the end is nigh. my retirement from cross country. i wouldn't have to do intervals on the track anymore after this saturday. a reflection on my time in cross country is the apt thing to do but i've decided to postpone it to after cross nationals. for it is that that will really determine what my legacy is. if we win we will be the first ever ri side to win cross nationals 2 years in a row, and after last year's first-in-50-years win, a win this year would be the 2nd-title-in-a-row-in-50 years, a feat that will surely etch us into rafflesian folklore, and confirm our status as legends in our own rights. i may not have directly played a part, but i can say i have trained alongside these extraordinary group of people.

till then, we still have a title to win, a race to fight. 6 days more. the wait is killing me. but my season is effectively over, save for one biathlon relay with daniel next saturday. now my aim's to get fit in time to run a good 5km time, enough for me to at least secure 3rd, hopefully sufficient for 2nd.

yesterday we did a time trial at the cross nats race route at botanic gardens. i ran a 16.45 for 4km, which is rather slow, but i went at a constant pace and was quite comfortable, so i was kinda satisfied. but a quick calculation showed how much i had slowed. yesterday i was running at 4.10mins per km for 4km, but in december at pandan reservoir i was running 4.03mins per km for 5km. now i'm running a shorter distance yet a slower pace, which left me kind of disappointed. just what've i been training for this year?

nvm, now its time to turn my focus back to football. thom and timo played seriously today for the first time in dunno how long. timo's shooting quite good but he said his control isn't so good, so he still has some work to do b4 getting back to form. thom's finishing just looked off, but its ok, we will play him at a position where he can do no harm, but based on current form even if he tried to score an own goal he might miss.

finally we have our full team back, been looking foward to this for a long time. we need to break our duck, cause not scoring won't get us anywhere. with timo back shoujian will now get more space and time on the ball, or vice versa, either way we'll benefit. i'm itching to play, quite badly. i think if we dun score i will just resort to dribbling my way through, which i think will work quite well. i haven't actually tried to dribble much, or shoot for the matter.

we were discussing about how to play now that everyone's available. timo joked that we shld just get thom sent off by asking him to foul people all over the place to solve our headache. but the problem is that thom will be able to do the aforementioned without getting caught by the referee, so gettting thom sent off will take something.

two flowers, both alike in beauty
in fair macritchie, where we sow our seeds
from childhood crush bloomed to new fantasy
where double flourish means double the feeds
from forth the sweet scents of these two flowers
a splitting headache awaits their admirer
whose fascination cause a guilty conscience
and hopes for both but could result with none
the tale of two flowers and something else
begins right now, though with trepidation.