Hong Kong Marathon: runners happy to be back in ‘new normal’ and hear ‘patter of feet’ once again as race returns after two years
- The 2020 Standard Chartered Hong Kong marathon was cancelled due to the pandemic, and the 2021 version pushed back from February to October
- Racers say they are happy to be back and ‘feel the patter of all these feet together’
Serene Yu was so excited to be able to race again she had her friend who is an artist paint a Hong Kong flag and the Standard Chartered logo on her early on Sunday morning.
“I also got my nails painted in the same colours for this,” said the 25-year-old who completed the 10k in 49 minutes, 25 seconds. “After the pandemic there was such a long time in between races so I was so excited for this. This has been such a good experience.”
Yu, who last raced in January of 2019, which was her first race, said it felt a bit strange to be back out running with so many people, but she adjusted fairly quickly.
“During the tunnel I felt a bit suffocated because there was a lot of traffic, but then after I got out I felt a lot better and picked up again.”
Matthew Ip, who is the coach for Hav Cheuk-lun, 20, ran with him to finish the 10k in around an hour and said the whole experience was “exhilarating”.
“The whole way I felt like I had energy because of the crowd and the people. It felt really nice.”