The Bangalore Marathon

The Three Musketeers ( me, Gaurav and Modi)

On 18th May 2008 I had a brush with what long distance running and I did not fair to my expectations. Bangalore organised its first international 10K marathon and I completed the 10K in 56 minutes. The winner did it in 28 minutes. I just cannot believe at what pace was he running. I thought I mantained a descent pace but he was running at more than twice my pace. Well then they are professionals but where these thin Kenyan guys get their energy from.

The race started at 9 am and the weather that day was much hotter than the previous days and to add to this I did lots of mistakes and hope not to repeat it in the other races. I forgot to take my sunglasses and the cap with me. I could feel the need when my head was banging in the sun in the middle of the race. Then I drank too much water and by the end of the 8 Kilometres I had to stop and walk for more than half a mile for the very bad stomach ache. But I really sprinted at good speed in the last 1 km. Also my reebok shoe was also giving me problem and I had boils in my right leg which was paining me throught the run( lesson learnt: branded shoes dont work good, better go for light weight Cats where one can feel the road). I did learn from my mistakes and hope not to repeat them in the future.

I used to think that I was somewhat a good runner while running in the treadmill in gym but real road is different. There were many old people and girls ahead of me and now I think I must concentrate more on long distance running and bring my time below the 50 minute mark in the next run. There was a guy who collapsed in front of me and ambulance had to come to pick him up. Then there was a beautiful girl who passed me. I tried to keep the charge for about 15 minutes and sometimes I even passed her ,but later I just let her go as I could no longer keep up with the pace. Then there were many airforce and army people who were leading the pack. Initially I tried to keep up with them but later I thought it was a bad idea.

There were many people cheering in the whole way. We went through the cantoinment area and the army poeple were cheering like anything. Whenever I saw girls cheering I would give a brief sprint in front of them. But I think these sprints proved disastrous at the end. Then after race I had few energy drinks to get back my energy level back ( recommended to carry them when running). There were other shows too going on but I dicided to come to room and rest. Anyways I enjoyed the run and hope in the next race I would be better and would concentrate on the race and nothing else.  

PS: Sunfeast organised the event. We were given a bag and there were lots of funny stuff inside. A few of them are : Red chill powder( I don’t know what I am going to do with this), Sugar Free (OMG), Fiama soap, lots of biscuits that anyway taste bad and a knigfisher water bottle. Still I think a T-shirt would have been a better option  

Also take the chip that they provide to be tied to the shoes. Later your timings and marathon photoes will come to you over the web. I am attaching some of my marathon photoes.

 

Marathon Pics

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