Last Sunday's Standard Chartered Hong Kong Marathon - an annual road race for Hong Kong runners - attracted a record 70,000 entrants.
Even though elite runners in the two shorter races - 10km and half marathon (21km) - started at 5.30am, many reporters and photographers were already assembled by 5am at the media centre next to the finish line at Victoria Park. Junior athletes born between 1992 and 1995 were able to compete in the junior categories over 10km and half marathon.
Rebecki Chan Yee-ki won back the girls' junior 10km title she last claimed in 2010 despite suffering from a bad fever the day before the race.
'Last year I used up too much energy at the start and could finish only third,' Rebecki, a Form Three student at Diocesan Girls' School, says. 'This time, although I wasn't feeling well, I lowered my expectations and relaxed; it helped.'
Mary Hui, a Year Two student at Li Po Chun United World College, in Sha Tin, won the women's junior half marathon - less than two minutes ahead of Coco Choi Pui-yan.
Coco, a Form Six student at Sacred Heart Canossian College, in Pok Fu Lam, said: 'Last year I came second in women's junior 10km; this was the first time I have run the half marathon at the Standard Chartered Marathon. I have done less training recently because of my DSE exam.
'My target was to beat my time at last month's Mizuno Half Marathon,' says Coco, who plans to win next year's race.