Mumbai Marathon 2011

Journey of 42.2 Kms:
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The most awaited event for everyone running SCMM. Reasons are multi-fold - best management, great route, great Mumbaikars cheering all the way and to TOP it all 25 mins early start. Couldn't manage to reach early as planned, but reached nick in time at 5:45 AM and met Prawaal, Nishant, Sandeep and Alok. Very quickly everyone started to move towards the starting area and exactly at 6:15 AM we started. I had been going over and over again on what pace should I maintain and in the process found a group of 3 folks - 2 men and 1 women in red t-shirt best to follow. I was able to pace up with them till about 8 Kms and took a urgent break at that point and lost the group. From that point the intention was to catch up with this group and I paced up a bit (just a notch up to ensure that I do not burn out). Managed to caught up with the lady after 5K and then from there on, we were moving close to each other. I also caught up with the 5 hr bus and met Sujit in that bus (it was nice to have finally met you). The atmosphere in the bus was amazing, hats off to Amit and the group. I was always hearing "Another one bites the dust" as the group crossed any Kms. It was really cheerful to be around them, but I had planned to stay ahead of them. Completed 21K in around 2 hrs 17 mins, same as my Pune HM timing and I didn't feel that I had pushed much. Then came the killer Sea Link bridge, I took it easy on this...walked a bit, poured a lot of water on my head, sponged myself etc. Eat half a banana on the way and the sea link was out of picture. Due to this, the 5 hr Bus had managed to cross me and I was left alone with no target in front or company with me. To overcome the difficulty, I managed to grab couple of folks with me, cheered them to run again and some of them ran with me for 5K approx. Ashish and Sachin were with me till Peddar Road uphill which we decided to walk initially, then I thought what's the point of training on NH4 if I have to walk a small hill. So, I started running again and these 2 guys were left behind...shortly I met Nikhil and then caught up with Prawaal who was also walking. At that time, we had completed 35K in 4:05 and looked all set for sub-5. I was all the time cheering, thanking the cheering crowd and grabbing everything the organizers had to offer - water, glucozade, banana, oranges...except the Parle-G biscuits. I was a motivator for a lot of folks out there and made them to reduce their completion time by couple of minutes, but the real reason was that I was able to run only with Company, alone I would have easily taken 10 more minutes. So, finally we saw the mark of 500 meters to go and Prawaal and I crossed the finish line holding hands. I am very thankful to all the support provided by SCMM organizers, volunteers, mumbaikars taking time out from their Sunday mornings with biscuits, bananas, oranges etc to help us, fellow runners who without saying anything were inspiration to me just by doing what they do best - run and to TOP it all fellow DMers. They were always there during the training period, motivating and guiding through the difficult part - training. A wonderful journey of SCMM 2011. A lot awaits in this year, for later to sort out.

Running Experience in India

This has been a long pending blog. I landed in Mumbai, India 2 hours late from the scheduled time and the company vehicle was already waiting for us. Once out, we started for Pune and reached there at around 3 AM. As expected, we spent almost 2 hours talking and I was not feeling sleepy at all. So, decided to utilize the jetlag to my advantage and since 1st Nov was Sunday, I planned for a long run.
Searched for all my long running gear in my bags after throwing a lot of clothes here n there and I headed outside at around 6:15 AM. The kind of stare people gave me while I was running was very interesting. Most of the people were staring either my Garmin Forerunner or my fuel belt and trying to figure out what the hell I am doing. Ignoring such glaring eyes was not easy but I somehow managed it.
I started out from my home towards Aundh, reached Bremen circle, then thought to continue till University circle. I had planned to run around 12 miles and hoped that I would be able to cope up. This was not the first time I was running 12 miles, but running in India is totally different. Even though I was running very slow, my heart rate was always above 180. One of the main reason could be that I didn't had proper sleep to keep the heart rate down. Somehow I was able to find strength to continue and reached University circle. There was a lady selling wierd (for me atleast) on a bicycle. All juices of different types like Karela juice, guava juice, carrot juice, Ginger+lime juice, kokum juice to name a few. She told me that none of the juice has sugar and salt added which most of the people might find very good, but not for me. I was looking for something refreshing with lots of salt and some sugar and all I could find was exactly the opposite. I finally decided to go ahead with Ginger + lime juice, somehow gulped it down and headed back. University circle is exactly 5.95 miles from my house. The juice option was not good in the sense that Ginger started kicking shortly. I was feeling uneasy while running back. With all the negative things happening, traffic also started with full speed. It was soo bad that I had to stop running to get out of the CO2 the vehicles were generating at the Sangvi Phata. With sun already up, I somehow managed with lots of walking breaks, to reach home. It took me longer than usual to complete 12 miles, but I was very much satisfied with my performance of completing the target. Mainly, since this was a totally new experience. Also, all the time I was running against wind, polution and heat.
I hope to get accustome very fast to this weather as the weather would be more humid and hotter in Mumbai during the marathon. With the way things are progressing, completing the marathon in less than 5 hours looks distant dream for now. But, I will still keep my fingers crossed and keep trying.
1st Nov - 12.2 miles
3rd Nov - 6 miles
4th Nov - 8.5 miles
5th Nov - No run - Mumbai trip
6th Nov - Return from Mumbai
7th Nov - Rest
8th Nov - 12.6 miles
I had earlier planned to run 14-15 miles on 8th Nov, but I didn't pay proper attention to the carb loading the earlier day and proper hydration as I had done in the past. So, I didn't had the energy to run more than 12 miles on 8th Nov. As i did on 1st Nov, this time I got Guava juice from the same Lady for Rs. 10. Guava juice was better than the earlier one, but not good enough for me. Next time I will skip this option and instead carry some power gel with me.
I have the following plan about running for this week -
9th Nov - Rest
10th Nov - 7 miles
11th Nov - 9 miles
12th Nov - 3 miles
13th Nov - 6 miles
14th Nov - Rest
15th Nov - 16 miles ( in Dapoli, I hope its not that bad)
Lets see how I am able to manage running these miles while attending office in India. Good part is that I am able to wake up at 5 AM in the morning.

Long Long Run

Sunday 11 Oct 2009:
I had planned to do 12 miles today and as per my running speed, I had estimated to complete this run in 2 hours timeframe. Last time I had run 9 miles was 2 weeks back and there was no running in between (a lot of excuses, none worth mentioning). I have only roughly 12 weeks left to complete my training and this also includes 2 weeks of tapering. Hence, I have to push hard. The only way out of this is try to run a little less than long run, but more than 1 hour runs (2 times) in a week followed by my target long run on weekends. I also plan to include speed work sessions later on.

I am always deprived of sleep, more to my mentality of not sleeping more even though I need it. I have in short trained my mind to wake up early in the morning even if I slept very late in night. This usually happens week after week. Hence, I decided on Saturday night that I need proper sleep in order to run efficiently on Sunday morning. I slept for a little over 8 hours and started my run at 9:30 AM. It was very windy with temp around 55 F. It was a good weather for a long run. I took my Garmin forerunner, put on the Nathan Water belt and head out for the run.

The initial 3 miles were very tough as I couldn't find the correct rhythm. I overshoot Heart Rate over 180 even before 1 mile completion and hence I had to stop intermittently at 1.25 miles and then at 2.5 miles. At completion of 3 miles, time was 33:30 minutes, slower than my target by 3:30 minutes. This is the time when I started pushing and to my surprise I was in rhythm. I ran non-stop for the next 3.5 miles, with completing mile 3-6 in 30 mins as per my target. I had to take a walk break for water and a big hilly road. I walked half of the hill and then started running again. On the way back, I took 2 breaks at 8.5 and 10.5 miles mark. I really pushed myself from 8.5 miles onwards and completed the 12 mile run in 2 hours and 9 mins. I was very happy with the total outcome i.e. completing the last 6 miles in close to 58 mins. The run went pretty well, except the high struggling part between 10 - 12 miles.
Miles: 12
Average HR - 172
Average Speed - 5.6

Monday 12 Oct 09:
I had planned to run 2 recovery miles on Monday, but couldn't do it. I am always scared of running in rain for 2 reasons
1> Getting my shoes wet causing problems the next day/run. I probably need more pair of shoes or a spray for waterproofing my shoes.
2> Getting all wet is a totally unknown experience to me. Hence, I am scared of getting sick due to running in rain and I don't want to ruin my other runs as well as long runs over weekend.
Hence, zero recovery miles on Monday evening.
I am desperately trying to switch from evening runs to morning runs, but first I have to learn to get to bed early in the night so that I am fresh for Morning runs.
Miles: 0

Tuesday 13 Oct 09:
I had planned to do a 6 mile run on Tuesday. The weather was perfect, very hot and humid for a run, but perfect since it was not raining. So, out I went. Same old story, initial 2-3 miles were very tough...no rhythm. I need to learn how to cope up with the initial miles. 3 miles completed in 32:50 minutes and the next 3 miles were completed in 30:30 minutes. I was happy with the second half, but first half was pathetic. I was happy to be able to run 6 miles within 2 days of a 12 mile run and confident that I would be able to cope up with the hard training ahead. Lets see how it goes.
One thing to note for sure is that the weather played havoc on me. I usually sweat a lot during my run, nothing new. But I had taken a limited stock of water and I was running low on that towards the end of the run. It was very humid and dehydrating today.
Miles: 6
Average HR: 172
Average Speed: 5.7

Wednesday 14 Oct 09:
As planned earlier, I desperately wanted to switch back to morning running. So, here it was. I had planned to run an easy 3 - 4 miles as I just ran 6 miles the previous day and had plans to run another 5-6 miles on Thursday morning. I woke up at 6 AM, freshen up and was out of home around 6:50 AM. I had thought to do 4 miles if things look good, otherwise settle for 3 miles. I ended up with 3 mile run only because the legs were pretty heavy due to small gap ( approx 10 hours). I completed the 3 mile run in 31:26 minutes and was still happy about it. The weather was very cold, I had to change my T-shirt to suit the weather. I was happy to switch to morning time because it was more colder and raining too in the evening.
Mile: 3
Average HR: 161
Average Speed: 5.7

First Blog

Recently, I have picked up a new hobby (thanks for my friend Santosh A.) in USA and I don't believe that I am already addicted to it. This hobby is running (slow jog ofcourse). I had never ran more than 1 mile before, but once my in-laws went back from US to India, we (me n wife) decided to hit the Gym. I used to do weights during college days, but I couldn't continue later (all silly excuses) and as a result I have always gained weight every month/year. So, this time I decided to focus more on running. I didn't had the patience to mix run and walk, somehow I find walking a lot boring. I decided to run as much as possible on treadmill in YMCA. I always kept pushing and somehow reached a magical 3 miles as my stamina. This was the time I asked Santosh on how come he ran a Marathon when I am unable to run more than 3 miles. He explained methods and suggested ways to increase my mileage and things started to take U turn.
In about 3 months, I increased my mileage from 1 miles to 9 miles and together Santosh and I decided to participate in Full Marathon together (yeah, full on first go). We couldn't run together due to we staying in central and eastern timezones. We also couldn't run together on our first marathon too.
Preparations started in full swing and the max miles I covered was 17.5 miles (once) and 15 and 16 miles before that. With a huge shortfall in my target, I still planned to go for Full Marathon. I took a whopping 5 hours and 40 mins to complete the marathon and I was most of the time walking (even though I hate it a lot) during the second half. I learned a lot of lessons from this preparation and have decided not to stop running for long time so that the stamina and consistency remains. Hence, I registered for Hyderabad HM (22 Nov 09) and Mumbai FM (17 Jan 2010). Preparations are going on very good right now. This blog is about my experiences during this and future preparations.