First Duathlon

All started with Sunfeast World 10k on 31st May, followed by 70kms cycle ride on 7th June. In this weekend, it was mix of both under different circumstances.

India’s first duathlon conducted by Runners for Life happened today (14th June) early morning hours here in Bangalore at Inventure Academy. Our cycles were delivered to the venue by Track & Trail guys.

(Photo Courtesy: Deepthi)
Morning after reaching the venue, I checked my cycle and everything seemed to be in shape. I had registered myself for 10k running and 20k cycling. This was split and we had to run 5k first, pedal 20k then run 5k again. There was also a track of 5k running & 10k cycling. The event was well organised and the weather was just perfect. The sun never tried to come out till we were out of the course. The chief guest was Mr.Bhaskar, Commissionaire for Road Transport & Safety. He is also an avid cyclist & runner.
There were cops along the course managing traffic and this was very helpful. They stopped the traffic whenever a cyclist was taking a turn onto the main road and also when we started off after the flag off.

After the flag off, we had to run till the 2.5km mark and then return. This 5kms looked to be easy. I did not sprint since I wanted to save energy for next cycling and the last 5kms of running. On returning we need to pick-up cycle from the transition area. From the transition area till start/finish point we cant pedal. We need to run with the cycle. Then we pedal for 5kms and return and go again in the loop. Once I managed to overtake a lorry also! (when he was picking up speed after slowing down for a speed breaker)
The course by no means was a very easy one. There were up’s & down’s. Luckily it was completely on the road and no cycling on the mud or sand to make it a more tougher course. My new cycle (Her Thunder Racer with 15gears) did help me to a large extent. But there were other imported road bikes which just zipped past me. No issues, I had my target and wanted to do within the target. My max speed in cycling was about 35km/hr though not consistently throughout the course.
having finished 20kms of pedalling, we get off the bike, run along with it leave it at the transition area on the same place where we picked it up from. Now we again run to the start/finish point and begin running for the last 5kms. By now, my thighs seemed to be getting heavy so I slowed down slightly at the up climb and speeded up while coming down.
In all I finished with a timing of 1hr 58mins which was well below my target time. The timing includes the time taken to pick-up cycle from transition area and also to leave it back there. Since I was not fit last night, I had planned to finish between 2hrs – 2hrs 15mins and not beyond. And I dont think I can reduce my timing far far below this. Maybe by 5 – 10mins is possible. But am happy on completing in less than 2hrs.
I noticed that I cant take a U-Turn on the bike without putting my feet down and this not only reduces my speed and I need to almost restart from 0km/hr but also add few seconds to my time. It takes few kms for me to get into the groove of pedalling.

The brunch after this was amazing. Then met up with few friends and we had some crazy photo shoots.

(Pic courtesy: PeeVee)
(In the photo: Manjula Sridhar, Ann Maria, Anita Bora, Ramesh Palani, Myself)

Now looking forward to Ultra Marathon in November and this time I would complete 75kms.

Brinjal Gotsu

South Indian side dish for pongal.
Recipe for 1 person.
Requirement:
2 big brinjals
small lemon size tamarind
1 big tomato
1 spoon Sunflower Oil
1/4 spoon mustard seeds
2 small green chillies
2 red chillies
1/2 spoon salt
Preparation Method
Roast the brinjal after applying little oil in gas flame. Peel off the skin. Mash nicely.
Boil tomato and peel off the skin. mash nicely.
Heat tamarind in little amount of water and mash nicely to get juice out of it.
Mix the tamarind juice to nicely mashed brinjal and tomato.
Cut green chillies and red chillies to small pieces. Heat oil in a pan and when mustard seeds starts getting fried, add green chillies and red chillies. Fry them and add the mixture of tamarind juice + brinjal + tomato. Add salt. Allow it boil once or twice.
Now the dish is ready to be served.

Pongal Recipe

Second most easiest South Indian Tiffin to make after Idlli.
This recipe is for one person.
Required items:
1 cup Rice
2 spoons Paittam parupu (Moong dal)
1/2 spoon Black pepper
1/2 spoon Seeragam (Jeera)
Finely chopped Ginger (little)
1 spoon Cashewnut (broken into little pieces)
1 spoon Ghee
1/4 spoon Mustard seeds
1/2 spoon salt (based on requirement)
1/4 spoon Asafoetida powder (perungayam)

Preparation:
Soak rice & moong dal & asafoetida powder in water. And keep it for boiling in cooker or oven. In the meantime, pour ghee in a vessel and fry mustard seeds, black pepper, seeragam, ginger, cashewnut.
If using the cooker when the steam comes up through nossel, reduce the flame intensity. Open the lid of cooker and pour the fried contents and salt and mix properly. Now close the lid and allow the rice to boil and get steamed properly.
If using oven then open the oven after 2-3mins and mix the contents. Put it back into the oven and allow to get steam cooked properly.

After 30mins your pongal is ready.

Cycle Trip to Jain Farms

Cyclists: Anita Bora, Ann Maria, Balasubramanian Anand, Deepthi Prasanna, Lavanya Vishwanath, Manjula Sridhar, Sandeep and myself.
Route: Koramangala – Sarjapura – Bagalur – Jain Farms
Distance – 72kms

A proposed trip by Anita for cycling to Jain Farms near Hosur in TamilNadu. It looked to be a short ride but finally turned out to be 72kms from my place. At Koramangala three of us met up in the morning to proceed to next meeting point @ Sarjapur Wipro Office. Another 5more joined us over there and by 6:15am we were off pedaling towards Jain Farms. The motivation was a breakfast at Jain Farms and it was by no means a disappointment.
Two from the group pedaled at good speed while rest of the group went leisurely. We had biscuits and stopped at times for general break and also for a tea break. Finally we reached Jain Farms a distance of about 30kms from Sarjapur Wipro Office by 8:30am.
Some more restful moments, guided tour around the farm, checking out pottery and killi josiyam (parrot astrology), we headed back to Koramangala starting at 12:30pm. We had to face heavy winds and good slopes making it difficult to cycle fast. And regular stops to relax tired muscles. When we reached starting point at Koramangala it was 3:00pm.

For photos from my camera, click here.
Photos from camera 2, click here.
Photos from camera 3, click here.

Sunfeast World 10k

Thanks to my company and Nike Run Club, i finished Sunfeast World 10k yesterday in 53minutes. I wasnt planning to run the 10k. Then Nike Run Club corporate face-off invite came over. After winning the face-off against SASKEN on 23rd May, 5 of us from 63 runners represented company in the final face-off.
The Nike Run Club results aren’t declared yet.
It was fun all the way. Met lot of people from same company and other runners.
We have finished in pretty decent timings. My split up in the run is as below.

Start Information:
Start Time: 8:09:30
Distance: 10 Kms
Category: 15 to 39 Years
Batch:

Split Times and Average Speed:
Acc. Time Split Time min/km km/h
4Km Split 0:23:50 0:23:50 5:57 10.07
8.5Km Split 0:48:24 0:24:35 5:28 10.99
Finish 0:53:54 0:05:30 3:39 16.41
[ More Information ]

Finish Information:
Finish Time: 0:53:54
Avg. Speed (min/km): 5:23
Avg. Speed (km/h): 11.13

Race Positions:
Category: 218 out of 1332
Gender: 259 out of 1575
Over All: 266 out of 1786

Split Times and Positions:
Acc. Time Pos. Cat Pos. Sex Pos. All Split Time Pos. Cat Pos. Sex Pos. All
4Km Split 0:23:50 273 319 326 0:23:50 273 319 326
8.5Km Split 0:48:24 213 251 258 0:24:35 209 246 253
Finish 0:53:54 218 259 266 0:05:30 337 390 403

Split Times and Average Speed:
Acc. Time min/km km/h Split Time min/km km/h
4Km Split 0:23:50 5:57 10.07 0:23:50 5:57 10.07
8.5Km Split 0:48:24 5:42 10.54 0:24:35 5:28 10.99
Finish 0:53:54 5:23 11.13 0:05:30 3:39 16.41

UPDATE: We were declared winners among teams with female runners. Over all we were second. Our team timing was 51mins 29secs. We win 50k worth Nike Goods.

Life is tough – 52 (Ripple Effect & Relation)

Ripple effect is gradually spreading influence or effect. When one hand splashes water there is ripple effect. The effect dies down over time. But put another hand to it and continue splashing, the effect never fades off.
Phase 1
Between two individual in a relation positive thoughts of one produces positive thoughts of other person also. This builds the effect/influence and the relation blooms. At the core the force is very strong which cannot be disturbed easily. Time flies by.

When one hand stops splashing water the effect does not stop since the other is still splashing with lesser force. The intensity reduces and effect still does not fade. This one hand wants the other hand to join so that intensity would be back.
Phase 2
In a relation one person takes a step back. The other person realizes something is wrong. Now both spread negative influence on one another. The ripple effect keeps dying down. A month seems like an year. Two months seems like decade. One of them tries to spread positive influence looking for, longing for the other to join.

The hand that had stopped splashing now returns. This is “point of return”. There is no end point. To move ahead both hands need to go back to where it all started. It takes time, slowly but steadily the intensity at the core is back.
Phase 3.a
The person who took a step back calls the other person. They both start meeting and talking avoiding the difficult topics of why one left the other. Point of origin. Positive influences spread from one to the other and vice versa. The relation blooms again. Everything is back to the way it was before.

The hand that had stopped splashing does not return. The hand has moved from the lake to a another lake. The one hand that was splashing with less forces realizes “point of no return”. This hand also stops splashing. The effect fades away. The lake looks still.
Phase 3.b
The person now understands that no more positive influence can influence the other. It time to stop spreading positive influence on same person. There will never be a ripple effect between the two.

Upcoming events

I did not want to participate in Sunfeast World 10k, but then Nike Run Club came up with coporate thingy. Now am in and running Sunfeast World 10k representing my company. This is happening on May 31st and just few days away.
I was apprehensive about running, since I have never ran 10kms. And I was out of practice since Mumbai Marathon.

I have registered myself for Bangalore Duathlon. First time to happen in India. I have registered myself for 10km running and 20km cycling. This is happening on June 14th.
The route is nice one and have been on those roads many times. For route map, click here.

What a journey

First time in past 4yrs, on a journey from Bangalore to Chennai on my vehicle, I have halted for night. Thats exactly what happened. From Ambur it started pouring like hell and I continued riding on my bike. Few kilometers later the sunlight dropped. Few minutes after switching on my headlight, it konked off. For the next 30 odd kms I rode in the dark using light of other vehicles in the downpour.
Crossing Vellore, it was difficult to go beyond with no signs of rain stopping. I found a mechanic who fixed a new bulb. That also konked off after 2kms. Finally, I decided to halt for the night and take no more risks.

Just like they say, there’s always a first time!!

Life is tough – 51

After years and doing lot of things you build trust with other person. They trust you to the core. But it takes few seconds for the person to loose trust on you.

Life is tough – 50

A kid or grown up, it takes a fraction of second that moment or that incident to lose focus on the object they are interested. A small kid of 2years, would be playing with a toy after 1hr the toy will be thrown away and no more point of interest.

(lines from “Its my life” song by Dr Alban)
Things I do I do them no more
Things I say I say them no more
Changes come once in life

Stop bugging me stop bothering me
Stop bugging me stop forcing me
Stop fighting me stop yelling me
Stop telling me stop seeing me
It’s my life.