More on SCMM 2011

While the Mumbai marathon on 16th January was my best ever Full marathon run where I comfortably exceeded my goal of 3:59 by clocking 3:52:48, the last couple of days leading up to the race was quite nerve-wrecking. I usually am quite nervous before a big event specially if I am targeting a specific time or a new distance. Even then this time was different - maybe it was the pressure of aiming to do my first sub 4 hr in India. Or the fact that the last time I attempted a sub 4 hr FM in October 2010 I ended up with cramps and  missed it by a whisker. I felt extremely hungry in the 48 hours before the race eating much more than normal. I was a bit apprehensive of getting to the start point well in time for the early start time of 06:15am. Specially the last 12 hours from Saturday evening after returning home from WTC was a very nervy and restless period so much so that I started feeling light pain in my tail bone. All of this fortunately had no impact in the end as  the race went as perfectly as possible on Sunday morning. 

As has been my tradition for the past several years  I landed in Mumbai Friday evening and went to WTC to collect the race bib on Saturday morning a little of noon. And as usual I met a number of familiar runners from Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad and Delhi. Also met a few new runners as well. As always the excitement, energy and passion among the runners  was great. After lunch at La Flamboyante in WTC I returned to Govandi by about 5PM. One thing I noticed was that Mumbai was less warmer and less humid on pre-race day comapred to the previous years. Was praying that race day weather would be at least s good.  I tried to relax as much as I could. The 2nd  India-South Africa ODI in SA served  a good distraction. I went to bed around 9:45PM soon after India got bowled out for 189 with the intent of waking up around 3:45am. I slept reasonably well and woke up just before the alarm rang. 

I got ready by about 430am and informed the security to send me an auto. Within about 7 minutes there was an auto on my doorstep which took me to Chembur station where I caught the 4:45am train and reached VT station by 5:20am. This can only happen in Mumbai in India - very impressive!In the train I chatted with a bunch of runners who got off at Vadala to head to Bandra for their HM start. Given the segregation of the FM and HM start points VT station was not that crowded. I changed into my shoes and headed towards the entry gate in Azad maidan. While wearing my shoes the timing chip came off from the plastic tag and I had to thread it through my shoe lace. I thought this was not a good start - in the end of course it had no impact. En route I met Pani and Sid - two other veteran runners from Bangalore(see photo below taken inside Azad maidan after finishing the race and collecting medal, refreshments etc).   In side the maidan of course there were a lot of familiar FM runners. After some warm up, I consumed a half of my fourth banana(had eaten 3 before leaving home) and checked  in my bag in the baggage counter and moved to the holding area around 6am. 

With Pani and Sid post the race

The gate was opened just before 6:10am and all of us took a brisk walk/slow jog to the starting line. The race started on time at 6:15(flagged off by Deepika and a few other 'celebrities'. Having managed to get myself close to the front of the start line  I crossed the start line in 12 seconds. Vasu and I started together and got off to a good start covering the 1st Km in about 5:22. At this point Ravi Balasubramanya joined us - though a much faster runner he decide to run the race with us(probably due to inadequate training). As always in the first few Kms it looked like there were lots of runners ahead of us. In reality we were probably in the first one third of the pack of runners. Around the 5Km mark Priyankar - another very strong runner - joined us and the four of us then pretty much ran together for the next 25Kms.  The weather was definitely much much cooler than it has ever been in a race in Mumbai and the 6:15am start was indeed a great help. The point of merger with the Half marathon runners was a bit of a bummer as the slower runners came in the way of FM runners impacting their momentum. The four of us managed to weave our way through the crowd reasonably well all the time hollering out for the slow runners to give way and keep our 5:27 per Km average pace.  We had crossed Sid Mallya from Bangalore during this stretch. In the stretch leading up to the sea link Milind Soman and his friends went past us. The Mumbai crowd as was to be expected had special cheers for Milind. (Milind's finish time of 3:49:53 is very impressive and a huge improvement on his time of last 2 years).  In the stretch leading up to the sea link a wide patch of shade had been created by putting up a tall side shamiana for a fairly long stretch. This was a pleasant and welcome improvement. At the sea link we were still running at an average pace of 5:27 per Km. One big change from last year was the presence of two water points on the sea link which was huge boon to the runners. Around the middle of the sea link stretch Vasu slowed down while I continued running  pretty much with Ravi and Priyankar.  I got to the 29.9Km timing point at 2:43:31(5:29 per Km pace) as compared to 2:45:21 at the 29.7Km mark last year. And felt much much stronger  compared to last year. Somewhere at the back of my mind I was hoping that my timing chip was registering at all the mats - at the 29.9Km mark this got confirmed.

Of course, as with any FM the last 12Km is the toughest and more so at Mumbai where you hit the Peddar road flyover in this stretch. Also it got warmer though it was not really hot. At the Peddar Road flyover Priyankar took off- I could not quite keep pace. I just focused on keeping the current pace below 6 minutes per Km. At this point it was clear that I would go below 3:59 fairly comfortably. Going below my previous best of 3:56:49 seemed very possible. Now I hung in there from Km marker  to the next one. As I turned from Marine drive towards Churchgate station for the last 2Kms I ran at a fairly comfortable pace to get to the finish point with a net chip time of 3:52:48!! I felt much less tired at the end  - so much so that I felt maybe I should have pushed harder in the last 5Kms to shave off a few more minutes. However, I am very satisfied specially to have exorcised the ghost of Hartford and achieving the 2nd sub 4 of my career in 26 Full marathons!! Chandra with a time of 3:47:42 was at the finish line. Soon after I met Rajesh Vetcha of Hyderabad runners and also my brother Mahesh and his daughter Divya. Mahesh and Divya had come all the way from New Mumbai to experience the marathon atmosphere and try and take a picture of me finishing. However, he had not expected me to finish in below 3:55(well nor had I expected to do it this year) - so he missed me by a few minutes at the finish line. Below are a couple of pictures taken a few minutes after completing the race.

Two new things were introduced in this year's event:

- there was a 5hr FM pacer and 2hr and 3hr HM pacers; pacers for every few minutes of finish time are common in most international marathons. 

- there were a couple of spray showers on the route to help cool down the runners ; this was welcomed by many runners though personally I did not run through any of them

Overall it was a great run for me and for a number of friends. It maybe a tough act to beat this next year unless the weather gods are kind again. 

with Rajesh after the run

With Rajesh, Divya and other Hyderabad runners

Cracker of a race at SCMM 2011

All the stars lined up perfectly this Sunday 16th Jan 2011 in Mumbai for my 26th FM finish(excluding the 4 ultras). The weather was as perfect as it can be in Mumbai, there was water support on the sea link, I had a good start to the race and excellemt pacing with Priyankar and Ravi  for over 32Kms(and Vasu till half-way on the sea link), my shoe laces did not come off, there were no cramps and the body felt pretty good throught out the run. All of this resulted in not only my fastest marathon finish at Mumbai but my fastest ever marathon time of 3:52:48. This is over 3 minutes faster than my previous PB of 3:57:56 in Washington DC in March 2009. And over 8 minutes better than my  last year's time at SCMM.  Thereby continuing my progression of improving my timing at Mumbai.  I did a pretty much even split covering the first half in about 1:54 and second half in 1:59. My average per Km pace was between 5:22 and 5:29 through out the race. I felt extremely good and not too tired after the finish(unlike last year when I was very drained and nauseous at the finish) which led me to think that maybe I could have pushed harder and tried to go sub 3:50. Well that will certainly be the target for SCMM 2012!

With Ravi on the sea link

A couple of things that could have been better with the race organisation:

• At point that FM runners merged with the HM runners there should have been two clear lanes to separate the two categories; this will help avoid the slower HM runners/walkers impeding the rhythm of the FM runners
•  The narrow entry/exit back into Azad maidan after the race which had hundreds of ill-tempered runners jostling to get in was very frustrating specially for the FM finishers. As in the past there could have been separate entry point for FM runners or the entry/exit should have been broader.

Overall though it was a well organised event and many many  friends had a great run and achieved their PBs. Congratulations to all the participants!! It is incredible how runners are improving with experience  -  shows that running as a sport maturing in India and many runners are yet to fully tap their potential. Despite finishing 8 minutes faster than last year my ranking in the veteran category is 13 this year compared to 10 last year! Though oddly enough overall ranking has improved from 90 to 49 - looks a bit fishy!!

Run Less, Run Faster ..the 3Plus2 training program from FIRST

I just completed reading this book and have decided to try this program for my next road marathon in 2011-2012(either Hyderabad marathon in August 2011 or SCMM in January 2012). The weekly mileage advocated by this program is lower compared to most other training programs. The FIRST program suggests running on alternate days 3 times of the week. However, it specifies that each run of the week be of a different type(tempo, interval, long run) and also the intensity of the run in terms of pace. This means though the weekly mileage is lower the intensity of training is higher compared to most other programs. Another critical component of the FIRST training program is two weeks of cross-training which can be cycling,swimming etc.  And hence the 3plus2 concept.

In some form I already do the 3plus2 training. I usually run 3 days and cycle 2 days a week. I also do one tempo run and one long run almost every week. However neither of these are usually done with a target goal pace and I have never ever done interval training program. I am looking forward to doing the the 16 weeks  FIRST program with a target FM time of 3:55 in the 2011-2012 running season.

The challenge of SCMM 2011 beckons

By this time next week I should  be done with my 8th run of the Mumbai marathon (6th FM)and would have hopefully achieved my goal of a sub 3:59 Full Marathon. While I am reasonably well trained and prepared for the event and can take heart from the fact that I have progressively improved my timings at Mumbai since 2006(see below) shaving over 40 minutes, I am well aware that now going below 4 is going to be very tough. Whatever be the training a lot of factors need to fall in place in order to have a good race specially in Mumbai: race start, heat and humidty, aid station support, sleep and rest in the days leading up to the race, mental and physical state on the morning of the race etc etc.

1. 2006        4:42:28 
2. 2007        4:37:16  
3. 2008        4:31:09 
4. 2009        4:13:16 
5. 2010        4:00:56

Of course for the last week or so one has been going through the usual tapering blues that encompass  reduced level of excercise with  higher level of food intake and imaginary aches and pains couple of weeks before an event. The light fever that I had every evening for several days since 31st December has been worrisome and had an adverse impact on my 35K run on Jan 1st.  While the timing of 3:40 was slower than my target time I felt much more fatigued than normal at the end of the run. Anyway, the fever seems to have gone now and my last 15K+ run before SCMM this morning was quite normal.

In order to devise a strategy for my run this year I analysed my split timings from SCMM 2010.

           Distance           Time                Average Pace

• 14.7 Km         01:21:35            5:33 per Km
• 17  Km           01:34                 5:31 per Km
• 24  Km           02:12:55            5:32 per Km
• 29.7  Km        02:45:21            5:34 per Km
• 42.2  Km        04:00:56            5:42 per Km

To shave two minutes off my finish time I need to increase my average pace by 3 secs per Km ie stay within an average pace of 5:39 per Km. My target is to hit the half way mark in about 1:55 at an average of 5:27 and get to the 30K mark by 2:45 at an average of 5:30. That will leave me about an hour and 14 minutes for the last 12.2Km at an average pace of 6 minutes per Km. This is vis-a-vis over 115 minutes I took for the 12.5Kms at last year's SCMM. More recently at the ING Hartford Marathon I got to the 32Km mark in 2:56:46 at an average pace of 5:32 per Km. and ended up taking 6:11 per Km for the last 10.2Kms.

Looking at these numbers makes me even more nervous - it certainly makes me very conscious of the enormity of the challege ahead of me next Sunday morning. I am going to keep my fingers crossed that all factors fall into place on race day and I am fortunate enough to continue the trend of improving my finish time at the biggest road marathon in India!

Here is wishing all fellow runners a great run at SCMM 2011!!