The Nike+ Human Race 10K

After some dilly-dallying I decided to go ahead and run the Nike Human race 10K on 24rth October with the goal of trying to complete it under 50 minutes and if possible under my  Sunfeast 10K 2009  time of  48:24. We ( myself and 3 others : Parminder, Shahid and Rajeev) left Domlur a little after 2:30PM - reaching Clarke's Exotica at just about 4PM - the traffic was a little more than we expected. There seemed to be a over 1000 runners in the starting area. Since everyone was wearing the red Nike race T-shirt the holding area was a complete sea of red.  Though at the time of picking up the race kit we were given a colour band based on estimated completion time this was not strictly enforced. I sneaked through the crowd and positioned myself towards the front. The race was flagged off a little before 430 PM by cricketer Sreesanth. Mahesh Bhupathi and Anju Bobby George were two other sports celebrities who were part of the event. I took off at a pace of about 4:35 per Km and ran the first Km in about 4:45. After that my pace started to drop. My stomach started cramping and I felt quite dehydrated. It was sunny and warm when the race started and I had lunch a little later than planned. Also, it probably was the side effect of indulging in a couple of drinks of  single malt on Friday night in the company of some relatives who had come over for dinner. Unlike at Sunfeast 10K I felt so thirsty that had to stop at each of the water stations which was every 2Km. Nevertheless I managed to get to the 5Km point in just over 25 minutes. The route was quite nice - completely within the resort property. At a couple of points enroute there was live music.The weather cooled off in the second half - this definitely helped me sustain my pace. Then with a little over 1 Km left I managed to accelerate a notch  to finish in 49:32 overtaking 'veteran' RFL runners Sunil and Jugy. Though a minute slower than at the Sunfeast 10K I was quite satisfied. For most runners like me who normally train in the mornings running in the afternoon has its challenges.  As per the results on the Nike website I finished 63rd among the Bangalore runners and 11644th globally among all the runners across the different cities where the race was held!

The men's winners in Bangalore were all from the army and clocked a little over 35 minutes. Among the runners I recognize,  ANS who is also from my age group, clocked an amazing 42:13 and finished 10th among Bangalore runners.Globally the fastest time clocked was 28:42 by a runner in Berlin - extremely impressive considering the world record for a 10Km is 26:17:53 set by Kennesa Bekele of Ethiopia in Brussels in 2005. Post the run we had some snacks and beverages and a foot massage before heading back around 630PM. We did not stay back for the live music and the dinner. That evening I felt quite fatigued even more so than I do after a long run. I crashed early and even skipped my Sunday morning run/cycling. This is probably due to pushing myself that too during an afternoon run- I do not seem to have the muscle strength and stamina to sustain a high pace for a period of time. Overall, I enjoyed the experience but now I need to focus on the Ultra on 15th November. My long runs have gone for a toss due to the cyclothon, sickness and now the 10K race - my last 30K run was on 27th September. I hope to get in a good 35K+/4hour  run this Saturday before tapering off!.

To run or not to run Nike+ Human Race on 24rth October?

The Nike 10K Human race is not an ideal one for long distance runners training for the Bangalore ultra on November 15th. Plus the race is on a Saturday afternoon and at Clark’s Exotica located quite far from the city. Therefore, it is not surprising that many RFL runners have decided to give it a miss. Nevertheless I decided to go ahead and register for it mainly because the NGO partner for the race is Dream A Dream and also a few others from my apartment community were interested in participating. The thinking was if I did a 10K in around 48 minutes , the same time as I took in Sunfeast 10K 2009, then it could serve as a good tempo run. Also I had planned my long runs in such a way that I could take it easy the weekend of 24th/25th October . The intent was to do a 4 hour/35K+ run on October 18th with a bunch of BHUKMP runners after gorging on Diwali sweets and savories on 17th. And follow this up with a 30K run on 31st October. Unfortunately, due to a massive stomach upset I could neither hog nor do my long run this weekend. For the 2nd time in less than 8 weeks I fell sick(does exercise increase or decrease immunity – a topic that needs to be researched further!). Due to this I am now in two minds about participating in this race. I am thinking maybe I will skip the 10K race and get in the 4hour/35K+ run instead. Will need to decide latest by Thursday. The irony is that I felt well enough by Sunday night to do a solo 21K/2:01 run this morning!.

Bangalore cyclothon 2009

The BSA Hercules Bengaluru Cyclothon 2009 was organized on 11th October by Sport18, a division of Network 18. As per the event website over 6000 cyclists took part across the 7 event categories ranging from 65 Km for the elite to 2Km for kids. Though I am not much of a cyclist I have been cycling 2-3 days a week for the last 3 years or so as cross-training and have found it quite enjoyable. I have done long distance cycling only once - in December 2006 a bunch of us rode from Hebbal flyover to Nandi hills - a distance of about 50Kms. It was a great experience. So I enthusiastically registered for the 50Km amateur ride at the cyclothon. My son Rahul registered for the 5Km teen ride.

I did not research at all about the cycling route on the NICE corridor but based on my previous experience of cycling long distance I decided I need to get a geared cycle. A geared cycle enables one to cycle longer at a constant pace with lesser efforts. After talking to a couple of people including A2 from RFL and Deepak I decided that I will not buy a geared cycle in a hurry. So I borrowed a couple of them including Deepak's Firefox Target. I finally used a Raleigh trail bike on which I practiced a couple of times. Compared to my ungeared bicycle in which I had to work hard to sustain an average speed of 17Kmph I found that I could do this much more easily and even hit 20-22Kmph with the geared cycles. A couple of more people from my apartment community were also participating in the event - so we arranged for a tempo to cart 5 bicycles from Domlur Layout to the starting point at BIEC.

A mailer from the organisers couple of days before the event informed the participants that the amateur ride distance had been changed from 50Km to 36Km due to traffic control reasons. This was disappointing news for many of us who wanted to do a longish ride. The so called expo at the Koramangla Indoor stadium was quite sad - there were hardly any stalls. Moreover there was only 1 counter giving Bibs for the amateur ride even on the Saturday before the event resulting in a long queue. Then they ran out of helmets which was part of the goodie bag and I understand thereafter they ran out of the bags themselves. Given that registrations were closed several days before the event I fail to understand how this can happen. Not surpisingly a few RFL runners who also cycle decided not to participate in the event after their experience at the expo.

Satish, Vani, Rahul, Venu and myself loaded our cycles in the temp around 630am and left from Domlur layout at 645am. We reached BIEC comfortably around 745am enjoying cheese sandwiches and boiled eggs thoughtfully brought by Vani enroute. Though I had feared that the tempo might be drive slowly and take longer to reach there(this was one of those mini-tempos) he actually reached there before us. We unloaded our bicycles and wheeled them to hangar 3 - the holding area for all the events. The infra in the holding area was decent - large and spacious, ample and clean restrooms, lot of stalls with water etc. There was also a lot of activity with people moving or even cycling around in their cycles. Satish, Venu and I moved to the area marked amatuer ride. I met up with several RFL runners : Manoj, Aswin, Amit etc . The event was supposed to start at 8:45am but there were absolutely no announcements as the time passed by. Finally, around 9:05am we were let out from the hangar to the starting point in 'waves' or batches. The start of the race was quite unimpressive. As soon as we started we went over a steep flyover and I thanked myself for riding a geared cycle. In general the route had quite a few gradients. It was great experience going down the NICE corridor with zero traffic. Our event probably had a thousand cyclists. The variety and colour of bicycles was quite amazing. I was mostly able to keep the speed slightly above 20Kmph at times touching 30Kmph.There were a large number of participants from MEG riding ungeared BSA bikes and most of them were faster than me!. Contrary to what was stated in the event booklet there were NO distance markers enroute. There were also no real aid stations - just saw one thinly equipped water station around the 10Km mark. Soon thereafter, when my Garmin showed that we had done about 13Km , we reached a point where lot of cyclists in front were turning around. The rider in front of me argued with someone standing on the road that we needed to go further ahead but he was directed to turn saying no one was going ahead. I followed suit and I think so did many other cyclists. I thought to myself that maybe the return leg has a slightly different route with some kind of a diversion of the main road or somethin. But that was not to be - it seems they had closed the 18K loop early. I ended up doing 26.7Km as per my Garmin in about 1 hour 20 minutes at an average pace of 3:02. There was also no clear finish line - apparently it was on the bridge that crossed Tumkur road.

It was very disappointing for all of us who had registered for the 50Km and eventually ended up doing a little over half that distance. It was not really worthwhile to go all that distance for this though the ride was quite enjoyable. In summary, it was an OK first attempt at a mass cycling event and it was nice to see so many cyclists come out a Sunday morning but for those of us looking for a sporting challenge it was disappointing! Rahul did his 5Km comfortably in under 20 minutes - though he had to rent a BSA cycle as he discovered a puncture in his cycle just before his event.

PB 5K solo run..

Like in many things in life when one has a rhythm or flow going then one can usually take one's performance to the next level. This is what happened during one of my training runs last week. I started off to do my usual 9K to 10K run in the EGL route with a average target pace of between 5:15 and 5:30. I got off the block quite fast (which by the way is not recommended by the experts) and covered the 1st Km in about 4 and a half minutes. I felt very  good and realised that I might be able to sustain a sub 5 minutes per Km pace for a while. I managed to do  that and hit the 5Km mark in 23 minutes 39 seconds - almost a minute faster than my previous best at last year's Urban Stampede which was 24 minutes 34 seconds. This helped me erase the disappointment of a slower finish(25:33)  in this year's Urban Stampede. I eventually did 10K in 49 minutes 30 seconds and 11K in just under 55 minutes - a great tempo run!

Importance of average pace to achieve target time

As I have posted before I am  addicted to my Garmin Forerunner 305 since I started using it 2 years ago and feel quite irritated if  either it runs out of battery charge during a run or worse if I forget to wear it for a run. Of all the different display fields available on the device, right from the beginning, I have been relying on the average pace reading to try and adjust my pace(usually to speed up) to hit the target time. And now as I focus on improving my FM timing  I am completely hooked onto the average pace field on the device.  I have recently changed the display settings on my device to have just 3 fields on one page: Average Pace, Current Pace and distance so that the Average Pace appears in large font size. In my recent training runs I look at this field on the device every few seconds! I put together the following table to keep in perspective the average pace at which I need to run marathons to achieve my target of 3:45 finish to qualify for Boston over the next few years.

Target FM Time	Average Pace	Target time 1st Half	Target time 2nd Half
4:15	6:02	2:05	2:10
4:10	5:55	2:00	2:10
4:05	5:48	2:00	2:05
4:00	5:41	1:55	2:05
3:55	5:34	1:55	2:00
3:50	5:27	1:50	2:00
3:45	5:19	1:50	1:55

Topically for me Active.com recently published Your Guide to Perfect Pacing recently which has a number of articles by people like Jeff Galloway and Matt Fitzgerald on how to pace one's run to achieve specific time targets. One of them Why you should run negative splits says that one should run 20 to 50% slower than target pace initially. Though this is in line with what books on runnng and experts say, it is  challenging to achieve. Personally I am looking to do a second half that is not too much slower than the first half - just a difference of 5 to 10 minutes. This is not going to be easy . In my only sub 4 hr FM I did the 1st half in about 1:55 and the 2nd half in a little over 2 hours. However, I have started working towards this and the average pace in my daily training runs has gone up. I now classify my training runs by average pace as follows:

Run type	Average Pace(Mins/Km)
Tempo Run	5:05 to 5:15
Fast Run	5:15 to 5:30
Easy Run	5:30 to 5:45
Slow Run	5:45 to 6:15

The above is a shift by about 15 seconds per Km in each band from what I was doing last season. I am hoping to do below 4:05 in Mumbai in Janaury 2010. And between the Bangalore ultra and Mumbai marathon , that is in December 2009, I plan to do at least one progressive run of 30K. That is, the first 10K at easy pace, the second 10K at 10 seconds per Km faster than target pace , that is at 5:38 per Km pace and the last 10K at 5:48 per Km pace.

Indian Long distance running season 2009-10

At the onset of the new Indian running season in August 2009, the thought that came to my mind is how the landscape of distance running has changed(for the better of course) during the last few years. In 2002 when  I started training for my first Full marathon I searched hard to locate an event to participate in. The only one I could find was the Pune International Marathon held in December of every year. It is not that we are spoilt for choice in India today. We lag considerably compared to other countries around the globe in terms of quantity and quality of marathon events eg US has over 400 marathon races a year; even a tiny country like Taiwan with a population of just 23 million people has seven marathons per year.

Nevertheless, long distance runners today have a choice of number of events that they can participate in during the running season spanning between August 2009 and February 2010. The table below lists the events of the 2009-10 running season that I am aware of and have been held at least once before. This list covers events which have at least a 21K distance. All except the Idea Chennai International Half marathon, Airtel Delhi Half marathon and Hyderabad 10K and Half marathon have a full marathon event and of course at the Bangalore ultra marathon one can run longer distances than a marathon. This note is based on personal experience through participation in all except three of these events and feedback from experienced runners on the remaining events. This year I plan to run 50Km at the Bangalore ultra marathon, HM at the Bangalore midnight marathon and FMs at Standard Chartered Mumbai marathon and Auroville marathon.

Event	Website	Date
Hyderabad Full and Half Marathon	http://www.hyderabad10k.com	30th Aug 2009
Kaveri Trail Marathon	http://www.kaveritrailmarathon.com/	13th Sept 2009
Idea Chennai International Half marathon	http://www.givelife-chennaimarathon.com/	27th Sept 2009
Airtel Delhi Half Marathon	http://adhm.indiatimes.com/	1st Nov 2009
Bangalore Ultra Marathon	http://www.bangaloreultra.com/	15th Nov 2009
Hyderabad 10K and Half marathon	http://www.hyderabad10k.com/	22nd Nov 2009
Running and Living marathon	http://runningandliving.com/marathonandahalf.html	6th Dec 2009
Pune International Marathon	http://www.marathonpune.com/	6th Dec 2009
Bangalore Midnight Marathon	http://www.toimidnightmarathon.in/	12th Dec 2009
Standard Chartered Mumbai marathon	http://mumbaimarathon.indiatimes.com/	17th Jan 2010
Auroville marathon	http://www.42k195.com/marathon/auroville_marathon	14th February 2010

Hyderabad Full and Half Marathon :

The 2nd edition of this event held on 30th August 2009 surpassed the high expectations that the participants had based the extremely positive feedback of the 1st edition in August 2008. Once again it was a runner friendly, point to point to road race with well marked route and amply stocked aid stations. The route took runners through two wonderful campuses: ISB and University of Hyderabad. The runners were taken care of very well with a pre-race pasta dinner, dormitory accommodation at the games village in Gachibowli, bus transport to the starting point and a decent breakfast and medal for finishers. The bonanza was cash prizes for the top 10 amateur finishers. With the feedback from the two editions of the race this event is surely a road race that should be on the calendar of every serious long distance runner in the country.

Kaveri Trail Marathon:

KTM is organised jointly by Runners For Life and Bangalor Hash house Harriers and is the only run in India that is close to 100% trail route. The route is a very scenic 10.5 Km out and back path going all along the Cauvery canal a few Kms from the historic town of Srirangapatnam. Full marathon runners therefore need to do two loops. The uneven terrain compounded by warm weather results in this being a challenging race for even seasoned runners. Though a great race to run in preparation for the Bangalore ultra marathon , its certainly not one to aim for a personal best in! The 2009 edition of this run held on 13th September saw record number of over 700 participants go through the gruelling run.

Idea Chennai International Half Marathon:

This is a 7K and Half marathon event. Chennai has had marathons in Jan/Feb in the past and in 2008 the first edition of this Half marathon was in August. This year’s edition was postponed from August 30th to September 27th. The reports posted on Chennai Runners group about the 2008 edition of the event were not very positive. Even then it is the only organized road race in Chennai and Chennai based runners are expected to participate in large numbers with the hope that the organizers will take better care of the details this year to ensure an event that is friendlier to amateur runners.

Airtel Delhi Half Marathon:

This is a professionally organised road race touted as the world’s richest half marathon. The event is managed by Procam the entity that manages the Stanchart Mumbai marathon and Sunfeast 10K in Bangalore, The HM starts opposite Nehru Park and takes the runners through historic parts of New Delhi such as Janpath, India Gate, Rajghat etc. Feedback from runners who have participated in this event is that this is an enjoyable race though it could get quite warm and large parts of the route does not have shade. This year's event is on 1st November.

Bangalore Ultra Marathon:

The only ultra marathon in India providing an opportunity for runners to test their endurance by running distances beyond the full marathon(42.2K) distance. The 2007 and 2008 editions organised in the Hesarghatta area outside Bangalore, with a mostly trail and part road route, were extremely well received by the participants. In November 2008 runners ran multiple loops of 12.5Km each - running between 2 loops(25Km) and over 8 loops(100Km+). Over 150 runners ran 50Km in 2008. The run course is kept open for 12 hours and the aid stations are well stocked with peanut sandwiches being a big hot among the participants. Definitely a MUST DO event for serious long distance runners in India. In the 2009 edition of the race, scheduled for 15th November 2009,  runners can do a 12.5K distance – this is expected to result in over 500 participants. Have been privileged to have been part of the first two editions this is an event I hope to do every year.

Hyderabad 10K and Half Marathon:

Organised by the Hyderabad 10K Foundation in November this event is growing in popularity and size. With inputs from the growing breed of Hyderabad runners this event is expected to pay attention to details and be friendly for amateur runners. I did this in 2006 and found it quite enjoyable though there should be have been a few more water stations in the route.

Running and Living Marathon :

Organized by Running and Living – another popular and passionate organization promoting running in the country the February 2009 edition was the first one. The overall feedback was very positive as is expected of an event by runners for runners. This year’s event, consisting of a full marathon and a half marathon, is on 6th December. The FM runners will do 3 loops of 14K. Like the 1st edition this year also runners can expect great support from volunteers and well stocked aid stations. Any serious long distance runner living in the North should definitely check this out.

Pune International Marathon:

This is probably the oldest organised marathon event in India– the 1st edition was  in 1983. At least in the early years this race was primarily used as a national marathon championship to rank Indian professional  runners. Therefore the organization was not friendly towards amateur slower runners in terms of traffic control, aid station support etc. Runners were expected to reach the half way point in 1 hour 30 minutes and complete the race in 3 hours. Experience of runners who have participated in this event in the last 6 years suggests that this race is avoidable for amateur runners. I attempted this in December 2002 - my first full marathon event. I had to give up at 33rd Km due to lack of water stations and traffic control. I for one would not recommend this to any amateur runner.

Bangalore Midnight marathon:

This event has so far been held twice : the first one wasMay 2007 and again in Janaury 2009(postponed from December 2008 due to the Mumbai terrorist attacks of November 2008). As the only non-morning race in India this event is unique. Since most of us run in the mornings during our training runs running at night specially starting at midnight is a tremendous challenge. Due to the event being held at night and being a route with multiple loops traffic control and aid station support has been reasonable compared to the other Full marathon road race held in Bangalore a couple of times. The 2nd edition of the event was a definite improvement from the first one. The most popular part of this event is the 7K IT-city run which usually has several thousand participants. The Half marathon also has a large number of participants. The 2007 edition of the event in which I ran the FM had less than 80 FM runners. The 3rd edition is scheduled for 12th December as per the website. However, this event has been prone to last minute date changes in the past.

Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon:

By far the biggest and best organised road marathon in India it has been growing in popularity since the 1st edition in 2004. The race date is now fixed for the 3rd Sunday of January every year. This road race that starts from VT station and goes along the Marine drive in South Mumbai also sees the city of Mumbai coming out in huge numbers to cheer and support the participants. In terms of spectator support this event is akin to the large marathons in Europe and USA. No wonder that this attracts runners from all over India with over 50 runners from Bangalore going over to do the FM last year  despite the challenge of a warmer and more humid weather. Another sign of this event’s popularity is that registration starts over 6 months in advance and gets sold out within a few weeks. This year the registrations opened in mid July and by August end both HM and FM registrations were closed Runners who are unable to register in time often get disappointed to be turned away. I have participated in every edition of this event and have seen it grow in size and quality. I hope to participate in this one for years to come.

Auroville Marathon:

This is definitely the most scenic marathon in the country organised very passionately by volunteers within Auroville. The 2nd edition held in February 2009 was mostly trail and consisted of 2 loops of 21.1Km. Both the editions of this race have received such an overwhelming positive feedback that many runners have added this to their annual race calendar and are already looking forward to the 2010 event on February 14th. The magnificent beauty of the course and the wonderful hospitality of the Aurovillans certainly makes this a must do event.

Momentum lost..and regained

The flu that hit me around the Urban Stampede event had a major impact on my running momentum. For the first time in a long time I did just one run (of 6.5Km) in a space of 8 days between 23rd and 30th August. I cannot recollect the last time this happened in the last 5 years. As with any addiction when one is forced to stay away from the object of addiction there are side-effects not often very pleasant. In my case it was general depression, lack of motivation and considerable reduction in irritation threshold making life miserable for those around me. Though I have gone through such patches before, albeit, shorter ones and have always come out and regained my running form fairly quickly nevertheless during this period I kept having self-doubt. The feeling of misery was compounded by the fact that I was forced to give the Hyderabad marathon a miss and had also decided not to run KTM on 13th September. Maybe I had got so used to focusing on the goal of completing a marathon every month that once the goal went away there was a feeling of emptiness and lack of focus to achieve anything in any sphere.

Here are a few articles that talk about running and addiction:

Over the edge exercise addiction

Exercise addiction - When more Is less

The Running Addiction - this article talks about the five criteria for addiction and a long distance runner will typcially meet all five!

Mercifully, this phase did not last too long.

I was able to run 3 days during the week of 31st August including a 16K at an average pace of 5:33/Km and the momentum was completely back the week of 7th September. I ran a total of 41Km including a 22Km solo run in 2 hours on 12th September. I was quite pleased with this run as I had to dodge puddles and muck as well as stray dogs on the route and was still able to maintain decent pace. Besides I was able to do this without drinking any water during the 22K run. Had I carried water I should have been able to run faster. With this my momentum in running is back and so is my focus on other things – I am hoping to continue doing 40K+ weeks till the ultra on 15th November with a couple of weeks of 50K+ in October.