Vanquished by the hilly terrain at Airtel Hyderabad Marathon 2013

Failing to conquer the hilly course of my first Full marathon of the season I missed the  aggressive target I had set  for Airtel Hyderabad Marathon by over 10 minutes. While the first half was pretty much as per plan I lost so much pace in the second half that I failed to even finish in sub 3:40. Somewhere between 27Km and 37Km I lost it  both physically and mentally and was disappointed with the race; Though it was my best time on this course beating my time in Airtel Hyderabad marathon 2011 by over 5 minutes and my third best time ever after MHRM in October 2012 and SCMM in January 2013. And I ended up coming first in the Senior or super veteran age category - this being my first race after graduating to that age group.

As usual I reached Hyderabad on Friday,23rd August evening. This time I went for the Bib pickup on Saturday afternoon around 3:30 PM  instead of the morning and decided to stay Saturday night with other runners at Nizam club(rather than at the in-laws place in Domalguda). The expo at Hitex exhibition hall was spacious and well organised - though the location itself was quite out of the way and not easily accessible. At the expo I met Ashish Shah of Zendurance - which organises niche endurance events. Jugy and I joined Partha(with whom I was room-ming)  and other runners at Nizam club around 6 PM. The room there was clean and comfortable. While most other runners decided to walk up to the start point about 1.5 Kms away I relaxed in the room after pinning up my racing bib and laying out all the accessories for the race - shoes, socks,cap, towel, Garmin etc. Between 8 and 9 PM we had a relaxing dinner of Rava idlis and curd rice at a Kamat restaurant few hundred meters away.  I went to bed at 9:45 PM and dozed off quite quickly. As usual I woke up a few minutes before my alarm was to go at 3:35 AM. After 2 bananas and some almonds and walnuts I was out of the room by 4:15 AM. Naresh, Ravi and I took a brisk walk to the starting point at People's Plaza and were there by 4:35 or so. After unloading my bladder in the open(the queue for the port-a-potty was too long) and some warming up I checked in my bag and headed to the start line around 4:50am bumping into numerous familiar runners along the way. 

At 5:01 AM, as per my Garmin, we were on our way. I ran mostly alone and was not able to get into a good rhythm. Due to early morning rains the humidity seemed to be a bit high. Runners like Siddesha and Neera were a few meters ahead. There was a small stretch of about 500m around the lake where it was compeltely dark and the road was uneven. Fortunately there was no mis-step. I reached the 10Km mark after the Khairatabad(1st) flyover on target in about 49 minutes. 

Just before entering the Panjagutta (2nd) flyover I went past Pankaj Rai. Lost bit of pace in the climb in Banjara Hills - I realised I was not able to completely  make up for the lost time in the downhill stretches. Nevertheless, I got to the 21K mark in a little over 1:45 at an average pace of 5 mins/Km. However after the Gachibowli (3rd) flyover the pace started to drop. I started getting light cramps in both my hamstrings due to which I was unable to push myself. Somehow in this part of the race I was not as mentally strong as I have been in the recent past. And the average pace began to steadily climb. By the 31Km mark I knew that sub 3:35 was not achievable - even sub 3:40 started to look challenging. My goal was to hit 34K between 2:50 and 2:53- it was 2:57+ when I got there. Now the hamstrings cramps got worse. I stopped at the medical station at around the 35Km marked and sprayed them generously with volini. I repeated the same around the 38K mark inside the Hyderabad university campus. At this point I found even the slightest of gradients quite challenging to negotiate. Though the goal was to keep the pace as close to 5:30 as possible in the last 8Kms my pace varied between 5:05 to 6:23! I felt a bit better in the last 2 Kms and should have pushed a bit harder to stay sub 3:45. Around the 40Km marke Neera went past me - she also seemed to be struggling a bit. But the stretch inside the stadium seemed to go on forever and though I sprinted the last couple of hundred meters on the tracks I crossed the finish line in a net time of 3:46:20 a minute or so behind Neera and Siddesha. I was tired and a bit down mentally but not completely exhausted. My training had been quite ok -  I probably over trained a bit. Maybe the slight cold and sore throat was a factor or the fact that BAA had responded that the Hyderabad marathon course was not recognised for BQ time was playing on my mind. It maybe a combination of this but the bottom line probably  is that I am not cut out for hill running!!

I hung around with other runners from Bangalore for a bit. The snack box was ok - though lot of runners seemed to have thought it was not good. 

This time I watched out for  the award ceremony and  collected the age category winner plaque.

I was back at Nizam club by about 11:30 AM and Domalguda by 12:30 PM. Overall the race was well organised. The traffic control and volunteer support in the village stretch between 26K and 30K could have been better. Asking finishers to climb up the steps to collect the snack box did not seem right.

A sore throat and running nose(had slight symptoms of these before the race) from the evening of the race dampened my recovery from the race. Did just one 4Km run the week after the race. This week went back up to 32Km over 3 easy runs . I will be taking September easy before starting training for SCMM 2014 from 30th September. 

Challenge of Airtel Hyderabad Marathon 2013 beckons

The Airtel Hyderabad Marathon is arguably the most challenging road marathon in the country. With three flyovers at the 9th,13th and 24rth Km respectively , rolling hills specially in the Banjara Hills and Jubilee Hills areas and a gentle uphill between 38th and 41st Km the route is testing both physically and mentally. 

I have run the Hyderabad marathon twice before and both times my experience has been very good  in terms of race organisation and experience and my race timing. Though tough on the legs the rolling hills has helped me do well there. The route this year and last year is fairly similar to the route of the earlier years with some small modifications. Being organised by Hyderabad Runners , one of the largest and most vibrant running communities in the country, the event is very very runner friendly. As the first of my 12 marathons in 12 months in  I thoroughly enjoyed the first edition of the run in August 2008. I had to miss the run in August 2009 after registering for it due to sickness - the only DNS of my running career so far. The event did not happen in 2010. In its new incarnation as Airtel Hyderabad marathon in 2011 the event was much bigger and established itself as one of the 'must do' road marathons in India. Though hit by severe cramps around the 34Km mark I managed a PB in that race. Being away from  India I gave the  2012 edition  a miss; as  this report from a good friend and ace runner testifies  it was once again very well organised and a resounding success! So without a thought I registered for Airtel Hyderabad marathon 2013 on the day registrations opened - had already  booked my travel even earlier when airlines were offering discounts in February 2013!

Race goal and pacing strategy

I have trained for 10 weeks using the 'Run Less, Run Faster' program of FIRST for a target goal of 3:35. While the training has gone off well I am aware that this is very ambitious considering the challenging course and that my all time PB is 3:37:20 in SCMM 2013 and my PB in Hyderabad is a good 17 minutes slower!. I will start the race with this goal and tune it depending on how it goes.How the legs hold up to the hills and the temperature, winds and rain(if any) will influence my race strategy. I hope to at least beat my PB failing which my next goal would be to keep my time sub 3:40. 

My pacing strategy for a FM has generally been 30-50-20 ie about 5-10 secs per Km faster than target goal for the first 30% distance ie upto 12 kms or so, close to target pace for the next 50% distance ie up to 34Km and then push as hard as possible for the remaining 20% distance. My target pace being 5:05/Km the intent is to hit 34Km between 2:50 and 2:53. I intend to follow the same strategy in this race expecting to lose about 15-20 secs /km in the flyover/uphill stretches and hoping to gain the same in the downhills. 

So the following are my interim timing targets:

10Km  49mins (4:55 mins/Km pace) - this would be towards the end of the 1st flyover

21Km  1:45     (5mins/Km pace)

34Km   2:50 to 2:53 (between 5 and 5:05/Km pace)

Though this will be my 38th race of FM or longer distance(including the 6 unofficial RFL runs in 2008-09) it has been the usual nervy period of ten days leading up to the race. Now with  less than 2 days to go, I am looking forward to the first FM of the season - hoping to enjoy the experience and catching up with runner friends from around the country!!