Amale, the assistant vice president for sales of Aegis PeopleSupport, said that for her, “running is a family thing.” It allows her to spend time with her husband, top triathlete Noy Jopson, and with her children.

DON’T FORCE IT. Triathlete Amale Jopson tells runners gathered at the Sun.Star Cebu newsroom to “listen to your body” when running. “If you feel (aches) don’t force it. It’s just a race. It’s not worth it. It’s not worth hurting yourself,” she said. CLICK ON PHOTO TO ENLARGE. (PHOTO BY ALEX BADAYOS, USED WITH PERMISSION)

The former competitive triathlete encouraged runners who attended Wednesday night’s Ungo Run, a weekly night run from the Sun.Star Cebu office to the IT Park, to get other members of the family involved in running.

“I run for a lot of reasons. I run because it’s fun. I enjoy it…It’s time I get to spend for myself. I like to run alone but I also like to run with other people. So there’s that enjoyment that I can be alone to think about anything or everything while I run but at the same time it also allows me to socialize with other people. It also allows me to spend time with my husband,” she said.

Amale first joined a fun run when she was 12, when she convinced her sister and her friend to join a 3K run that started near the old Sun.Star Cebu office on Osmeña Blvd. to Baseline. Later, when she became an exchange student in Iowa in the United States, she became part of a cross-country running team. It was during her stint in the team under their principal who also served as cross-country coach that she learned the proper techniques of running and training under all weather conditions. She said that until today, she still hears her coach’s, Mr. Bohy’s, voice in her head especially when running uphill, “take short, choppy steps.”

“I love uphills. Try that next time you run uphill, lean forward a bit and take short, choppy steps and swing your arms up and then you’ll find running uphill is easier,” she said.

She later joined the Ateneo track team. But it was when she ran in college during a fund-raising for Mt. Pinatubo victims that “fate brought me and my husband together.” She said she woke up 10 minutes after the scheduled start of the run but still decided to attend the event because she had already collected the pledges.

“I wanted to run as fast as I could and I did, but ended up dry-heaving,” she said. It was at that point that Noy approached him to offer water.

No coincidence

“This guy comes up to me smiling and giving me water and I thought he was cute. He was talking to me as if I knew him. And then he started inviting me out,” she said.

“I believe there’s no such thing as coincidence. Everything has its purpose. Everything has its time and place,” Amale said of the encounter with Noy.

Noy influenced her to try triathlon and she became competitive at the sport.

But she said her running improved when she underwent training in the United States by a coach whose “workouts took me to the next level.”

“Among the things he taught me was to put in the long runs. A favorite workout of mine is what he called a fast finish long run. For example, you are doing 15K, you do the first 12K at the heart rate or perceived exertion of 80 percent of max heart rate… just keep it controlled and easy and then run the last 3K at race pace. That was one workout I like because it allowed you to train your body to finish strong even when you’re tired,” she said.

FATE (AND RUNNING) BROUGHT THEM TOGETHER. Noy and Amale Jopson. They met at a fun run that Amale almost missed because she woke up late. She said fate brought them together, “there’s no such thing as coincidence. Everything has its purpose. Everything has its time and place.” CLICK ON PHOTO TO ENLARGE.

Sports is a strong bond that ties Amale and Noy.

“One of the reasons I love to run as well because it’s one of the things I can do and enjoy—spend time with my husband and train,” she said.

But the two competitive athletes were so intent on training for their sport that they decided to postpone their honeymoon because she was preparing for the national championships. But she got injured and looking back, she said, made her think “why did I ever think that I would have to postpone my honeymoon for a race?”

“It’s not my life”

“Triathlon or running is not my life, it is an important part of my life but it’s not my life,” she said.

Jopson quit from competitive triathlon because of a ruptured disc that was affecting her running, her favorite discipline in the multi-event race. But before this was discovered, she was running injured for more than a year.

“The biggest lesson for me was ‘listen to your body.’ If you feel things like that, don’t force it. It’s just a race. It’s not worth it. It’s not worth hurting yourself,” she said.

Jopson said she got back into running last year to lose the weight she gained after her pregnancy. She said she’s now “back for good.” When asked how she balances her running and work, she said it was good that her company has a running team, the Black Panthers.

Running “is a lifestyle that I love to live,” Jopson said, “I hope to continue running until I’m old.”

On Sunday, Bontol, with the rest of the Cebu-based Team Reborn, will join the CamSur Ironman 70.3hoping to finish strong in a three-discipline event that ends with running, which he describes as his “comfort zone.”

Coming from hearing mass in Sto. Rosario Parish while wearing the hot pink Ungo shirt, the running shirt of a group of Cebu-based night runners, a Phiten necklace and a Power Balance bracelet, Bontol said in an interview that he’s ready to do anything he thinks can help his first Ironman event.

Preparing for the event has consumed Bontol’s life these past months. He has decided to postpone an important exam for his specialization next year because he thinks he isn’t prepared for it.

“I don’t want to go into something unprepared,” he said. A confessed obsessive-compulsive, Bontol says he could hardly sleep the night before important races, getting out of bed repeatedly to make sure everything he needs the next day—shoes, shirt, race bibs, timing chip, energy gels, cap, eyewear—are ready and in order.

On Sunday, Bontol hopes to swim 1.93 kms., bike 90 kms., and run 21 kms. in less than six hours and with enough energy left to take a phone call. He said Sunday will be the “graduation” of months of triathlon training under an elite athlete, Noy Jopson, last year’s Philippine 70.3 Ironman champion.

Bontol has been training, along with fellow Team Reborn members Jung Cases, Joseph Miller, Annie Neric, Tenggoy Colmenares, seriously under Jopson for the past few months. The intensity of the training is such that the once muscular Bontol lost 20 pounds without diet, “eating whatever I want.”

Heading to CamSur, Bontol is on a roll, winning last Sunday’s 5th University Run doctors’ category with a new 10K personal best of 42:38.

That win, said Bontol, proves cross-training works. He said he used to think that to run fast, all you needed to do was lace your shoes and hit the tracks or the road.

But Bontol said his triathlon training made him an even faster runner. He was third in the Speedo National Age Group Triathlon in the 30-34 age group. He said he did not expect to win and was already in his car when the results were announced.

Bontol has gone far and fast, from being an overweight 1st year high school student with a waistline of 34 inches. A close friend, who was also overweight, started going to the gym and shed off pounds. That inspired him to also hit the gym.

Since then, Bontol has been on and off the gym. At any given year, he has at least three months of gym membership.

It was heart surgeon Dr. Alex Junia who encouraged Bontol to run, enlisting him in the 10K category of the Run for your Heart in February 2008.

Bontol finished the race in 72 minutes even without training. The only running he did before it was five- to ten-minute sessions on the treadmill as warm-up to his gym workouts. He said Junia, who was the race organizer, stayed at the back of the pack to look after the runners and paced Bontol, challenging him that if he could do it, how much more the young resident physician, a muscular and buff gym rat.

After that race, he did regular 10Ks before joining the Milo half-marathon six months later. Bontol has finished two full marathons, both in four hours and 55 minutes—the Milo Marathon and the Quezon City International Marathon.

After CamSur, Bontol wants to focus on his medical practice and return to running. On Sunday, however, he only has one thing in mind, “to finish strong.”

Jopson told Cebu Running that as of this noon, more than 1,000 people have registered for the run. He said registration will close today. Those who want to join the race, which is open to all runners, not just children, can registers at the SM Northwing beside the SM Appliance Center and at the Watch Republic in SM Cebu and Timex Ayala.

MANILA EDITION. Children dart off from the starting line in the SM Megamall edition of the Looney Tunes Active Fun Run. (CONTRIBUTED FOTO)

The run is being organized by the Warner Bros. Consumer Products as part of a global campaign to promote an active and healthy lifestyle for children. The run will have the following distances: 2K, 5K and 10K as well as various kiddie dashes. Registration fees are P350 for 3K and 5K and P400 for 10k.

Jopson said they will be giving out a lot of goodies and surprises for the kids category. He said parents are welcome to run along with their kids, especially those four years old and below.

Jopson also said all winners of the kids category will get Purefoods Hotdogs birthday party packages.

According to the race packs, the race will have the following assembly and gun times:

5K and 10K: Assembly time: 5 a.m. / Gun time: 5:30 a.m.
3K: Assembly time: 5:30 a.m. / Gun time: 5:45 a.m.
1.5K: Assembly time: 6 a.m. / Gun time: 6:15 a.m.
1K: Assembly time: 6:30 a.m. / Gun time: 6:45 a.m.
500 meters: Assembly time: 7 a.m. / Gun time: 7:15 a.m.

Below are the interactive virtual route maps of the different races. You can pan the map around and zoom into it to view details. (Note: These maps were plotted out when organizers were still in the early stages of planning the race. Although I’ve been told the routes indicated here were adopted, there might be slight changes.)

500-METER DASH

1K

1.5K

3K

5K

10K

Ahmed Cuizon, who anchors the Sugboanon Na Ni radio program over dyAB, said the swimming by Lapu-Lapu was continued by Oponganons (Lapu-Lapu City used to be known as the town of Opon) until the 70s, when swimming contests were held across the Mactan channel every fiesta.

BLACK SATURDAY WITH THE BLACK PANTHERS. Testing The Great Lapu-Lapu Run route with Noy Jopson, Dr. Raymund “Doc Reel” Bontol and triathlete Amale Jopson with her Black Panthers Aegis PeopleSupport running team. (PHOTOGRAPH BY MARLEN LIMPAG)

“As to running, I only presume that he was well into it, too, considering that there was no means of land transportation in those days and since Lapu-Lapu was the supreme ruler of the entire Mactan Island, he would surely have run around his kingdom at times,” Cuizon said.

On Sunday, Mactan Island, the erstwhile kingdom of the first Pinoy to have resisted Spanish colonization, will hold The Great Lapu-Lapu Run.

“And that’s one more nice thing about the activity. You get to run around in a place where Lapu-Lapu moved about during his days. In a sense, we are celebrating his life and times,” Cuizon said.

This Sunday’s run is being organized by Ironman Noy Jopson, who seemed cast from the same mold as the Visayan hero, marathon man Raffy Uytiepo and Waterfront Airport Hotel and Casino general manager Hembler Mendoza, himself a runner who finished a marathon.

“We are working hard to have a memorable race for everyone,” Jopson said.

Lapu-Lapu City is doing everything that it can to make this Sunday’s event a great run.

The Great Lapu-Lapu Run will be using RFID timing chips for the 21K and 10K races. This is only the second time that timing chips are used in a race in Cebu. The first time the system was deployed was during the highly successful Cebu City Marathon.

The Cebu City Marathon, however, only used chips for the 42K and 21K races. On Sunday, 10K runners in Cebu will, for the first time, be using timing chips.

Jopson has been repeatedly running the 21K route to check on the distances and it is as advertised—a half-marathon route of 21.1 kilometers—to the meter.

The race will have water stations every two kilometers and several Gatorade stations.

For the first time in a race in Cebu, pacers will be deployed.

Pacers are runners who run at a certain pace so that other runners can gauge their speed. You’d know the pacers because they’d have balloons where their target finish times are printed. Kenneth Casquejo and Annie Neric are the 2 hours to the 2:15 pacers.

Mendoza said the race will also be fielding running marshals, on top of the scores of marshals deployed in strategic portion of the route.

“We are 100 percent ready. We’re just waiting for the participants,” Mendoza said.

The race will start and finish at the Liberty Shrine in Barangay Mactan. The route is relatively flat, save for the bridge portion of the 21K race, and runners stand a good chance of setting personal records. (The virtual map is embedded below.)

If you haven’t registered yet, you still have time. Organizers will still accept 10K and 21K registrations until Thursday and 5K and 3K registrations until Saturday.

Below is an interactive virtual map of The Great Lapu-Lapu Run race route. The blue line is the route for 21K and 10K while the red line is the route for 3K and 5K.

View Great Lapu-Lapu Run route in a larger map

Veteran runner Raffy Uytiepo sent me a text message last Wednesday to ask whether I would like to join organizers Noy Jopson and Hembler Mendoza run the route they were considering for The Great Lapu-Lapu Run on April 18.

WITH NOY JOPSON. Running with Noy Jopson and Hembler Mendoza (left) to map out the route of The Great Lapu-Lapu Run. (FOTO BY MARLEN LIMPAG)

As soon as I read the words join, Noy Jopson and run, I immediately hit the phone’s reply button and said “YES!!!! What time?”

Several minutes later, I realized the full implication of the invitation.

Noy Jopson is The Ironman. He is the Philippine 70.3 Ironman Champion. He has three national triathlon titles. He won the Asian Cup Junior trophy in 1995, the bronze and silver medals at the Asian Championships and the Philippine Enduraman. I’m an overweight journalist barely a year into running. It was like Ronaldinho deciding to play pickup 1-on-1 football with an elementary school kid.

I immediately texted Raffy to ask about the pace, telling him I might pass out trying to keep up with Noy. He texted back, “slow lang. Walang iwanan.”

We met at the Liberty Shrine in Barangay Mactan at daybreak the next day. Noy is easy to pick out in a group, especially among grouchy early-morning runners, because the first thing you see him do is smile. For an elite athlete, he is down to earth. He’s “just like your boy next door,” said Annie Neric, Holiday Gym & Spa fitness program director.

“He has accomplished a lot but is still down to earth…He can be very unassuming,” Neric said in an e-mail.

The two hours and 15 minutes that Hembler and I ran with Noy Jopson last Thursday were among the best two hours on the road I’ve ever had. While running, we kept on discussing The Great Lapu-Lapu Run route. Noy commented on my and Hembler’s running forms. We talked about running equipment—from shoes to GPS watches to a Timex watch he was beta-testing. He talked about chia seeds, which was mentioned in the seminal running book “Born to Run.”

Noy Jopson’s enthusiasm is infectious. We were set to run directly to the Waterfront Airport Hotel & Casino Mactan, where Mendoza is the general manager, but ended up running the Marcelo Fernan Bridge not once, but twice, and going down to the park under the bridge in the Mandaue side.

Noy Jopson is a great athlete not just because he is a bio-mechanically efficient human being. Noy Jopson is a great athlete because he is such a wonderful person who is also bio-mechanically efficient. He has no airs about him.

Four years ago, when Annie Neric was still new in Cebu, she attended a spinning class, an aerobic exercise on a stationary bike, conducted by Noy at the Holiday Gym & Spa. When Noy knew she was from Manila, he got excited to know that she was a kababayan and kept on talking and interviewing her while holding the class. When she told him she was also a spinning instructress, she ended up leading the cooldown for the class.

“After his class, he introduced me to the manager of Holiday Gym and the week after, I became one of the spinning instructors of the gym and got myself a job in less than two weeks here in Cebu,” Neric said.

Noy would later introduce Neric to triathlon.

“I remember how he would go back for me after he finishes his race. I was still in the course since I was a new runner then. He would shout at me that I could go faster even when he knew that I was already struggling. Noy is like that because he knows that you could do it. He motivates and challenges you at the same time,” Annie said.

When we were in the final meters to Waterfront last Thursday, Noy playfully pushed Hembler, who wasn’t feeling well, at a pace I couldn’t sustain for long even in an actual race. But all three of us finished together, sprinting to Waterfront in time for a group photo.

We spent two great hours running about 19 kilometers last Thursday. With Noy around, I felt we could have run a full marathon.

But a sumptuous buffet breakfast was waiting for us at the Waterfront.

With Noy Jopson, Superman.

The race is organized by the Lapu-Lapu City Government and the Lapu Lapu City Tourism Cultural and Historical Commission.

This year’s edition of the race is being organized by elite triathlete Noy Jopson and veteran runner and race director Raffy Uytiepo.

GREAT LAPU-LAPU RUN. The Great Lapu-Lapu Run will be using RFID chips to time runners of its 21K and 10K races. The website printed above, however, is still not live.

Jopson told CebuRunning that the race will start and finish at the Mactan Shrine in Barangay Punta Engaño. He said they will be using RFID chips that will be deployed by Finishline of renowned runner and coach Rio dela Cruz. Finishline also deployed the timing chips during the Cebu City Marathon last Jan. 10.

The Cebu City Marathon was the first time that timing chips or RFID (radio frequency identification) chips were used to time runners in Visayas and Mindanao. The chips, which are attached to runners’ shoes, activate once these pass special mats placed on the race course. They provide not only the finishing time of the runners but also their split times.

The chips provide organizers quick and accurate finishing times of runners.

Uytiepo said that Hembler Mendoza, Waterfront Airport Hotel and Casino general manager, is considering collecting P450 as registration fee. Uytiepo said, however, that it is still being finalized.

Jopson said they are still finalizing the race routes but there is a “big chance” it will include the iconic Mactan-Mandaue Bridge. (Make sure to keep checking this site because we will be putting up an interactive virtual map of the route once it is finalized.)

Jopson and Uytiepo also confirmed that the top male and female runners in the Great Lapu-Lapu Run will be sent to the Standard Chartered Hong Kong Marathon.

Yong and Donna finished the 10K race together in 54 minutes and 11 seconds to top a field of about a dozen couples who joined the run. The Escasinas couple finished second with a time of 57:28. Noy and Amale Jopson were third with a time of 58:06.

Yong said it was the “best birthday gift” for Donna, who celebrates her birthday today, Valentine’s Day.

Those who joined the couples run were required to be no more than 5 meters of each other throughout the race and finish it holding hands.

There were no surprises in the other categories of the race.

Kenyan Simon Losiaboi finished his 10K run in 32:23 to claim first place. Elmer Bartolo finished second with a time of 33:41 while Ian Bernido was third with a time of 33:56.

In the women’s division, top runner Mary Grace delos Santos did not let a medical layoff get in the way by topping her division with a 10K run of 39:59. Mary Joy Tabal finished second with a time of 40:43 while Marlyn Alin finished third with a time of 40:43.

In the 5K race, Roland Batiancila topped the men’s division with a time of 17:30; Jobert Carolino was second with his time of 17:34, while Rolan Onrada finished third at 17:48. Rose Angele Amores topped the women’s division with her time of 22:92; Lennie Caduada was second at 26:47; while Diodel Moralla was third with her time of 27:23.

Ramon Carsido topped the 3K men’s division with a time of 13:49. Rafael Tan finished in second place with his time of 17:39 while Euegene Esteban was third with a time of 17:40. Mizraim Capangpangan, meanwhile, topped the women’s 3K division with her time of 19:16; Camille Flor and Cecilia May Uy were listed as being second and third, respectively, with identical times of 19:52.

Although relatively well-run, yesterday’s race had some complaints of lack of water in some stations and a shorter than advertised 10K distance. My GPS reading indicated the route distance to be 9.87KM.

The run will also have a 200-meter sprint for 7-year-olds and below and 400-meter race for 8-year-olds to 12-year-olds. The races for children will be held inside the SM City Cebu compound.

The Rotary Run will start and end at the old v-hire terminal near the Northwing of SM City Cebu. (Interactive map found at the end of this article)

ROTARY RUN. Rotary PR Chair Lilu Aliño answers a reporter’s question during the press briefing for the 2nd Rotary Run. Among those who attended this afternoon’s press conference are (from right) Jet Neric, Me’Anne Alcordo and Rotary Run chair Kenneth Casquejo. The run is directed by Raffy Uytiepo (extreme left).

“On top of promoting Rotary and a healthy lifestyle, joining the race is an opportunity to contribute to the End Polio Now, a program of the Rotary Foundation to eradicate polio worldwide,” said race co-organizer Kenneth Casquejo.

“Running is a good way and a very cheap way to be healthy,” said Casquejo.

Co-organizer Jet Neric said that apart from promoting a healthy lifestyle, running also encourages family bonding. He said organizers hope Rotarians “will develop a running lifestyle.”

Casquejo said the 1st placer in the men’s and women’s categories of the 15K race will get P8,000, 2nd placers will get P5,000 and 3rd placers will get P3,000. The 4th to 6th placers will get P500 and the 7th to 10th placers will get P300. All the winners will get medals.

In the 7K race, the 1st placers will get P5,000; 2nd placers will het P3,000; and 3rd placers will get P2,000.

The registration fee for the race is P150, which is inclusive of a race singlet, race bib and a Jollibee snack. The registration center is at the Philippine Sports Commission office in the Cebu City Sports Center. Casquejo said registration will no longer be allowed on race day.

The top-seeds for the run are Mary Grace delos Santos, the top female runner in Cebu, and Kenyan Simon Losiaboi.

ROTARIANS, TOP RUNNERS. Top runners based in Cebu pose with Rotary officials during the launch of the Rotary Run. Among the top runners who attended yesterday are (back row, starting 3rd from left) Kenyan Simon Losiaboi, elite triathlete Noy Jopson, tope female runner Mary Grace delos Santos and her trainer, Sherwin Managil.

Race director Raffy Uytiepo said that although some runners have complained against Losiaboi, the “presence of top runners also make you fast.”

“If you want to win or to beat me, just train hard,” Losiaboi said yesterday. He told the press conference that he doesn’t do anything special and that he trains hard with local runners. He said he is thankful with the warm welcome of Cebuanos.

Asia Brewery Inc., one of the sponsors of the race, pledged ample water supply and said 100 Plus isotonic sports drink will be distributed in the finish line.

Casquejo said they have coordinated with the Cebu City Traffic Operations Management (Citom) to make the race route secure for runners. He said they will be fielding enough marshals to help secure the routes.

Since the race is in February, organizers said they will be giving awards to the top running couple. They said the couple need not be married and they only need to finish together. They said they will not discriminate and same-sex couples are welcome to join the couples’ race.

Uytiepo also said pacers and bikers will not be allowed on the race route. He said the Emergency Rescue Unit Foundation will be providing medical support for runners.

Below is an interactive virtual map of the race route based on data given by the organizers.