Family Featured In Newspapers

The family had some exposure in the Mainstream media lately. First it was in The Star weekend edition under the Fit4Life pullout. This was in conjunction with Father's Day where the journalist covered three family men in their 30's, 40's and 50's. I am apparently, representing the Father's in the 30's. Thank you for the coverage The Star, and thank you Fiona, for making me look good. :) The honor was having the family mentioned along with two other man that is important in their organisations and vocation, as i am after all, just an engineer ;-)
Fit Dads

TWO FIT
By FIONA HO
starhealth@thestar.com.my

You’ll be surprised, but keeping active amid a dizzying conundrum of modern-day demands is not as impossible as it sounds. This Father’s Day, we catch up with fit fathers who have managed the feat while juggling their daddy duties.

THE advent of parenthood rarely heralds a period of optimum fitness for any working dad. Between dropping your kids off at school and grabbing lunch on the run, you are stuck on a busy work day that grows increasingly longer as you clock in more and more hours to support your family.

You are stressed, you’re constantly tired, and you’re left with little time for things like exercise and healthy nutrition.

While maintaining a work-life balance remains an elusive struggle for most working adults, keeping active and sticking to good eating habits amidst a dizzying conundrum of modern-day demands is not as impossible as it sounds.

We caught up with fathers who have managed the feat while juggling their daddy duties.

Lim has made his outdoor adventures a family affair. He encourages his family to lead an active lifestyle by taking them on regular trips to the park.

No excuses

Bio-fuel engineer, Lim Ee-Van, 36, makes no excuse not to exercise. “There are 24 hours in a day. You have to ask yourself what you really want out of it,” he says.

The lean father-of-two walks the talk. An ardent runner who participates regularly in marathons, Lim trains an average of three times a week, either before or after work, depending on his schedule.

“I usually have to be in the office by 9am, so I would wake up at 6am to go for a short run near my house in Damansara Utama on my training days,” he says. And by ‘short’, he means a good 30 minutes to cover 5km.

The course comes easy for Lim, who has completed the Ironman Triathlon three times (the Ironman is a long-distance race that comprises a 3.86km swim, a 180.25km bike and a marathon 42.2km run, to be raced in that order, and without a break within a time limit of 17 hours).

“The goal isn’t to run insane mileage everyday. You just need 30 minutes to keep your legs moving and your heart pumping and you’ll get faster over time,” he explains.

It was his training for the Ironman race that really tested his physical limits. “When I was preparing for the event, I trained vigorously. On Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, I would wake up at 4.30am to cycle about 17km, and on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I would run a minimum of 12km in the morning, and up to 15km in the evening.

“You suffer during training, but when you’re out there in the race, everything is going to be easy,” he says with a smile.

He credits his unwavering discipline to his tough early education. Lim says he attended a military school where they could be “penalised for anything from the top of our heads to the tip of our toes”.

There, he learned to adhere to a stringent lifestyle, and also acquired a penchant for sports. “I was a fat boy in primary school, but was forced to live a highly disciplined lifestyle after I went there when I was about 14.”

Lim played competitive rugby, and later took up endurance sports like adventure racing, canoeing, mountain biking, and abseiling.

He progressed to triathlons in 2003, and has not looked back since. This year alone, he has participated in marathons held in Kenyir, Terengganu, and Port Dickson, Selangor, in March and April, and is looking forward to a race in Desaru, Johor, at the end of the year.

He does not run for the prize, but takes genuine pleasure in his journey to the finish line.

Lim has since made his outdoor adventures a family affair. So many of today’s activities for children are sedentary in nature, he notes. He encourages his children – Ryan, six, and Nadia, four, to lead an active lifestyle by taking them on regular trips to the park.

On weekends, Lim wakes up as early as 5am to run with his wife, Aileen Har, who is co-owner of the popular local boutique Cats Whiskers.

“It’s a little bit harder to train now that I have a family, but it’s made possible with an understanding spouse and a ready support system. My mother or her mother takes care of our kids when we go for a run.

“Usually, it’ll be around 8.30 or 9am when we complete our 20km run, and that’s when our kids will be up and we can spend the rest of the day with them.”

Lim believes that adequate nutrition makes up the other half of the health equation. His brief brush with iron deficiency prompted a complete change in his eating habits. “My iron levels fell below the average for about 11 months. It was so bad, I was hyperventilating after just one flight of stairs.

“I had to take iron supplements, and I made a full recovery this year. Now, I only take whole foods. Processed foods like white bread for instance, are a definite no-no.”

“I plan to do this till I’m 80,” he concludes with a laugh.In spite of the debilitating experience, Lim is determined to stick with his exercise regime. “I hardly fall sick nowadays. Whenever I’m feverish, I go for a run and sweat it out, and I’ll be okay,” he says.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------The Second coverage is in Sin Chew Jit Poh Metro Pullout. :)

Unfortunately, i can't read Chinese and had to get my mum to read it for me. :) Essentially, they were mentioning about healthy living and how the whole family can get together to make the change. Thank you Sin Chew and SCKLM for the opportunity! The full excerpt can be found here

Courtesy of the PR company. A copy of the paper has been bought and kept. 

Many thanks for the exposure and we are pretty sure the kids will blush when they reflect on this in years to come. :)