MSC Watergames 2005

According to the astrologers, Gemini is an air sign and is apparently ruled by the planet Mars. Well, as far as I’m concerned... other than geeky interest in the rovers roaming around on Mars and fascination about jets in the air, that’s about all Mars and air have to do with me. Put me somewhere with lots of sun and sea or any other large bodies of water and that’s a different matter altogether.

I love water. I love playing in water in the sun. Unfortunately I live in KL, where the nearest large bodies of water are former mining pools & so, I don’t get to play in water in the sun very much. So naturally, I grab at every opportunity that allows me to do that.

On the 1st of October, MDC organized the inaugural MSC Watergames. Participating this year were teams from Shell IT, DHL, IBM, MDC, PJ Holdings and a combined team of smaller companies (Shell Global Solutions, Setia Haruman, Nokia, national level rowers, etc.)

I’d not been rowing for more than a year now, mainly because I got lazy, lost interest and just didn’t feel like being at the lake by 7am. Being one of the more experienced rowers in the company, both me and J were sort of expected to take part… we didn’t have much of a choice… not that we’re really complaining anyway. The only problem was we’ve not been rowing together for a while and synchronization as well as balance is a fairly key factor in this sport. As busy as we were (J was busy… I was lazy), we managed to get one practice session done… the day before the actual race. Supremely dedicated sportsmen aren’t we? I have friends who practice daily for months in preparation for competitions.

Race day came and we’re there early, all excited cos we’ve never participated in a large scale rowing competition before. I had my single scull heats first, followed by the single kayak and finally the double scull heats. Won the single and double heats easily, so confidence was high for the finals.

The kayak was a different matter altogether… I have very little experience with it but I do recall being able to handle it the last time I tried. This time it was a disaster… I couldn’t kayak straight if my life counted on it. Getting from the jetty to the starting point itself was an achievement. There were 4 of us in the heats, 2 ladies and 2 guys. This lady from Putrajaya holdings beat us pants down… well, she was the only one who was going straight… but if it was a distance kayaked competition, I’m sure we’d have beaten her with all the circles we were doing. Amazingly I came in 2nd, a full 2 minutes behind and to my horror, realized that means I made it into the finals.

The other excitement of the day was that by getting into the single and double scull finals meant that I had to do 2 final races back to back. So we worked out a plan that while I was in the doubles race, the team would prepare my single scull for me to jump in and scoot off. Also, I was thinking, we’ll probably win fairly easily as well, so I can sort of conserve my energy for the singles final. Unfortunately our other team wasn’t having any of that. When the klaxon blew, they went flying off the starting line and was almost a whole boat length ahead. Now I can't have that, I introduced the sport and trained these guys!

All plans for conserving energy for the more difficult race went overboard. Our boat surged to catch up as we dug in and rowed out hearts out. Brushing off near disaster when my oar dug into the water and leapt out of my hand, we clawed into the lead and went ahead. Eric B & Victor rowed a great race. Unfortunately they lost concentration, went off course and almost collided with the Putrajaya team on correcting.

It came as a slightly costly win as by the time I jumped into the single scull, I was fairly tired. It wasn't a smooth switch either as just before shoving off to the starting line, I realised the team had rigged the oars incorrectly. By the time I reached the start line, I'd rowed over 1000m and was not in any shape to challenge for the medals for another 500m, but it ain't over till the fat lady sings rite? Or in this case, the fat mermaid...

Although I started well and kept up with the lead boats, I was exhausted and had to concede the race to them two-thirds down the course. I coasted home the last third of the race, taking advantage of a bad start by the other Shell scull to finish 3rd. All in all, an acceptable result considering the amount of training I had. But by now, I was in no condition to compete in the kayak final.

The main event of the day was obviously the dragon boat race. Shell was in the final with Putrajaya Holdings. Although not an MSC company, they were invited to participate as they owned the only 2 dragon boats in Putrajaya. Naturally that meant they were the strong favourites.

The Shell team surprised everyone as they kept in touch with Putrajaya for two-thirds of the race. Putrajaya’s experience saw them through as they surged ahead when their strongest rowers took the kneeling position and powered their dragon towards the finish. We’ll be back next year and we promise we’ll learn the kneeling position. And I promise I’ll train at least one day more than I had for this year’s.

Overall, we finished 3rd which was the highest between all the MSC companies anyway. Overall Champions were the combi team followed by Putrajaya Holdings. All in all, a very successful and enjoyable event and is sure to stay.

More photos can be found here:

Mark's @ beanz
Dennis' @ fotopages