An Item Off the Bucket List

 

Marathon is a popular sport, even a habit, for many. The few runs I’ve done earlier, much earlier – 5K, 10K, did show me that that is not a sport I’m going to enjoy much, leave alone making a habit.

There is this wisdom someone gave me quite some time ago that running on concrete/ asphalted surface is not good for the knees and running is best done on natural surface – clay/ mud, even sand, if you can do it. Given my life as a total urbanite with no rural living to show but only visits, the wisdom was deemed powerful enough to help my innate lazy self to decide that I need to protect my knees for old age and hence no running on concrete/ asphalt, effectively no running/ jogging.  Of course, running is mainstream activity today, marathoners are no rarity. Story of an aspiring marathoner in the later part of life would not exactly be a thriller. Given that, this narrative is not for the runners/ marathoners. I can understand if any such reader stops here and exits.

But there is also the other memory – while just out of school into pre-university, I found a long distance running competition about to start in the locality and joined up instinctively, never mind that I didn’t even have any shoes on, just rubber chappals.  That I ended up coming second and got a prize was a high that has stayed in the RAM within the top ever since. I can’t even remember the distance, must have been 5km or so. The bit in the RAM has also included a suffix that I can run long distance, note the ‘can’. Hence the occasional shorter runs have happened. But watching several colleagues/ friends doing marathons, having a friend who is a celebrity marathoner having done more than 60 marathons (!!!!) did leave a growing thought in the mind to do a marathon at least once. That’s how it got on to the bucket list years ago. Two registrations to join a full marathon and a half marathon in the last 5 years remained just that – registered but no show. Travel on work was the reason, but the heart knew there was more - it was a hesitation – as an irregular walker and trekker, can I complete it? Worse, will I end up with problems in my knees? I can understand if any runner has reached this far and is laughing.

But the bug wouldn’t  get off the mind and has only grown active – what with age catching up and – even fancied term for that – FOMO. So, two months ago, I did register for a half marathon with a colleague and his newly wedded wife. Plans were laid out – minimum 5 days’ walking at least 6 km, at least 2 km of those running. All that I managed in these two months was average a day’s walk, 5 days’ yoga and occasional trudge up the 17 floors to my bachelor pad, in a week. The climbing stopped on the wife’s strict instructions, again the knees. With that kind of preparation, I did go to the half marathon at Delhi today. The strategy was – somehow complete it, preferably within 3.5 hours, the timeline organisers set for tracking and hence, no medal if timeline is breached.

 

Here are some pointers during the run and  hours thereafter.

·       The wife suggested having a drink of the protein shake she has armed me with, I indeed did ( not that I could ignore) before leaving home. Oh boy! Did that help – like magic. Running half a km while during walks was an effort, and today in the morning after start, continuing to jog up 7 km with only a wash room break, gave me a high that could only be felt!

·       Second strategy was - carry a litre’s flask of energy drink – a pouch from the goody bag helped realise that. Having started opening this only after 7^th km, there was still about 100 ml left in the flask in the end! This, of course, did not make me run the rest of all the 14 kms. It still kept me jogging till 18^th km, a miracle to a no- preparation athlete!

·       A cousin suggested that having a few caffeinated sugar chewing gums/ candies would keep me going, each a km or more! I did have a box of them. I am very happy to report to my dear cousin that I did not have to open the pack at all.

·       Boredom is the biggest challenge. While walking too, its difficult for me to keep going beyond 30 minutes and inertia takes over. 21.1 km over certainly more than 3.5 hours would be the biggest challenge! Treks do take much longer, but you get to stop , enjoy the scene around, take pics, chat up with fellow trekkers and move on. A friend’s suggestion was - find a fellow runner with similar speed and pace with him. I did try – about a km together is all I managed with a young man before I stopped for a drink and never caught up with him again. Another young lady was in the vicinity for about 5 km. I can report to my friend that pacing may have happened only for me – there was no indication I did for her! Much as I wish, I’m unable to report any signs of recognition at all from this pacer I adopted.

·       Another strategy for the same challenge of boredom helped – chant a well known hymn that would take about 30 minutes and beyond that listen to Bhagavadgeeta rendered by Vidyabhushana Swami in a continuous track. I knew the track ran for 2.5 hours. This was a very important factor that kept me going all through to the end, grateful respects to Swamiji. At around 12^th km, a goal formed in the mind – see the finish line before Swamiji finishes the 18^th chapter. Well, he had started the 18^th chapter when the finish line was crossed.

·       The track was beautiful, well planned and the best of New Delhi was on show – Lodi Gardens, all the swanky new Bhawans, the old Vigyan Bhawan, the Raj Path, sorry Kartavya Path, India Gate,  Subhash Bose in stone under the Chabutra, National War Memorial, and huge leafy bungalows of the powers that be in the Sarkar, Fauj and judiciary in the cool morning as the sun came up.

·       Also happy to report to NDMC that nothing on me or anything picked up from outside was left on the track, except probably a few drops of sweat. A 250ml bottle picked up at a water station around the 12^th km, joined rest of trash in my bin at home.

·       Legs started complaining from 15^th km and cartilage on the left knee started complaining, as it has regularly been since more than 7 years on all treks. Consequently, the pace slacked. The later parts were made endurable by the 5K/2K runners joining in and running away – after all, bulk of fellow half-marathoners had long pulled away ahead.

·       The complaints grew louder and after crossing 18th km, the legs would barely jog, forget running. My time had dropped from around 7 minutes in the first 4 km to around 9 minutes after the 10^th km.

·       The last 3 km were walked through – any attempt to jog was resolutely resisted by the legs.

·       A small but important goal was forming in the mind after crossing the 19th km – run the last 100 mtrs to the finish line of the 21.2 km. The legs would have none of it – just couldn’t get the legs to jog those last 100 mtrs! I knew I had taken them to the limit with a big stretch.

·       I do wish I could stop here with a self-congratulation, now that finish line was crossed before it was removed, the half marathon medal collected, photographed, nashta box collected, and report that I happily went home feeling on top of the world. It was not to be.

·       While limping through to the exit in National Stadium, dizziness hit me, I hadn’t felt dizzy since at the time of typhoid and relapse, while at college! The mind was blank, may be for about 3 – 4 minutes, it certainly wasn’t working, the body seemed imbalanced, about to crash down, barely reaching a concrete slab left on the side of the road by CPWD contractors to put the hand on.

·       Following 20 minutes till I got into a cab were quite dramatic by my standard – no place to sit, barely able to stand, booking cabs but unable to reach them (2 cabbies left as I couldn’t reach them), thirsty as never before but no water having emptied the flask, finding a young man offering Chas (beaten curds) from his stock, he also finding a folding stool for me to sit beside the road and helping me into the cab. I haven’t felt so thankful and grateful to someone for a long time as much as I did to this young man who also did the 10K run.

·       The legs and the sides that had been protesting till I reached home, exploded in anger as soon as I got in and flopped on to the bed hoping to relax and take a nap. On the back, on the stomach, on the sides, , knees bent, knees straight, one knee bent, sit up, try to walk – no position would the legs let me be without cramping. They were bent on taking their toll and more for the trouble I put them to, today.

·        After a small protein drink and much more water, the anger subsided a bit, I might even have dozed off. But it wasn’t more than 30 minutes before the legs started cramping up again – the same sequence earlier repeated.

·       It was only after about 3 hours that the legs and muscles o the sides and back themselves got tired and slowly settled down in sullenness as their anger dissipated. Everything passes – a lesson I was reminded of again.

There it is, one item scratched off the Bucket List. Will I do it again, may be a full marathon? The wrath of the legs in the afternoon is still fresh in the mind to dare answer that. And in this age of ChatGPTs, CoPilots and Geminis of the world, it will be good to know from the readers if they could discern if any AI agent helped me form this narrative !!