“Did It“

That was the SMS I sent to Sangeeta at 4:00 AM after finishing my half marathon in the Midnight Marathon held in Whitefield, Bangalore on Dec 11, 2011.

Now to the story.

The Irrational act !

A month back on Nov 11, some one tweeted saying “Registered at Midnight Marathon“. I just clicked on the link and paid 600Rs for the half-marathon. Human progress happens on such irrational acts.

Why was it irrational? : My personal best was 12.5 Kms. The half marathon is 21kms. I thought I can practice harder and increase my mileage.

After signing up for the marathon, I announced on Facebook and even got 13 likes and 5 comments and tips. I duly forgot about the marathon and went on with my work + occasional runs ( I average 6 runs a month – yes its very bad – good runners run almost 4 times a week )

The Panic Attack

Suddenly around Nov 26th I panicked. I SoSed some of my friends and runners I follow on Twitter and got useful tips.

@nilakanta, @_bharath_k,@ulaar and Jayaram Srinivasan ( ex SAP VP and now entrepreneur ) – Thank you guys for the pep talk and encouragement.

Some of the tips I got from them :

* eat curd rice couple of days before the race to load up on carbohydrates

* watch out for the cold in the midnight marathon – it will be good if you can change your t-shirt in the middle of the race

* Just run – thats what running is all about. Don’t over analyze things

* You can easily stretch your 12.5Kms to 21Kms on race day – adrenaline will keep you going.

So I started pushing myself a bit – went for 3 runs on alternate days and ended up with a new pain – “runners knee”.  This was Nov 30th.

The Suspense

The next 10 days was the most harrowing time. I was reading more and more of runners knee – and learnt that I should have been doing strength training exercises – not just running. Now it was too late – so I decided to just take rest and not injure my leg any further.

Twice I was tempted to run but better sense prevailed and stayed at home. Walked gingerly all the time and even got a knee socks kind of thing and wore it now and then hoping it will do some magic.

Race Night

I was very anxious through out the day. We reached around 10:30 pm and I got my first whiff of a marathon event. The atmosphere was electric. So many were walking in shorts and wearing sports shoes, wearing bibs, people stretching, warming up. There was a rockband called “one night stand” playing some oldie hits. I couldnt quite enjoy it as I could only think of the race.

Around 11:40 PM went to the race line. A huge crowd was there already. Here are some snaps from the starting line :

My Running Accessories : Bata Canvas Shoe, Sennheiser headphone, SGS Android phone with Cardio Trainer App for tracking time and distance

The ambulance was reassuring. Also behind my Bib had to write emergency contact person name and mobile, blood group, alergies to any medications etc.

My Cheer Party!

Just before the start

The Race

At 12 precisely the race started. There were drums at the entrance and people were cheering. After the first bend it was quite and all I can hear was the sweet thump of foot hitting the road – and ahead of me – for the entire stretch that I can see where heads bobbling rhythmically. It was beautiful the very sight.

We were to complete 5 laps for the Half Marathon ( 10 laps for Full Marathon ) – each one was around 4Kms. I typically alternate between running and walking – and keep increasing my running time and reducing the time I walk. My knee pain did not surface and I was very much relieved.

The course had 3 slopes. I have never practiced on a slope and I found that it was hard to run on an upward slope. I had to redo my strategy and started walking on upward slope – this totally messed up my rhythm – but I didnt mind much as I was enjoying the whole experience. When I crossed 1Km I saw the Ethiopian runners on the opposite side – they were already returning from the half way mark. Just watched them with my mouth open !

I managed Laps 1 and 2 pretty smoothly.

And it gets tough

I reached my 12.5km mark without much trouble and felt elated. I typically average 7Kms per hour, but this time it was 6.5Kms per hour…because of the slope walking.

Then I felt a tinge at the back of my right knee. This always surfaces when I cross 12kms ( and this is the reason I stop running after that and go home ). I knew what was coming – so stopped stretched, ate a banana and gulped some gatorade in one of the stations. I completed Lap 3 running.

The pain was pretty acute now and so I stopped and rested again. Did some more stretching and ran gingerly putting more weight on my left leg ( earlier this was the problem leg with shin splints – thankfully I am beyond that now )

By the time I was returning on the 4th lap I knew I could not run in this race anymore. The right leg will not bend. Also since I was putting more pressure on my left leg, started getting pain around the knees on left leg too.

The last lap


I walked slowly to the finish line at the end of lap 4. The experienced half marathoners were completing their runs and the newbies like me were walking or slowly jogging.

I went and sat. I had carried Volini – a pain ointment my mother uses – and applied it generously on my knees. Removed my shoe and let my toes breathe – they were literally burning.

I did not bother looking at the clock as I knew it will depress me. I took a deep breathe and started walking. I had another 4+ kms ahead – and it looked very far. I was literally dragging my right leg as bending it would send pain waves through my leg.

Most of the half marathoners had completed by now and only the full marathoners were now running or were also walking. But they walked briskly and also jogged – unlike me.

One kind soul while over taking me said – walk briskly sir thats all you have to do. I just smiled at him and said Thanks!

I dropped the idea of sitting and resting – as I knew the last time I sat and applied ointment I had a tough time getting up. Lot of thoughts were buzzing in my head. Why the heck did I even decide to run? This is it – I kept thinking – I am not going to run any more Marathons ever. I tried to banish such thoughts but the negativity in me was going on increasing.

To shut up the devil in my head I started focussing on the pain. The toes were literally burning, there was a sensation of a tight pull above my knees and also a searing pain behind my knee. I tried diverting my mind to think of positive things – but the negative thoughts started coming and it was making me angry and wanted to give up – so I started focussing on the pain again.

I think focussing on the pain strategy might have worked. I reached the mid way point and was elated. Phoo – just 2 Kms more. I was certain at this point that I would be completing the race.

I did not stop for any refreshments but kept walking dragging my right leg literally. I had become an expert on my pain  as I had been observing it so much. I literally lost track of how long I was walking and I started hearing drums – I was getting closer to the finish line.

The finish


I registered my final beep on the RFID scanner and crossed the finish line. I need not turn back for any more laps. I had such a surge in emotion that very moment. I walked very slowly and found a chair and slouched on it.

A kind organizer came to me and asked if I was alright. I had a tough time talking and said yes, Thank you. He let me alone and went away ( later he would come back give me a bourbon biscuit packet saying apologetically – this is all I could get! – he had no idea how grateful I was  ). I was basking in pure joy. The pain was still there but I did not mind it anymore. I just sat there stretching my legs. I could see the full marathoners turning back for their remaining laps.

The kind soul who asked me to walk briskly was coming towards the finish line. I clapped and he saw me – he put his thumbs up and smiled. He went back on his lap – don’t know who that person is – wish I had shouted to ask for his twitter handle.

Here are some screenshots of my phone.

My home screen – always shows the calories burnt from previous runs – was 0  at the start of the race.

My running graph captured by Cardio Trainer

Now to the devil in my head – I will participate in marathons again and again – year after year. I will try to better my time, will aim for 42 kms and more. You sir, the devil in my head, can go take a hike!

I am getting back to Paulo Coelho after a very long time. The last one was disappointing – “The winner stands alone”,

Here is an equation that dawned on me today while running. It is quite simple.

a) Speed at which you can run.
b) Distance that you can cover.
c) Running without any pain or injuries.

You can only have two of the above.

Obviously c) has to be selected – cannot imagine a life with pain – unless you are Zahir Khan or one of the sissy Indian cricketers who always feign pain in order to skip playing and go act in more Ads.

That leaves us to pick either a) or b). So if you have only 30 minutes to run – run as fast as possible for a short distance. If you have lot of time on hand – run as far as possible – but slowly with enough breaks.

At times these constraints are a real PITA – but that’s life – we should just try to make the most of it.

I read Ayn Rand’s FountainHead in 2008. A life changing novel.

If you haven’t read here is a gist.

The hero of the book is Howard Roark. 
He hates the old school architecture – where you have the professors expecting one to design buildings with 18th Century architecture – the pillars and ornate designs. Howard Roark could not stand this “apeing” and refuses to follow the college’s dictum and drops out and moves to New York to start his own design firm.
At the same time – Peter Keating, his fellow student, graduates with top honors and moves to New York.  The first half of the story is all about how Peter Keating’s career rises while Howard Roark is rejected by the System and he goes to work as a day laborer in a mine quarry and as a construction worker. 
The second half is all about how Howard Roark’s style of architecture is accepted and creates a new School of Thought. He creates a design secretly for Peter Keating which wins an architectural award by the same people who rejected Howard Roark. 


In the end, Howard Roark Wins. 

Towards the end of the book I almost believed that a Howard Roark existed. I was so fascinated by the idea of a single “man” revolutionizing an entire industry.

Whenever I heard about Steve Jobs or read about him – the picture of Howard Roark kept coming to my mind and I secretly believe Steve Jobs is Howard Roark!

Here is one man – who was instrumental in creating not one – but many industries.

1. The PC Industry

You and I would still be stuck with the ‘dumb’ terminals with green fonts had not the visionary Steve Job spotted the whizkid Steve Woznaik tinkering on a project.

2. CGI Animated Movies


Animation was just another special effect in a movie – until Pixar came along created those magical CGI animated movies.

3. Glamorous OS

It was love at first sight when I first saw Puma in 2001 – borrowed from NeXT OS. If you enter a wrong password the login dialog box would shake like a head refusing to accept the answer – an OS can be fun and elegant while still doing the OSy stuff. Was a convert from that day onwards.

4. Portable Music Device


iPod. What a simple elegant device ( except the fat nano ). Apple did not invent the hard drive based mp3 player, nor the clickwheel – but took them to the next level.

5. Online Media

People wrongly attribute the success of Apple’s Digital Media Offerings to iPod – but the secret is iTunes – it made the process of media consumption easy.

6. Podcasts


What will I do without them? Twit, Car Talk, Macworld podcast, TED Talks – all at my finger tips waiting to soak my brain whenever I run or for a long journey to kill time.

7. Smart Phones and Tablets


My Brother in law bought a Nokia smartphone in 2007 – it had a touch screen, a gyroscope etc. It was jerky and will freeze now and then. I liked the touch concept but did not excite me. Then came iPhone and elevated the SmartPhones to an entirely new level. And alongside the “App Industry”.

This man had Taste and Instinct like no other. He created multiple industries. He turned around Apple from the brink of death. He brought smile to millions of kids and adults. He inspired so many entrepreneurs to go against the current.

The world is a better place because of him.

In the end, Steve Jobs won.

Finally – after years of reading Newspaper with a cup of filter coffee in the morning – I am breaking free from the thing called Newspaper.

The disillusionment started with Indian Express becoming more of yet another run of the mill Masala Newspaper. When the world was burning with Wikileaks – IE choose to look the other way.

“Tata Sumo turns turtle on NH-4”
“Mugging on ORR, techie loses mobile,laptop”
“Old Couple Murdered in Jayanagar”

I started feeling that it is a random generator which picks these news. Of course there were these moments of brilliance – when the editorial will go hammer and tongs against the establishment. But it was becoming less and less.

Then Nadia Tapes leak happened. With it Vir Singhvi – whose columns I used to love – was chucked out. Swapan DasGupta left IE long back to write for ToI. Gurumurthy and TJS George’s columns were coming very sporadically..they were getting old. IE could never find anyone to sit at their desks.

Finally I gave up – and switched to ToI for 2 months.

“Should item numbers be done by popular actress” – center page editorial debate.
“Strawberries good for health” – with an accompanying photo revealing all other details.
“Property News” – actually Ads – you can’t guess which is which anyway

And always the opening page – being sold to companies with deep pockets. It is like a coupon book the whole newspaper. There was no sincere intelligent editorial. Swapan Dasgupta’s editorials didn’t have the punch it used to have -felt very much tamed. The leaks, scams, Anna Hazare – all had a passing reference – something that should have been the front page news.

Finally with my disillusionment complete – I gave up.

Now I have filter coffee with a book in hand. It is so much peaceful.

And for the world and scams – I get them on my twitter & facebook feeds – can make my own judgments – I am grown up now.

I picked this book because the cover had Julia Roberts saying – “this is an amazing book and I gifted this to all my girl friends”. Before you start passing a judgement let me just say – I agree. It is not a smart way to pick a book.

But – I did and ended up reading this one. and I recommend it wholeheartedly to both boys and girls.

This lady, Liz 34 years of age, goes through a pretty messy divorce. She is an accomplished writer/journalist living in New York – like one of the New York movies ( wait they did make a movie out of this – with Julia Roberts ). Has an affair that does not go well either.

So she takes off on a vacation for a year – split in 3 parts equally – Italy, India and Indonesia ( Bali actually ).

In Italy she joins a class to learn Italian. And she hunts for great food. I was hungry all the time while I was reading this part of the book – every page will have some dish or the other that she relished to the core. That is all she does – day in and day out and puts a lot of weight.

Then she moves to India – to an ashram near Mumbai. She was to spend 6 weeks and then go around India – but she ends up staying the full 4 months and never leaves this place. There are some hilarious bits here – how she does meditation and how her mind keeps getting in the way. If you are a beginner in meditation you should read this part – you are not alone.

Then something magical happens during her stay. She experiences ecstasy – the divine one. Till date I have only heard of this – but she explains it beautifully. She gets over her messy divorce finally – and is at peace with herself.

Then the story moves to Bali – where she had a deal with a renowned medicine man who had said during one of her earlier visits ( she is a journalist – and keeps travelling to interesting places – and during one of her trips she had met him ) – she can come and live with him to understand things better.

However the medicine man does not remember – but accepts her and she learns interesting things. She finds a place to stay and from here it is like a fiction. She is to find the balance in life in Bali – between the pleasure ( Italy ) and divine stuff ( India ). She gets lot of insights into the medicine man – he has mastered various types of meditation and can visit Heaven and Hell apparently.

It was interesting reading on Bali culture – Bali babies never touch the ground for the first 6 months of their life – as they are still Gods. After 6 months there is a ceremony to convert them to humans. Also they have only 4  names – The firstborn is “Wokalayan” (or Yan, for short), second is “Made,” third is “Nyoman” or Komang (Man or Mang for short), and fourth is “Ketut” (often elided to Tut). [got this from wikipedia] The fifth kid on wards the names are repeated. So if someone tells their name you can easily place them where they are in the family.

The books ends well – she falls in love with a 55 year old divorced Brazilian and ends on a high note. I read that her second part of this book ( which I am not going to read – as 2nd part always suck ) is about this second phase of her relationship.


So that is it – got a nice mix of spiritual and meta physical, 2 interesting cultures ( Italy and Bali ) – all written very fluently and in an entertaining manner – good TP.


and for me – I have moved on to metaphysical stuff – I am conversing with God now for the third time – perhaps will write about it next. 

Yep – thats the one. Took almost 2 months to finish this monster. Recommended reading for geeks, nerds and all the in betweens.

I first read about Neal Stephenson in a Wired article in 2006. Since then have been on the look out for his books. Every year will go to Strands book facility and will ask them about any of his books – they will draw a blank.

Anyway – found this book in JustBooks in February- the wonderful library chain that has been feeding me books for the last 2 years.

This is one big masala book – has some mathematics ( yep – equations, graphs and all that ), computer stuff of late 90s when the book was written ( Finux is the OS one of the main character uses – I do not know why he did not use the word Linux ), has an elaborate VC/lawyer, entrepreneur battle, nerd culture of late 90s – and of course the whole underlying theme – cryptography.

The book starts during World War II and the interesting stories are only here. Alan Turing and his college buddies fight it out ( one of them is a German and goes back to work for Hitler ). Each party will try to break each other’s cryptosystems and once broken they will do lot of stage managed accidents in order to keep the opposite party from knowing that they have broken the code – so they will not change it.

The present and past keep alternating – and the whole story centers around a ton of Gold buried under a man made lake by a Japanese Naval Captain who would have escaped from an air attack – escape from sharks, land on a cannibal island, escape from them, get captured by a rogue Japanese Army who are the ones secretly stashing tons of Gold. The Captain while designing the elaborate tunnel system will also plan his escape route through that without his bosses knowledge.

The location of the Gold is hidden in an encrypted message which will finally be cracked by our hero ( who uses Finux ) and the story will end with them bombing the gold out.

After reading this book I do not feel awkward to encrypt all my stuff with TrueCrypt and Keepassx – someday will blog on my paranoid setup !

I salute thee Neal Stephenson – you are the next Michael Crichton.

Imagine someone holding the above whistle and constantly whistling into one of your ears – day in and day out, month after month. That is Tinnitus for you.

Have been enjoying this since my child hood days – will get loud whenever I have cold or some fluid gets into my inner ear. Couple of days before new year some fluid entered the inner sanctum sanctorum in the middle of the night and all hell broke loose – accompanied by severe pain. I made my first visit to the doctor in 2010 – on Dec 30th – bummer.

You might be wondering – so how does this story end? Well – there is no end. Medical technology is only now figuring out slowly why this whistling happens – it seems there are 20,000 miniscule hair inside our inner ear. They respond to the tiniest of sounds and transmit it to the brain.

For some ( around 30 million Americans – no such statistics for India yet ) – some rogue hair “imagine” that they heard something and keep transmitting to the brain the sound – this is the shrill whistle noise I hear – Tinnitus. There is a famous personality who has this condition – Guy Kawasaki – he had mentioned it in Art of Start.

From my unscientific research – anti depressants are prescribed for Tinnitus – which is depressing to hear ( double pun !! ) . Best solution is to just get used to Tinnitus and enjoy the constant raaga.

If you know anyone in your network having Tinnitus – do connect me to them – would like to know how they cope with this.

1 & 2. Dune and Children of Dune by Frank Hebert

The first part – like all movies – is the best. Truly unputdownable – best science fiction I have ever read. Second part is little tiresome.

3. Flow – Psychology of Optimal Experience. How to find joy in everything you do. This book helped me in my running and car washing! Amazing book – will give a new perspective to how you view little chores to big tasks.

4. Outliers – By Malcolm Gladwell. Reasearch is boring – but reading the interpretation of such research is fun. The figure – 10,000 hours got drilled into my head.

5 & 6. Goal 1 & Goal 2 – By Dr.Eliyahu M.Goldratt. This book is a must read for everyone in any profession. It has got nothing to do with Agile or Lean – it will shake you up and make you think. I have heard multiple times about out-of-the-box thinking – this book has enough examples to trigger the out of box thinking process. Also it gives a whole different view point to dealing with constraints and inefficiencies – it is an opportunity waiting to be exploited.

7. My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk. I picked this book because cover said Nobel Prize winning author. And what a ride it was – Traditionalist vs Modernism. I think I missed most of the deeper philosophies ingrained in it – but what I grasped it was intriguing. Highly recommend this one.

8. Viral Loop by Adam Penenberg. We live in a an interesting social networking era. This book will be defunct in another year or two ( Ning is already on a downward spiral – and this book glorifies Ning ). With MySpace going down the drain – Facebook is not far off. This book covers the journey of all these startups.

These are the 8 books I read in 2010. Just finished reading a mind blowing book this year already – but hey – to know about it you have to wait for my 2011 Books Roundup !

This post is to brag on a mini milestone achievement – I can now complete the upcoming Whitefield Mid Night Marathon ( only the baby 4.2 Kms )!

Of the last 3 runs I have been consistently covering 4.2 kms plus.

Here are a few steps (woohoo managed to squeeze in a pun ) I took :

1. Shunned the iPod. The ear hurts after a while, the buds keep falling off, the wire keeps coming in the way – and the podcast / songs might get boring and I lose interest in running. So ditched the iPod and I can now run just with my thoughts.

2. Psyche myself on Diabetes. Genetically South Indians are programmed with this disease and shipped into the world. I sit and work 12 plus hours – almost 7 days a week. Office is just on the 1st floor. ( ahemm home is on 3rd floor but I am lazy ). Only way to beat diabetes is to exercise – no other way out.

3. Psyche myself on Personal Victory. This one is from Stephen Covey’s 7 habit book. You should first win personal victories before you can win public victories. This one statement makes me spring up from the bed and keeps me going till I reach the goal I had set – 4.2 Kms.

4. Enjoying the zone / the rhythm. It took a long time before I could find the rhythm. Now when I get over the initial few minutes of heart pounding – I start to glide – it is a beautiful feeling – and I do not notice the minutes that go by.

5. Ignore the knees will give away scare. It will be another ( hopefully ) 2 decades when my knee problem surfaces. I am betting on knee technology to improve – and there will be a magic pill very much like the Taj Mahal pill – which will rebuild the knee !

My next goal is the half marathon ( 21 Kms ) and then a full marathon ( 42 Kms ).

PS : A special thanks to @diduPublish Postknow, @nilakanta who I follow on twitter – their tweets used to make me feel guilty and now their tweets inspire me.

PSS : See Twitter is much more healthier than facebook. All I do in facebooks is view and share youtube links and talk politics. My eyes and head are getting corrupted 🙂