Engr. Christine Bonifacio, an employee of DPWH CamNorte District Engineering Office, began to earnestly compete in running — which she started as a hobby in 2019 — only early this year.
It didn’t take long for her to acclimatize in a competitive environment as months later and on Nov.4, she won in convincing fashion the female category of the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology Bicol’s “Reformers Ultra Marathon” in Albay province.
The diminutive civil engineer admitted she took up running as a challenge after some people said she “was clumsy and tends to tire easily.”
Bonifacio,28, admitted there’s a correlation between her favorite hobby and her chosen profession.
“Both require a lot of patience and persistence, for instance as an engineer you have to design and draw plans and you have to revise more often than not,” said the Daet native and CNSC alum. “In running I have to train regularly, usually for three hours or more and sometimes it feels like there’s no progress. Yet in both cases I know I need to move forward painstakingly to reach the goal — the finish line.”
A mindset that has categorically shut down the “clumsy and weakling” taunts that persisted just a few years ago.
