Rising to the challenge

What say you on the issue below?

I WAS never a very athletic boy although I tried to play as many sports as possible when I was younger.

My family, short of my oldest sister, tai che, were pretty sports-centric. Mum and dad were avid sports people and my second sister, ee che, was part of the women’s hockey national backup squad and a field athlete.

One for the album: Cheong (second from right) with fellow Nike+ Human Race 10k Ambassador Challenge personality Rudy from Hitz.fm (in blue), Nike Malaysia staff and other runners after the race in Singapore.

I’m not sure if it was because of this “lineage” that I got a lot of support from my family whenever I wanted to participate in sports. Either that or perhaps, with my obsession with computer and console games, my parents agreed to anything that took me away from the screen and outside of the house.

I remember when I wanted to take up basketball, my parents took me shopping for a basketball hoop. We couldn’t afford that proper set, so dad screwed just the hoop (sans the net) onto one of the old backboards from a shelf at home and fixed it to our roof.

When I wanted to play badminton at a nearby playground, dad allowed me to buy some nice shuttlecocks and even a badminton net for the court there. I even took tennis lessons at one point.

I didn’t stick to those games, though.

The one sport that I really took on for a long period (in secondary school and later in Australia, where I completing my degree) was hockey. Even me getting into it was accidental, in that it was more ego than the actual sport that got me excited.

You see, ee che was one of the top players in the Kuala Lumpur team at that time, and the local print media had written a couple of articles mentioning her. Kuala Lumpur, then, was the team to beat.

I have never actually told anyone this but let’s just say that I wanted a taste of her “fame” so I took the game up.

I wasn’t great at the game but I was decent. Not all my teammates agreed but they envied me because I had all the right equipment - nice hockey sticks, proper shin pads and turf shoes among others. This led to one of my coaches actually commenting (probably trying to save me from taunts), “Mutu tak de takpe, asalkan ada gaya” (Doesn’t matter if you don’t have the skills, as long as you have the style).

In retrospect, I am not sure that was a compliment.

Naturally, I didn’t get my name printed in the papers for being a brilliant athlete. In fact, the only thing I had to show for with my interest in sports was the top 16th medal I received one year in La Salle PJ, where I studied, for the school’s compulsory cross-country event.

That is, until I started running last year. Sure, I am not an elite runner and I would never imagine myself being in contention for one of the top spots. However, because most of the runs I’ve participated in - usually 10km - provide medals to all finishers within a stipulated time, I now hold four medals for running.

Sure, hundreds of others also have the such medals but I think that is the beauty of it. Unfortunately, we live in a country where participating in sports isn’t a big part of our culture.

When I was in school, some of my teachers’ idea of physical education is to throw us a half-pumped football and get us to run around the field.

Dad, who was a physical education teacher in his younger days, would always be mortified when I tell him this because for him, there are so many lessons to be learnt from sports; not just techniques but social skills like teamwork, discipline and mental strength.

By giving out medals to finishers, the organisers of these runs are in a way encouraging more people to engage in the activity. Imagine hundreds or thousands of people running just for the three top prizes, one is basically setting the rest up to lose. But with finisher’s medals, everyone is not only competing with others but also with themselves. This also means that everyone can be a winner.

I was in Singapore last weekend to participate in the Nike+ Human Race 10K. I was also one of the personalities roped in for the Malaysian edition of the race’s Ambassador’s Challenge to encourage people out there to put their shoes on and start running.

There was also a charity element to the run - the team I was part of - the Rojak Runners - won the challenge and Nike has pledged to donate RM2 for each kilometre we completed to the World Wildlife Foundation.

When people tell me I am crazy for running such long distances (hey, at least I’m not doing a marathon!), I tell them that it is not really that tough if only they would try it. Besides that, I find that running allows me to challenge myself constantly and it is great therapy for me to help clear my mind. Not to mention that it helps keep the beer belly at bay.

The Human Race last week marked one year of me taking part in races. Last year’s edition was my first ever race.

I didn’t beat my personal best time but I did get a finisher’s medal. Most importantly, I tried my best, enjoyed myself and had a good time with friends.