there is no place for runners to practice running through the under-river tunnel that connects the University of Macau and Taipa.
“The UMAC tunnel is different from the Western Harbour Tunnel (a section of the Hong Kong Marathon course) in that the exits of the former are steeper and the air flow is not really good. Therefore, when there is a group of runners going into the tunnel together, they may feel a bit stifled.”
The two professional runners have some advice for amateur runners in the Macau Marathon. Kuok recommends a high carbohydrate diet when approaching the competition date, as well as reducing the amount of meat intake.
“On the day of the marathon, I would recommend people have a light breakfast, such as an energy bar or power gel. If they have a heavy breakfast like fast food, they might suffer from excessive gas.”
Chan also warns against eating dairy products before the race in order to avoid an upset stomach.
In terms of his feelings towards the Macau Marathon, Kuok describes it as an event that has the best atmosphere. He also hopes that more institutions will sponsor this type of sporting event in the future.
