Talk by Anu Vaidyanathan - Hyderabad Runners

Sunday, June 26th 2016, I went to St Mary's College at Yousufguda. There was supposed to be a talk by Anu Vaidyanathan, India's first  Ultraman. Now, I didn't know what Ultraman means.

Anu is a triathlete. She runs, rides bike and swims. She has finished several marathons, iron mans (2.4 mile swim, 112 miles bike ride and 26.2 miles running). In 2009, she completed the Ultraman, which is swimming for 10k, bile riding for 425.6k and running for 84.4k. Now, you may be thinking that she is an adventure sports junkie.

Well, she has a graduation and post graduation in computer science, a PhD in electrical engineering, and she has been a professor at IIT Ropar and IIM Ahmedabad. She has her own consulting firm operating in the patents field. Also, she is a daughter, wife and a mother!

Now, that's some list of achievements that can make any one proud. But she is all about humility.

I had read about Anu earlier and knew about her achievements. So, when HR Runners decided to host her talk in the occasion of the 10 years celebrations, I registered a slot for myself.

Though I had been to St Mary's College at Yousufguda earlier, I was and still am not familiar with the way. Google maps have become my best friend and they guided me to the destination. There were few cars and bikes parked outside the college compound. As I entered the gate, the security staff told me to go to the 4th floor.

Near the lift, I met Amulu, a Toastmasters friend who was also there for the talk. There was a small auditorium, with capacity of around 150 people on the 4th floor. Rajesh Vetcha, founder of Hyderabad Runners, along with Shiv Kosgi, the operations manager, were there at the door of the auditorium, welcoming people as they walked in.

The auditorium was dimly lit. There were about 50 odd people inside the auditorium. Some were seated and some were milling around the stage. On the stage, there was a small table to the right with a pile of books neatly stacked. There were 2 standees on the stage, one announcing Hyderabad Runners 10 years celebrations and another for Anu Vaidyanathan' book, Anywhere but home. Anu was standing there talking to anyone who wanted to, signing the books for anyone who bought it.

After some time the talk started. Rajesh gave a welcome speech and invited Anu to take over. Anu passed on a feedback from and a post card with a lucky draw instructions before starting the talk. She was very calm and composed. She spoke in a natural style, spoke very fast and had lots of humor baked into her talk. She started with her connection with Hyderabad and especially Rajesh. Then how there were many Telugus who were part of her life and the contribution by them in her journey. She told about her childhood, school days and college days at USA. She apparently used to be a chubby kid during school. Is was the college that one of her friend introduced her to running.

Post her engineering in the US , she started pursuing a PhD there. Somewhere in between, she got frustrated and decided to come back to India. She came to Bangalore and started a start up. Running was her anchor during that time. She felt most comfortable while running.

Then one after the other, she started taking up bigger challenges, culminating with the Ultraman in 2009. Later she got married to a person who also supported her ambitions. Then, she became pregnant and continued long distance walking till almost the end of her pregnancy. It was during that time, someone asked her to write a book. The book project took about 2-3 years to complete. Now, it was being released.

If you look at her now, it will be difficult to believe that she was once a triathlete. She has gained weight. But there is one thing that she said which I liked. Her overall message was to keep passionate goals and achieve them. She said, people like to brand themselves as something. Like you may say you are a runner. Then you become imprisoned with your own definition of yourself. You have to prove to yourself and to others that you are a runner. You have to beat a certain time. That is dangerous. She said, do not cubby hole yourself. Do whatever you are passionate about. Reinvent yourself based on the time and circumstances. You define yourself. Others definition of you doesn't define you!!

Finally, there was a question and answer session and a prize distribution ceremony of HR Relay Run.

Shriram Properties Bangalore Marathon - 2016

Runners are mysterious creatures. How else would you explain someone endure the all pain during the training, then travel long distance sometimes even to god forsaken places like Antarctica, and finally endure even more pain during the run? And the madness does not stop there. Even if they are injured, even if they feel they are under prepared, even if they do not meet their targets, time and again, they are back on the track, running the loops, chasing another imaginary goal, getting exhausted, getting exhilarated and getting excited about running!

With the above introduction about running madness, it is now not difficult for me to accept the fact that I also travelled out of Hyderabad, for the first time ever, just to run in an event. This was the Shriram Properties Bangalore Marathon, which was held on 16th Oct 2016.

It is true for all marathon runners that as soon as you finish one race, you start itching for the next one. On 28^th August, I finished the Airtel Hyderabad half marathon and I started thinking of my next race. On 1^st Sep, I registered for the Bangalore Marathon. Friends told me that unlike the Hyderabad Marathon route which has lots of elevation, Bangalore Marathon route was quite flat. I hoped, I would be able to do my PB (personal best). So, that was one of the attraction of going to Bangalore.

My training had tapered a lot after the Hyderabad marathon. I had taken couple of weeks off running and when I started, it was just a maintenance run of 5 kilometers for 3-4 days a week and a longer Sunday run of 10-15 kms. I did not do any strength or cross training at all.

The travel to Bangalore was via train. I started on 14^th Oct, Friday evening. My wife and daughter also joined me. During the journey, I was not able to sleep properly in the night. So, by the time I woke up in the morning, my body was quite sore. My cousin came to pick us up from the Bangalore Cantonment station. We went to his home. I took bath and gorged on a sumptuous breakfast. Then, I went to the kanteerava stadium to collect the bib and came back at lunch time. Post a heavy lunch of biriyani, chicken and seer fish fry, I had difficulty keeping my eyes open. So, I took rest for about an hour.

In the afternoon, we went to another cousin’s place at Whitefield. I wanted to take rest. But they insisted to go out somewhere. So, in the evening we went out on a ride. On the way we had street food - panipuri, momos etc. The dinner was again a gigantic affair at a restaurant – Ji Hujoor. It was a buffet dinner and again I could not resist gorging myself on the spread over there.

By the time we came back home, it was midnight. The plan was to wake up at 3:00am, go by a car pool with another runner, Vaibhav who stayed nearby with whom my cousin had connected me.

Started from Whitefield along with Vaibhav around 4:00am and reached the venue around 4:40am. We went to the baggage drop area and found few of the runners from our colony. There were Madhuri, Neeti, Himanshu and Abhishek. We did some warm up and then proceeded to enter the stadium. The crowd was huge!! I was told some 8000-9000 folks registered for the half! Since the run started from inside the stadium, and the entry being quite narrow, it took at least 10 minutes for me to get to the start point.  By the time I reached the start point, we were all dispersed and I was alone.

The goal was to try to finish below 2:23. The only strategy was that I will not walk till the first 10 km. Later, if I felt like walking, I will do so only on uphill. The weather was cool and I started running slowly. I thought I will pick up pace after 5k or so. I finished 5k in about 33 minutes. My plan was to increase speed between 5 to 10 k so as to do 10k in 65 minutes. But somehow, I was not able to push myself fast. By around 8k, it was clear that I will not be able to do 10k in 65min. I did that in about 68 minutes. My goal of doing PB of 2:22 seemed difficult.

I pushed along. Somewhere around 12k, I saw a runner lying on the road surrounded by few support folks. Then I saw an ambulance blaring its horns coming along to pick that person up. A little shiver went up my spine. I thought that the sport that I am indulging in could also be fatal. I slowed down a bit.

After about 14k, I saw Venkatraman Pichumani of you too can run. I came up to him, wished good morning and started small talk with him. We ran almost 3-4km together. He is now almost 60 and had undergone a cardiac bypass surgery in 2003 (if I remember right). After that he has been running a marathon every year. He has been a successful entrepreneur and created and sold many BPO enterprises. Now, he focuses on running which is his passion. He has a company, you too can run which organizes running events, seminars and he also coaches other people on running. He has also written a book called “Sofa to 5k”. This is available on his website at a nominal cost of Rs 100. He told me that I should start strength training if I want to increase my speed. My sagging spirit was uplifted with this conversation. But by that time I realized that I was slowing down. I had lost almost 3 minutes in those 4 km. So, I told good bye to him and picked up my pace to see if I could at least beat my Airtel Hyderabad timing.

I could finish the 18^th kilometer faster. But again on the 19^th kilometer, I could feel the cramp coming in my left leg. Remembering what happened to my legs in Hyderabad marathon, I slowed down. I did not push myself. I finished the run in 2:27:45 seconds. Post run breakfast was very good. I returned back happy and exhilarated.

I could not push myself fast in this run. I think it is because of inadequate rest. The lesson learnt is that it is advisable to take more rest before the run. I would have slept 9 hours in all in the 48 hours prior to the run.   I should go to bed by 9:00PM and try to get at least 6 hours of sleep on the night before the run. Also I should limit the errands on the day prior to the run.

This run was my first run outside of Hyderabad. I have a dream now which is to run in a marathon/half marathon event in as many states of India as possible. I do not have a time limit for that. Will take it as it comes. And I will blog about it.

Happy running, happy blogging and happy reading!

My First Full Marathon

‘The magic of a marathon isn't in the 26.2 miles on race day; it's in the nearly 500 miles of training that happens in the months before. It's in the countless feelings, frustrations, and fears I have worked through while running down those desolate, tree-lined roads. You see, I wasn't supposed to be a runner. But I am. And my life is better because I chose to be one.’ - Stacy Lucier.

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As the M-day- 25-Aug-2013- came close; my mind started casting doubt about my ability to finish the complete course of 42.2 kilometers. But since I had anyway announced to the world through my daily Facebook status updates that I was going to run the marathon, backtracking was not an option. I forced myself on my training plan focusing on the taper period.

24^th August being a Saturday was a holiday for me. In the afternoon, I went to the Hitex exhibition centre at Hyderabad for the marathon Expo to collect my race packet. This time it was a much bigger expo than last year. There were many more stalls. But, I went directly to the stall where full marathon bibs were being distributed. I showed them the confirmation email, handed over photocopy of my id proof and collected the bib no “1487”. Last year, we had a timing chip that was supposed to be tied to the shoe. So, I enquired about the timing chip. The amicable volunteer pointed me something pasted on reverse of the bib and explained that the shining strip there was the timing chip.  Then he guided me to another stall to verify my timing chip and collect my T-shirt.

Back home that evening, I was wondering how to go to the start point. I messaged couple of friends and one of them suggested we can pool in a cab together. Then my cousin Arya called me and offered to drop me at necklace road which was the start point. I had an early dinner, arranged my running gear and went to sleep by 9:00 PM. The full marathon was to start at 5:00 AM. My plan was to start to necklace road by 4:00AM. I had to get up by 3:30 AM. But quite like the night before the half-marathon last year, I could hardly sleep this time. This was not unexpected. Various things were running in my mind. I just lied down and kept my eyes closed all throughout. When the alarm rang at 3:30AM, I got up. Arya was ready with his car by 4:00AM to pick me up and we started. On the way, we picked up Satyajit and his Italian friend Gio. We reached the venue by 4:35 AM.

The full marathon crowd was much thinner than the half crowd that I had witnessed last year. Also, at that early hour, it was not a hotspot of activity. I realized that, unlike half marathon which attracts a lot of crowd, the full marathon crowd is not that popular. Only serious runners take it up. I guess the crowd would have been around 500-600. Arya took a couple of snaps and left. I mingled among the sea of runners and found a 5:30 pacer. My plan was to stick to them. I knew that 5:30 would be difficult. But I wanted to start with them. Satyajit started along with the 5:00 hour pacer. We parted ways.

The sky was still completely dark. The air was charged. Exactly at 5:00AM, the run started. As the crowd moved ahead, I kept pace with the 5:30 bus. We moved along steadily. The initial run was around the Hussain Sagar. After about 2 kilometers, my shoe lace came off. I secured them carefully and ran again to catch the bus. There was light banter and folks were talking about various things. After sometime, as the first water station arrived, the group slowed down to sip some water. Since I was not thirsty yet, I kept running and left the group behind.

In the faint light of the dawn, just ahead of me I could see another person running in an Orange T-shirt. I ran closer and saw that it was a “Chennai Runners” T-shirt announcing the TWCM on 1-Dec-2013. While running just behind him, I noticed that he was wishing “good morning” to all the police personnel who were managing the traffic. Some of them responded back. Many of them ignored him. Nonetheless, I liked his friendly attitude. I moved closer to him and started a conversation.

We ran almost together for the next 20 kilometers. I found that he was a very active member of Chennai Runners. He has completed 6 full marathons at various places. He advised me on many things like how to tackle the hills, how to pace etc. It was a very good conversation. Most of all, he asked me just to enjoy the nature than have any time target.

As we looped across the Hussain Sagar lake, the sun rose from the east. The sun had its resplendent reflection on the lake water. It was a sight to behold.

By the time, we looped back to the start line, the half marathon had been flagged off and we could see the massive half crowd just in front of us. The course took us up the first flyover and having crossed that soon we were running on the Rajbhawan road. There were lot of police personnel deployed there. Soon I saw a very tall, fair and well built gentleman and a lot of police officers were milling around him. My friend from Chennai told me that he was a commissioner of Police. When we went near him, he shouted and wished him. Mr Commissioner told him that his wife was running the half this time and he was here to cheer her. A short distance ahead we crossed someone in a batman dress. Again my friend shouted “Batman! Save the world!!”. Batman waved and he waved and we moved ahead. I was really glad that I was running with him. Some of his enthusiasm also brushed against me and I also started waving and shouting at the crowd.

Soon, the second flyover came and we took that on the stride. Even before it ended, the third started. By the time we were in Banjara hills road no 2 it was another hill to cross. I was looking for something to eat. I could not get a banana. Grabbed a couple of glucose biscuits and some Gatorade and kept running.

By the time, I reached Jubilee hills, I could see some folks collecting the litter that was lying on the roads. They were the waste warriors who were doing a superb job of collecting the bottles, paper glasses and banana peels. Hats-off!!!

Also, on the way were numerous photographers who were taking snaps. Then there were volunteers who were cheering and showing the way, guiding and encouraging us. I felt really glad and humble that so many people were helping and supporting us to run the marathon.

By the time I reached Madhapur, I was running among the half crowd. We took a left turn at Hitec city and went towards Gachibowli. On the road from Hitec city to Gachibowli there were many daily labourers who were waiting beside the road on their way to work and were watching us. I was pretty tired by then. I asked my Chennai friend, who seemed to run pretty strong to move ahead as I wanted to slow down a bit.

I kept running slowly and reached highway. Taking a right I went up the last flyover. On the way up, it was hard. I looked around. There were some mikes which were blaring out some local songs. Everyone around me was walking. I also eased down to a walk. The walk gave my tired legs some rest. By then it was almost 26-27 kilometers from the start.

Again on the way down the flyover, I started running. It was a busy road. Kept running till I reached IIIT junction and finally I could grab a couple of bananas there to get some fuel in the system. Had to wait there for a couple of minutes so that volunteers could stop the traffic and let us go. From there the half crowd separated as I took a left turn and started running on the ISB road.

The ISB road is my regular weekday route to office. In contrast to the heavy traffic that I witness on weekdays on that road, on the Sunday, it was pretty empty and desolate. There were a couple of volunteers beside the road. I grabbed a bottle of water from them and mixed some Gatorade powder and ran. By the time I reached the Wipro junction, I could see several volunteers standing there and cheering the runners. I could count only 5-8 runners ahead of me. At the water station, I had some water and popped some sugar boiled lozenge in my mouth and kept running. By that time, almost 31 kilometers was done. We had been running for 4hours 15 minutes by then. I was running with the 5-6 other runners from Mumbai. They were talking that they would finish the run remaining 11 kilometers in the next 1.5 hours and targeted a 5:45 finish. I thought it may be difficult, but if I stick to them may be I also have a chance for a sub-6 hour finish. But it was getting increasingly difficult. I had to start walking again. So, I decided to do run walk for the rest of the distance.

By 33 kilometers, a motorbike with 3 folks stopped just ahead of me. One of the guys jumped from it and started running. I just realized what happened. What is the use of running a marathon and cheating it? One does not run a marathon against anyone. One competes against himself.

I kept pushing myself. By 34 kilometers, my fingers started getting swollen. My hands accumulated a lot of blood. I never had similar experience earlier. While running and walking, I had to raise my hands up to let the blood flow down. When I entered the university, there were few people still cheering. I pushed on. Now it was more of walking than running.

Finally, I managed to come out of the university on to the highway. On the highway, there were those conical red road dividers that separated the incoming traffic from the runners. I was a bit afraid running there as some loose chips on the road could come hurtling from under a vehicle tyre and hit any runner. I was quite fatigued and exhausted by that time. But I knew that it was only mental. I knew that having run so far, it was only the last mile. I knew I have to finish it.

By the time I saw the Balayogi stadium, I was bit relieved. But I knew that inside the stadium there was a circuitous route to the end. It was almost 6 hours of running by then. I pushed along inside the stadium and kept running slowly. Finally, someone told me that medals distribution will be stopped within the next 2 minutes and that I need to dash. By that time, I was fairly inside the stadium and started my last victory run on the red turf for a strong finish. As soon as I finished, someone put a medal around my neck.

I checked the time. It was 6 hours and 10 minutes from the start. I didn’t feel anything then. I was neither happy; nor tired. I was calm. My mind was blank. The feeling of completing the marathon had not sinked in yet.

It was 11:10 AM and by that time, most of the crowd had left. I dad some snacks, drank some water asked someone to click some snaps on my phone. Then I called home and reported all is well.

Took a public transport to come back home.

Back home, the exertion of the run was creeping up on me. I felt exhausted but the feeling of achievement was also brimming up. I realized that with the marathon, one item from my bucket list was ticked off. I was elated that I kept another promise to myself. Running the marathon was not the big deal, but the months of dedication, determination and discipline in the practice was the big deal. That was the real triumph. That was the real accomplishment.

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I would like to dedicate this post to all those who were involved in organizing the Airtel Hyderabad Marathon 2013. I thank Hyderabad Runners for organizing this awesome event and giving all runners a chance to run and test our mettle against ourselves. There is so much effort involved in organizing such an event.  You guys do it for the love of running and for the sake of runners. You forgo your own running to provide a wonderful experience to the other runners. Each detail was taken care of. The more I say about the medal, the less it will be. I do not many medals, but this was arguably one of the ‘awesomest’ medal that I have ever seen. Apart from the organizers, the policemen and the volunteers did a wonderful job as well. Thanks to you all.

My Full Marathon Training

I completed my first full marathon - Airtel Hyderabad Marathon - on 25^th August 2013. The Airtel Hyderabad Marathon is one of the toughest of the road marathons in India. Since I stay in Hyderabad and had ran the half marathon last August, and since the running bug bit me, it was a no brainer for me to participate. I had planned for running a full marathon at least once in life. So, after I recovered from Chicken pox in March, I started preparing for the marathon earnestly since April. I customized my own marathon training plan and followed it religiously. I ran for 4 days a week with 3 rest days. The 4 days consisted of 2 short runs, one medium run and a Sunday long run.

When the registrations opened in May, I got a mail from the organizers having participated in it last year. Immediately I signed up for the full, though I had my own fears and apprehensions. But I continued in the training.

To make it more interesting, I posted my runs in facebook so that my friends could see and comment. Their comments kept me motivated through out. Overall I ran for 85 sessions over a period of 5 months and covered almost 840 kilometers in training.

The training progressed slowly starting from about 24 kilometers a week. The initial few weeks were short runs and gradually I increased the mileage. I started with short runs of 5 kilometers and long run of 8-9 kilometers.  In one of the long run of 13 kilometers after about 4 weeks of starting the training, I felt pain in the back. I realized that I need to do some core strengthening exercises to keep the back pain away. Also, need to sleep properly the previous night to keep the fatigue away. I also realized that back pain would stop as soon as I corrected my posture. The next Sunday, I reduced my mileage of long run. It was a recovery week and the back pain during the sun did not appear.

I followed a different strategy the next week for the long run. Slept almost 19 hours on Friday night and Saturday night and went for the long run. Ran 16 kilometers absolutely pain free. Followed similar approach for next few weeks and kept increasing my long run distance.

But one weekend, I ran a 24kilometers long run and injured my left foot somewhere. The pain in foot started after the run in the afternoon. The pain was severe and threw me out of track. Took rest for 2 days. Went out running on the 3^rd day and could not run more than 3 kilometers. Had to limp back home and took rest for next 4 days. I felt bad. I was afraid as well. I thought I may not be able to run the marathon. But assured myself that time will heal me.

Again, the next week, I started running and slowly increased my mileage. By this week, my mid week runs were 12-15 kilometers. I had a bit of pain in feet. But the long run of 27 kilometers that Sunday was pain-free. Those days, my weekly mileage was almost 60 kilometers. I used to feel very sleepy in the night. I had to retire to bed latest by 10:00PM and did not have much energy for anything else. I think I should have slept more.

Due to a week of incessant rains in July, I had to miss few runs. This was the second week when my training hampered. In the subsequent weeks, I ran 2 long runs of 34kilometers in alternate Sundays. In these long runs, I also realized that the fatigue was more mental than physical. The last 10 days before the marathon was easy on running but difficult mentally. I still had a lot of fear and anticipation before the D-Day. I was not confident if I could finish it. But I focused on the taper period and reduced my running mileage.

Here is my training mileage chart:



Weekly mileage - Actual



p.s: I will post my race report shortly