Chennai Marathon 2006

These organisers better go and do something useful. It was the worst kind of marathon that I had ever run. Right from the start, you can tell these guys were acting like clowns with no plans in their heads. It was required of all the runners that we get examined by a doctor. If they had more doctors, it would've worked out ok, but they had only one doctor. Any way, as usual I had my complaining session with the organiser. The organiser grabbed me by the arm quite roughly, he took me to a guy who is some kind of coach who organised the race. The organiser complained that I was shouting at him. It was so funny.

I had a nice chat with the guy, I assume that he was the race director. He let me know go without getting examined by the doctor. I also had three applications for Amri and his friends, they also got the bibs for the race.

The race started at 6:30 a.m. It was much better than starting at 7.45 like at Mumbai. Well, I crossed the 10km mark in 40 minutes, there was no water at all till the 11th Km mark. When I complained to the guys who were part of organising committee, they said that I should learn to run without drinking water. Instead of water, they had offered Glucose powder and peeled oranges. Any way, I didn't really want to run the whole race, so I stopped at the 21km mark. It took me 1:31 hours to complete a half-marathon.

This is great when I consider the fact that I didn't run at all from 15th of Jan till the race on 5th Feb. I was sick with mumps. I had lots of rest and lots of food.

In my opinion, the Rotary Club should stop organising marathons by themselves. They should ask someone who is capable of organising it better or they should employ someone with a little bit of common sense!

Been There! Done That!! Bugured now!!!

Well, I had a good run last in Mumbai. Here is the break-up of my time. I hope it makes sense to you. btw,

14.1km 0.56.38
23.2 km 1.35.22
32.5km 2.21.54
finish 3.19.30

Any way, I wore a singlet with the Tibetan flag with a message that "FREE TIBET from Chinese Occupation"

Well, the first half of the race, I did really well, but when the sun was out, it was fairly hard to run in the heat. The temperature was pretty high around 26c.

Most of the way, people were chearing me on and sometimes they would call out, " Go sri lanka! GO!!!" It was really funny to see these educated people getting confused with the Tibetan flag for Sri Lanka. Then, some people would should shout out, " Go India!!!' when I got closer to them, they would kind of mumble and say, " oh!! he's a Tibetan!" I could only smile at their lack of decernment to features of people from Tibet. Then again it's a good thing they accepted me as just another person and cheered me on. One"aunty" even gave me a chocolate biscuit to eat! That biscuit was really needed at that part of the race.

At the 32 km mark, all my energy was totally depleted and I kept trying to move my legs but, they were bloody tired. I generally take some money with me when go out for a run, This time carrying money proved very useful. I stopped at a roadside store and bought me a nice bar of chocolate and stuffed myself and continued on. The last 10 kms were the toughest, but I kept thinking of all the fun things that I have done in the last few months, I was just trying to take my minds off things. Especaillyall the jokes that Tsering (a Tibetan Friend) used to tell me, I imagined him with his football matches with his yellow hair etc. I also remembered all the crazy people I have met. I kept me going till the end of the race.

I finished the race at around 11:15 and they gave me medal for finishing the race. Then I went and got my time printed on an official certificate. Finally I dragged myself off to the nearest pub to get me a nice bottles of foster's, I realised I had only an hour and half to drag myself onto the train, back to the sweat paradise called Chennai. So, I reluctantly abandoned the idea of taking the muscle relaxant and got myself a nice bowl of noodles which was so good.

It was so nice to have a bath in cold water. Before the race, I had taped all my toes in surgical tape to stop the blisters. I have no blisters from this race, I also didn't lose any of toe nails!

Enough about the mumbai marathon, now I have to start training again for the next race that is on in three weeks. I better start burning more fat fairly soon. Yeah, I went down from 68kgs to 62, my target is to achieve somewhere around 58-60. In Chennai heat, that can be done quite easily.

why, why, why???

I still can't understand who really *&^% up most of the things on this planet. People are totally trashing this earth. Mainly the people who live in the city. You walk down the street, you will see plastic everywhere. Sometimes even rich people throw rubbish from their cars while on the road. That really peeves me off. Why can't they just stop by a rubbish bin and drop the s**t?

The situation is quite different when you go to a small village or a small town. I was so surprised when I went to Salem recently. They had cleaned up the storm water drain which used to smell so bad. But, now only the rain water flows in the drain and it's so great someone actually thought about things. I wish we would get some thinking people here in Chennai.

I think the more we rape the earth of it's resources, the more disasters that we are going to face e.g earthquakes, tsunamis and hurricanes. I guess I am becoming more and more of a greenie. I don't think people ever consider the idea/fact that one day we are going to run out of resources. Even basic things like water, we won't have. Chennai people are the great example of how to conserve water. Man, some people do really make me angry. I have seen people who forget to turn the tap off at restaurants just after they had washed their hands. That's pathetic. I really hope someone will teach them not waste resources.

On a different topic, the shape of the beach has changed a lot in the last month or so. It seems this might have something to do with the tusnami we had 6 months or so ago. The sea water has come in further in land in some places and some places the water has gone so far away, it's pretty scarey when I run on the beach. You can't really predict when the high tide would return. We really need to treat the nature with respect or else it won't treat us with any respect at all. I guess we haven't learnt anything at all so far with the recent natural disasters. Well, the history is that we never learn from the history.

Ah... yeah! I am getting into shape now, I ran for an hour or so today and felt really good. Good to be fit again!

back from ashes!

Finally I feel good again and all my sickness is gone. There is no constant fever or head-ache. I dont have to take Paracetamol any more. What a relief! I really appreciated medicine when I was sick. Sometimes the fever went upto 40C. Without the medicine, I could've died.

Any way, finally I started jogging on Tuesday and Wednesday. Yesterday, I thought it's about time I pushed my body to get fit. I decided to do repetitions of 100 mts. I did 10 times and almost all the time I averaged 16 secs. I was so happy I am getting into shape pretty quickly. I really really really hope that I dont get sick again. Now, I have been very careful about what I eat.

I am on salty lemon juice diet still. Lemon juice is so amazing. I drink a lot just to help my body with the electrlytes that I keep losing when I run for an hour or so. Lemon has pottasium and add a bit of sugar and salt to the lemon juice. That would help to replace that Sodium and sugar. I find that it's cheaper for me to make salty-sweet lemon drink than to buy the electrolyte powder mix.

still recovering!

it has been two weeks since I ran last. Life has been pretty strange recently. I feel pretty good now, but still I will wait for a couple of more days before I start running. Good thing about the whole sickness thing is that I lost about 5kgs. Any way, I have to be really careful and try not to wreck myself.

sick no running for a week

I got pretty sick on sunday, so i am not going to be running for a week.

chasing cows

Yesterday I went for a slow jog for about 40 minutes on the beach. While I was running, I met some old friends who like to have lots of kids. This woman had about 6 when I met her 6 years ago, I think she added four more to the count. I don't know when they are gonna stop. Their religious belief is that they shouldn't use any form of contraception. Any way, it's my job to make judge people about their life. I had a nice chat and then just came home.

This evening, I took off hoping that I would be able to do about 20kms or so, but I just ended up just doing 15kms in 1:09:20 hours. Pretty tired now and I better hit the sack!