Sorry, We Only Made it to 88 KM.

Sunrise by the Hovsgol Lake, 1 hour after the race started.Exhausted but had great fun - that summarized our trip to Mongolia.

The race took off at 4:30 a.m. and we had a pleasant jog during the first 12 KM, witnessing a beautiful sunrise by the Hovsgol Lake, before we started crawling up the first mountain with an altitude of about 2300 meters. 

Clearly we didn't prepare enough for trail running, and especially something hilly like this - 3 major climbs with a total of 3365-meter elevation gain/loss over the 100 KM race. By the time we descended from the second hill at about the 30 KM to 35 KM, our thighs were already souring and our speed dropped sharply.

Well, but so what? We were enjoying ourselves along the course, taking pictures of the beautiful scenery, eating loads of baked potatos prepared by local nomads and chatting nonsense with each other. To us, that's the fun part of the race.

It took us 7 hours 40 minutes to finish the first marathon (42 KM). By that time, Mo and I were both embracing an awful blister on each of our legs. We put on tapes and changed socks, continued our long match.

From that point onwards, finishing the race was more of a mental rather than physical issue - tireness was a must, it's just a matter of how you convince your body to keep functioning.

Monami dashing downhill at about 33 KM point. You can see the lake behind the mountains.

I didn't know and still don't know how Mo resurrected. She gradually regained her stamina and sailed all the way to the 66 KM mark. I kept praising and cursing her at the same time while trying my best to catch up with her pace.

Yet we were still too slow.

By the time we hit the 75 KM point, we already spent 14 hours 30 minutes. That means we only had 1 hour 30 minutes left to hit the next check point at 88 KM, otherwise we will be eliminated by the cut-off time. In fact, we were already the last two runners of the race and several horsemen were escorting us from behind, in case we wanted to give up or collapse on the trail.

So sad that I couldn't think of bribing the horsemen to give us a lift at that moment. We tried our best to limp through the never-ending 13 KM in the woods, but were still 30 minutes behind schedule when we reached the 88 KM mark.

9 p.m. Sun was setting. We had run for 16 hours 30 minutes and according to the regulations, we were eliminated.

Sigh, still 12 KM unfinished.

But it didn't matter anymore. Throughout this trip, we won friendships with inspiring runners, spent starry nights together and completed the longest distance ever in our one-year running history. More than enough for us!

Thank you everyone for supporting us and donating money to preserve the nature of Mongolia. The proceeds will be used for collecting garbage dumped at this beautiful lake and to fund education of nomad children.

Our race certificates.We will keep running, for ourselves and for a better world. Please continues to support our charity works in the future.

P.S. Monami finished 2nd in the female 42 KM group, 21 minute behind the winner. Hurray to amazing Mo!

Good afternoon from Ulaanbataar!!

Support Us by Donating $15 to Mongolia's Nature

Lake Hovsgol. Photo by Damiano Luchetti.Two weeks away from now, we must be either slacking on horsebacks at an elevation of 1,600 meters, or breathing our lungs out to accomodate the high altitude before the Aug. 3 race.

We can't wait for this escape from the multiple black screens we face every day, and most importantly, a valuable chance to make our contribution to Mongolia's nature.

As described by EcoLeap Foundation, organizer of "Mongolia Sunrise to Sunset", is to "contribute as much as possible to the local economy and to raise awareness among locals that standards of living can best be raised by preserving the park and the local culture."

Proceeds and money raised from the race will be used on preservation projects in Hovsgol National Park and other national parks in Mongolia.

For an economy hugely supported by its abundant mining resources at the expense of its nature, environmental preservation is more important than ever - before it is too late.

From the bottom of our hearts, Mo and I would like to invite you to support us by donating 15 U.S. cents for every kilometer we run, i.e. $15 U.S. dollars in total (or 10 euros).

Your every contribution will be vital to keep Mongolia's nature alive.

Thanks Kitty Ho for being the first donor and summarized the few easy steps below:

1. Go to www.ultramongolia.com and click "make a donation" on the left

2. Click on the blue "make a donation" box and fill in your personal details (see sample here). In the field of name of sponsored runner, please enter "Lui Kwok Wing" or "Monami Yui". Marco will be grateful even though you are sponsoring Monami, and vice versa.

3. Enter your card details (see here). 

4. You will see a confirmation screen now. Wait for a few seconds and it will direct you to the final step.

5. Payment is done and you should be seeing this page now.

6. Send me a message and I will grab you a souvenir from Mongolia!

Countdown to Our Ultramarathon in Mongolia

Lake Hovsgol in Mongolia. Photo by Zoharby, used under Creative Commons license.

After months of anticipation and preparation, the day finally comes.

On August 3, Monami and I will be running our first ultra-marathon, a 100-kilometer trail by the world's second largest lake in Mongolia, Lake Hovsgol.

The suicidal idea to join the "Mongolia Sunrise to Sunset" was a total knee-jerk decision made at the beginning of this year, when Monami and I were talking aimlessly around random topics - a common friend who did an ultramarathon in Japan, pictures of a new born of Monami's Mongolian friend and our travel plan in 2011.

Then Monami unconsciously typed these keywords on Google - "ultramarathon" and "mongolia".

The first entry popped up on the screen reads:

Mongolia Sunrise to Sunset - The World's Most Beautiful 100km Run

In one sentence, the race organizer has neatly summarized our personal and shared affections.

For Monami, Mongolia is a place where she spent on and off a few years since her childhood. Riding on horses across highland and listening to Mongolian underground band songs were once her daily routine. It's been five years since her last visit to Utlaanbaatar and she wanted to reunion with her old friends.

For me, a mediocre runner who just limped through his first ever "half" marathon, the prefix "ultra" is totally out of the chart and exotic. I was too excited to test my physical limits.

And for us, the Tibet trip back in May 2010 sounded decade-old and we were too thirsty to go back to the nature.

Whether we were overly optimistic to death or too pessimistic to life, we had no clue.

Yet we signed up.

(to be continued...)

My 1st Photo Lesson - Photo-taking Takes Time

Taken at Kota Kinabalu, April 29, 2011Photo-taking takes time - this is the first lesson my first photography teacher told me in 2005.

I very much enjoy the moments when I observe the world through a tiny viewfinder and press the shutter button, but equally so I love standing idle, look around for smiling faces and approach them.

When I first saw the background of the picture above, a vivid orange brick wall with patterned street photos outside a Kota Kinabalu market, I knew it would make a good photo - with a right subject.

First take.The first attempt, with a family of three, was a failure.

"Two too many," Monami handed down the verdict. Damn right.

Then a flip-flop solo passed by and I made my second attempt.

"It couldn't be wrong, right?" I asked.

"One too fat," the judge said.

True.

So we stood by the side of the street and waited, until we spotted a little boy wearing an Argentina football shirt. A big-eye Lionel Messi who's too sweet to miss.

Second take.At first he was shy and hid behind his welcoming elder brother and mother, who were sitting on the adjoining doorsteps and encouraged him to talk to us.

We stepped back and waited again. Finally he came with his brother to play with the phones, giving me a good 3-second to fire a string of photos at his back.

Messi heard the shutter sound behind him and swiftly turned around. He grinned and ran away, as if he knew he lost in the hide-and-seek game - but with great fun.

Monami and I showed him the pictures on my digital camera. We all laughed together and waved a goodbye to each other. With the time it took, it brought me a good photo and an invaluable interaction in a Malaysian city.

Blogger Woeser wrote an article (in Chinese) about "photo violence" in Tibet - photographers, coming to the "roof of the world" with an exotic imagination in mind, pointed their "guns" to local people without considering their feelings.

"The relationship between photographer and the one being photographed should not be a 'hunter and prey' one, but rather 'person and person'," Woeser wrote.

I couldn't agree more. Photo-taking takes time - to wait for a good composition and more importantly, to show your respect and care to the people.

It won't take you long. This time, it took me 6 minutes.

Little Messi after hide-and-seek.