Reminiscing The Day I Got IPPT Gold.

I still remember the day when I first got a gold award for my IPPT in Officer Cadet School (OCS). It wasn’t a problem getting maximum points for all the other fitness tests but the 2.4km run has a timing requirement of 9mins 44 secs & below and it has always eluded me. The army won’t present me with 1 million dollars and 99 virgins if I do get gold for my IPPT but I thought of it as a one of the things I must achieve during my stint with national service.

ippt gold award

The IPPT Gold Award that resembles the silhouette of Superman as he takes off to peep at Louis Lane again.


It was extremely frustrating for me especially when my timings for the 2.4km run has always bordered around 10mins. Shaving 16 seconds off from a 10min timing is by no means an easy feat – trust me.

On that very day, there was about 4 out of the 30 odd people running that day that were shoo-ins for the gold timing. The game-plan for me and another friend called Christopher was to follow the leading pack as close as we can, without looking like we want to hump them from behind; using them as benchmarks to get a gold timing.

Adrenaline was pumping through me like never before that day. It’s one of those days where I feel like I can accomplish anything – barring jumping down from a flat and the likes of course. The breaking point for me was always on the 3rd lap when the front runners would peel away from me, leaving me with little confidence in their wake. This time, however, I kept up with the pack right up to the 5th lap. As I turned around the corner of my final 100 meters or so, Christopher used his long, lanky legs to put himself for a 5th place finish while I ran for my life to keep up. Another guy overtook me during the last 20 meters and I was about 3 strides behind that sneaky fellow who finished with the timekeeper shouting, “9 mins 42 secs!!!”. My heart was racing as I crossed the finishing line and stared at the timekeeper while time seems to stop as I avoided bullets, Matrix style.

“9 minutes……”

“… 44 SECONDS!!!“

I punched the air jubilantly and gave a grunt which exhausted every ounce of energy left in me as my sweaty platoon mates congratulate me on the achievement that wouldn’t win me 1 million dollars and 99 virgins.


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  2. Ping.sg Blog Awards 2008 – HP Blog of The Year!
  3. I Could Have Died Over A Stupid 2.4km IPPT Run
  4. BLOODY IPPT! CHIN YOU!!!
  5. Enjoying the Run Again…

Tags: 2.4km run, army, Christopher, fitness tests, gold award, ippt, officer, officer cadet school, RSAF, , saf, test

This entry was posted on Friday, December 12th, 2008 at 12:40 pmand is filed under My-Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

3 Responses to “Reminiscing The Day I Got IPPT Gold.”

  • spankalot Says:
    December 12th, 2008 at 1:45 pm

    Haha! Such a post will always strike a chord with the many Singaporean men. Sigh……ippt, the bane of NSFs and NsMen around. The run that can be completed with the same amount of time needed to take a sh*t but with so much more pain!

    Reply
  • GERMS Says:
    December 13th, 2008 at 1:37 am

    I know how you felt bro…i’ve been there before…KEY WORDS BEING “BEEN THERE” and “BEFORE” and “FELT…notice all past tense…when will we ever get back to those days…BRAVO WARRIORS…need more motivation…say like a month’s salary??

    Reply
  • krisandro Says:
    December 15th, 2008 at 2:10 pm

    spankalot> Shitting is much faster and enjoyable for me dude. HAHAHAHHA~

    GERMS> Well, I do hope that I’ll get back on the fitness track in 2009. Love to convert those past tenses into present ones. :)

    And you pilots need to keep fit okay! Don’t talk about salary!

    Reply

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