Category Archives: Musings

The Alien Chronicles – Part 1

Greetings fellow Plingians. I am hovering around Earth right now – in our newly built LightSpeed Space Ship. 
Earth as you know is in a far far corner of the universe – in Milky Way Galaxy, in Solar System, revolving around a tiny star they call the Sun. Earth is a tiny planet – much smaller than our smallest moon of our Beautiful planet – but is stunning to look at and is mysterious. 
What impressed me were the Humans who inhabit Earth in large numbers. They have won the battle with all the other animals and are currently ruling the world.
We took a 25 Earth Years sample Human Being for analysis in our Space Ship and ran him through our Biomedical Decoder machine. The results were fascinating.
They have the usual sensory objects – for vision, for sound, for feeling etc – as expected in any aliens. However what fascinated me was somethings hidden deep in them.
There is a big bone like structure that runs from the middle half of their body and is connected to their Brain at the top of the head. They call it the Spine. Again expected in any 4 legged alien.
Starting at the base I found lot of hidden power – they call it Chakras. Our Biomedical decoder went crazy when I tried to zoom into this location. I found 7 such spots – the top most one on their head.
I put the sample Human Being back in his habitat ( I was very careful not to violate any of the inter-galaxial treaties on alien observation – the human being had no memory of the study, nor his health got affected in any way )
I downloaded new software to our Biomedical decoder as our Scientists had to rewrite the code to handle the Chakras – had to wait in Earth for 10 Earth Years ( roughly half Plingian Year.) 
I was now able to uncover interesting things. 
I picked up the same Human being – and ran the tests on his Chakras now.

Each Human, is already preprogrammed to do a major task in his lifetime. This task is to take the human race a step ahead. These chakras hold the secrets to making this lifetime task come to life.

From Mindbodygreen.com

Root Chakra

When this Chakra is opened up fully, this human being now has financial independence and the basic necessities are take care of . This Human Being can survive the day to day living without much difficulty.
Sacral Chakra

This Chakra when opened up gives a feeling of abundance, well being and pleasure.
Solar Plexus Chakra

This Chakra is associated with Self Confidene, Self Esteem and Self Worth to the Human Being
Heart Chakra
This Chakra  gives Inner peace, joy and love for all beings.

Throat Chakra

This Chakra on activating allows the Human Being to express clearly and communicate truthfully.

Third Eye Chakra

This Chakra on activation allows the Human Being to act with Intuition, Wisdom and make smart decisions towards his primary lifetime task.

Crown Chakra

This is the highest Chakra when opened up is able to connect spiritually with the bigger spiritual universe. His task gets completed easily because of magical assistance from the cosmic universe.

I did not know what the primary task for this Human Being was.

I put him back and waited for a few more years. Again picked him and ran the tests. I did this till the death of this Human Being – while doing other tests of Earth and writing those boring daily reports I have to fill daily.

And the Human Being I was sampling – went only till the Heart Chakra – he failed in his mission and I could not find out what it was. Most of the Human Beings go with their lives not knowing the main purpose of their life – the task they should accomplish – and Human evolution doesn’t seem to move an inch further.

Imagine even if 1% of the Humans open up all their Chakras and complete the tasks they have been coded internally – the Humans will be knocking at our doors right now in Plingia.

I am continuing my investigations.. will narrate them in my next report.

2015 Books Roundup

Here is the post everyone was waiting for – list of books I crunched in 2015 – and here is the list for 2010, 11, 12, 13, 2014.

2015 began well with The Martian. Saw the movie on October 2nd, 2015 too – well made and did not disappoint. I will recommend the book any day – brilliantly written and well researched.

Once a Runner

Then one day I took a decision – lets run a marathon. So to inspire myself picked up this classic. This is a fun read and has some hilarious moments in the hero’s college days. Has lot of philosophy on running.

Seven Years in Tibet

I had seen this movie before – Brad Pitt is the hero. In this case I recommend the movie. The book is  an autobiography of a German Mountaineer who is imprisoned in British India and how he escapes and reaches Tibet. This could very well be the first book to ever be written about Tibet – as Tibet is very secretive and does not allow outsiders in. The first half was very interesting – our Hero ( Heinrich Harrier )  escapes and gets captured multiple times. Finally he makes it to Tibet surviving the harsh weather and bandits.

A Wizard of Earth Sea

Harry Potter is a poor copy of Wizard of Earth Sea ( written in 1968 ). Harry Potter is this boring kind of guy – who will ace in everything and will not do anything wrong. In the Wizard of Earth Sea however, our hero kid is quite complicated. He is prone to vanity – like any of us – and once he loses his mind and invokes a very dangerous spell which kills his teacher ( dumbledore like character ), and brings out the dark creatures ( much like Voldemort ) from the depths. Rest of the book he tries to fix this. Highly recommend the book – especially to Harry Potter fans – you should know what a poor copy Harry Potter is.

2001, A Space Odyssey

I had seen the movie long back and did not understand it. Read the book and understood to the most part but for the ending. Wont spoil it for you. The book was ahead of its times. After reading the book saw the movie again. The book was written mainly for the movie. Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C Clarke collaborated a lot – and it shows in the movie.

I ran the Kaveri Trail Half Marathon listening to this book.

The Devotion of Suspect X

There was this hit movie – Dhrishyam – a Malayalam Movie, which was remade in Tamil as Papanasam and then in Hindi – as Dhrishyam again. Was quite curious and read somewhere that the story is based on a Japanese murder thriller.

And what a story this turned out to be. A High School Mathematics teacher will do an elaborate setup to cover a murder. And a Physics professor – his school friend – will try to break it. A well structured cat and mouse game. Even if you have watched the movie – you should read this book. The movie(s) don’t do justice to this story.

Natural Born Heroes – Christopher Mc Dougall

I am a big fan of Born to Run – it made me a runner. This was the second part and a huge disappointment. In this book the author tries to uncover another energy within humans – elastic energy – which the parkour athletes use – and how it had helped the Davids win against the Goliaths. The book never took off – drudged on and on till I dropped it midway. Wasted money.

Darbar – Tavleen Singh

I don’t know how much of stuff written in this book is fact or fiction – but scary nevertheless. Lot of stories are covered – Sikh Riots, the self made mess in Kashmir – which our poor soldiers are still losing their lives – and the Gandhi family – who still are very much in power and will be for the next 2 centuries. You are a person who like politics or not, you are on BJP/AAP/Congress/Amma/Appa or whatever allegiance you are on – read this.

Scrum

This is the book from the horse’s mouth – the creator of Scrum. If you are a manager, developer, BA, Project Manager, Client, practice agile or not – read this book.

Bhagwat Gita as is 

I had a goal to read all the religious books in my lifetime. Towards this I got this book from Iskon – thinking this is it – the unadulterated version as the title claimed. Would have read 100 pages or so – but some of the interpretations in it had my blood boiling. So left it “as is”.

SingleTasking

The title says it all.  This is a small book – a blog post would have sufficed. It has study after study proving why Single Tasking is the way to go. It did help me in restrategising how I work – as at one point I was doing it all – and poorly.

Being Mortal

A must read for all of us. I witnessed my Father in law’s condition deteriorate – after undergoing 6 rounds of Chemo ( 3 before and 3 after a major surgery ) – and still we could not save him. This book will help plan our life at its end, as well as our loved ones.

1984 by George Oliver.

This book is eerily close to the truth. So many of the terms we loosely use like “Big Brother”  – came from this book. The book describes a dystopian world – and the attempt by our hero to break it. After reading this book – and now when I see the newspaper –  can already see some of the things in the book being enacted. Sigh.

Sorry for ending on a sad note. Books hold a mirror – and it is not pretty what we see in the mirror.

And in terms of quantity I did very poorly – hardly 1 book a month. For 2016 I have put a high goal of 1  book per week. Lagging behind terribly. Have to plan a few book vacations. Hmm.. why not?!

 

2016 Here I come!

Had Julius Ceasar decided to go on a hunt – Jan 1 might be actually Jan 15. These days, new years really does not make sense in the large scheme of things – a speck going around a little brighter speck in a  random corner of the Universe.

However – it does matter in the personal progress. Am I wiser, stronger, smarter compared to last year? What am I going to accomplish this year, that I did not do last year?

It does serve as a mile stone.

In no particular order – my goals for 2016 – where I return to Bangalore for the 2nd time in my life.

Running

In 2012 December, I ran a half marathon (21.6 KM) in a little over 4 hours.
In 2015 September, I ran a half marathon in a little under 3 hours ( 2 hours, 53 minutes )

In 2016, perhaps I will run the half in under 2 hours? Or should I aim to run a full marathon ( 42.2). I have at my disposal 2 lakes at walkable  runnable distance from my home. Today I did a 5k in 32 minutes.. will see if I can extend it to 10k in 64 minutes and try to increase distance and maintain the pace. Yes.. my age is increasing…. but I am getting younger.

Biking

In 2014, I did a Bangalore to Mumbai Ride – on a Royal Enfield, Thunderbird 500 cc ( http://kvrlogs.blogspot.in/2014/06/bangalore-to-mumbai-on-thunderbird.html ) . The longest I did after that was the Gorai Beach trip, or could be Thungareshwar from our home in Kandivali.

Perhaps this year I will ride to Nilgiris. It is a crime not to let the bike run full throttle.

Reading

2015 has been a good year with books.  Crunched a cart load of them. Yet to compile the list of 2015 – to continue my annual tradition (  http://kvrlogs.blogspot.in/2015/01/2014-books-roundup.html )

In 2014 ( or could be 2013 ) – read about a guy who planned to read 365 books that year. Now at a minimum I will crunch 52 books this year. Life is too short for the number of good books that are there waiting to be read.

Cycling

The Home-office distance is 5.2 Kms one way. The days I don’t run I am planning to take the cycle. Tried it once and it was just right. Did not get too sweaty that I needed a shower. Don’t know how it will be in summer.

Dog

The idea of having a pet dog bites me every year. Last year I got serious and joined a few adoption forums of Bangalore and Mumbai. Anyone coming there looking to adopt  a pure breed get nicely scolded and they leave the forum and go buy one from a pet breeder ( or puppy mills as they call ). I keep seeing the posts in these forums – cannot bring myself to adopt an Indie ( call me a hypocrite if you want  – I see them on the road all the time and cannot imagine them running inside the home ) – and at the same time cannot bring myself to buy from a breeder – as it perpetuates this inhumane practise. So waiting for a puppy to fall into my lap – hope this year I get lucky.

Programming

I started writing a Project Management tool in angular ( I evaluated so many but none fit my simple requirements  – all had too many features). Will complete it and make it available for our team.

I got a Raspberry Pi last year. Played around with but didn’t do much. This year will improve upon Python and along side plan a few projects. I strongly believe low cost computing will be the next big thing. Perhaps I will hook it to our Generator in our Apartment  Complex – Being in Mumbai last 4 years I had forgotten how it used to be without power cuts. But here.. in Bangalore – when Generator is on – I cannot turn on the iron box or geyser – as the Circuit Breaker will trip immediately. This is an immediate problem I want to solve – a simple App that shows when the generator is on.

I enjoy coding. I enjoy working on a Mac. Want to learn Swift and write a Mac application – perhaps a todo list ( while Omnifocus is good I am not too happy with it ) or an Email App ( Mailbox was almost perfect.. and Dropbox idiots acquired and killed it ).

Travel

I am not a wanderlust. I am more than happy to be holed inside the home – with my mac, music and a fast internet connection – for days.

However, with the responsibility of bringing up a human being –  the 8 year old son – I have to maintain his curiosity levels and keep him exposed to different experiences – I have to plan more travel. Perhaps will show him the temples of South, or go to the bottommost tip of the country, or show him Snow..

Food

Its been more than 2 years since I turned Vegetarian. But still I consume Egg occasionally and Diary products. Perhaps this year I will kick off the Animal products entirely and go Vegan. Now that I am in Bangalore – I can afford to do this.

Fasting

Have never done fasting – other than the times when I was forced to skip a meal. But it has been disastrous – head splitting headaches, irritated mood levels.. have to conquer this. The Vegan fad has subsided ( it has become mainstream ) – and now the new fad is fasting.. the mentions are increasing in the podcasts I follow. Will as well try it.

Going Carbon Neutral

I heard that a guy in our Apartment Complex has made a van with solar panels – which is parked in our visitors parking lot half the time. Apparently he is doing research on this and has got grants etc. Yet to meet this guy. Planning to put up a panel on our roof and see how much juice I can generate.. and start learning on these technologies – perhaps when I retire off in a small farm somewhere someday I can live off the electrical grid entirely – or who knows – this might as well be my next startup – once I own all the Apartment Complex Rooftops 😉

So thats it – starting a new tradition with this – will revisit this post in 2017 to see how I did.

Back to the Path

After I got busy with my marathon preparation – since June –  I stopped going Sudarshan Kriya by myself.

Every Sunday at 7:00 AM, there is a refresher course – where an Art of Living teacher guides us in doing Suriya Namaskar, and a few Asanas, Pranayama and finally Sudarshan Kriya in Guruji’s voice –  in our Apartment Complex party hall.  I used to attend them occasionally before, and after signing up for the Marathon – I stopped going.

On Sep 20th evening, after I finished the Half Marathon and was cooling my heels in the hotel room reading a book I picked up at Blossoms on Church Street – I get a WhatsApp message from Aditiji – she was my teacher when I attended the Art of Living Course in August, 2014. “Where are you, don’t see you nowadays?”. I was in such a good mood ( runners high ), and I immediately replied, “I was training for the Marathon. It is done. See you next Sunday”.
After sending the message I wondered – Man is this sheer coincidence or is it all planned. Would be interesting to know the sequence of events in Aditiji’s life which prompted her to send me the message  – perhaps that Sunday no one turned up and she went through her contacts to round up elements like me ( on-now-off-now ) 
That Saturday I told San, ( more off-now-rarely-on element ) – tomorrow lets go to the refresher meet. San incidentally was suffering from cough which started almost around Monsoon beginning and was not going away. She said perhaps the So-Hums will be of help and she readily agreed.
Sunday morning I wanted to sleep – no more long runs – it was the very next week after 4 months of running on Sundays – but San was all pumped up to go do Yoga. Seeing her charged up the enthu rubbed on to me, and we both went to the Party hall. 
We did all the Yoga, Pranayama and Kriya and by 9:00 when I opened my eyes – I felt the same feeling I got after running 12 kms during the marathon – that same calmness, the clarity of vision and mind – and being almost thoughtless. I just wanted to go sit under a tree, close my eyes and linger there. 
After that the next few days we continued doing the yoga and Sudarshan Kriya by ourselves. San’s cough went off. Again – can be coincidence – the rains stopped – or the So-hums had an impact. I am finding more of the skeptic in me reducing and I am starting to believe in the meta-physical world. 
I am realising a few things. 
Breathing is the key to opening something amazing locked up within our bodies. From my early days of running to the current running form – my breathing has gone from huff and puff – to a gentle steady relaxed breathing. I can run for long distances without getting exhausted. Likewise the breathing we do during the Pranayama – especially the Ujjayi breathe ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ujjayi_breath )  and the fast paced Bhastrika (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhastrika ) – immediately puts the agitated mind in a calming state.Then the countless So-hums we do during Sudarshan Kriya takes it up a notch. 
Yoga is another crazy body hack. It would take a solid half an hour of pounding the road before I would start sweating profusely. Within 5 minutes – a fast paced Suriya Namaskar will have the same effect. I think I can only do 6 or 8 rounds of Suriya Namaskar. There are these Yogathon events ( like Marathon ) where they do 108 rounds – want to give it a shot sometime. I have some fatal attraction to these Marathons and Yogathons.  There are a few more asanas I have learnt which gets the heart racing in no time. 
There are a few Magic spots in the body. Chakras and Kundalini Energy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kundalini) , and Solar  Plexus (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celiac_plexus) – which Yoga and Breathing activates in a positive way. 
There is so much to tap into the India’s century old secrets – Yogas and Kriyas. Since there was no scientific explanation I thought these were all VooDoo – but having experienced a glimpse of the “other side” – I want to continue unravelling the secrets. 

September 20 – The Half Marathon

Tl;dr : After preparing for a Full Marathon, I complete the Half Marathon – in just under 3 hours.

This reminds me of a tweet I read “Woman completes marathon without talking about it” – and thought about myself. Here I am chronicling each week of my Marathon training![ Starting here ]

Anyway – here is a brief write up of my running the Kaveri Trial Marathon 2015.

I had booked a cheap room near MG road, one of the fancy startups of 2015 – parallel to Church Street – where all the pubs are there. Woke up at 1:00 AM, freshened up and walked to the bus pick up point near Queen Victoria Statue. This is near the Chinnaswamy stadium – and till I reached I was not sure if the bus will be there – and was wondering what will the plan B be if the bus had already left or didn’t show up.

Thankfully 2 buses were there – and a volunteer cross checked my name and let me in. I got in and immediately dozed off.

Took more than 2 hours to reach the race venue. It was still dark. They had music going on and felt energised.

Some 200 odd Full marathoners were there. Their race was to start at 6:00 AM. The race starting point was a Km away. For the 800+ Half Marathoners , the race was to start at 6:30 AM. The full marathoners started proceeding to the race start point.

I went and stood in the queue for the Portable Potty. There was a long queue and there were 5 units, but only 2 were functioning as water and toilet paper were out in others. Next time – carry a roll.

I had to rush to the race starting point – and boy oh boy – there was such a huge crowd. And the track was so narrow. I thought – there is going to be a stampede.

It was beautiful. Just perfect weather – not too cold and fresh clean air. And the excitement and enthusiasm all around crept into me.

Starting point at the distance

6:30 Start.

The fast runners pulled away quickly and we laggards started slowly – the narrow road was not a problem. I was looking at how people run  and a few were stomping heavily – felt bad for their legs – it will hurt bad at the end.

I ran without a break till the turn around point came – and still kept going – passed all the aid stations and finally stopped at around 12kms. I was listening to 2011 Space odyssey. What a brilliant book.

I was munching parle biscuits and looked at the sky – and it looked so clear. My mind was calm and devoid of any thoughts. Paused the audio book and let the moment sink in.

I resumed running and continued my gentle unhurried pace. Soon I was just 5 or kms from finish line. No pain came thankfully and was enjoying the run.  It is all in the mind.

The sun was up, but clouds quickly covered and there was a gentle breeze.

The people in front

People behind me

Full marathon gives me the shiver.. 

Finally completed it in a new Personal Record time of 2hours and 53 minutes.

The deed was done.

The Full Marathon looks impossible now. Perhaps will give it another shot next year. Will continue my training. Have to increase the pace. This number I put up – was still slower than the veterans – 60 years and above – first place finish ( 2:45 I think ).

Not Much Running Notes : Week 11 – 15

I think Week 11 Sunday I ran 26kms. I felt some weird pain in my foot so stopped. Had set a target of 32kms.

Then as the day went I found my left mid foot hurt really bad. Yaay – new pain. Started research and read all about pronation. Perhaps I was not running right. Saw a youtube video too to prove myself. Read about the correction shoes and got even more confused.

Then I read a post – saying – this is how humans run – no point correcting it. So I came back to my starting point – thanks and no thanks internet. My running is fine.

Perhaps my legs gave up after too much of running on hard surfaces.

I took the tough decision and downgraded from full to half marathon.

Waited for a couple of days, and went for a run. Stopped after 1.5kms as the pain was back. I stopped running for the next 4 days or so.

Should I just quit and live to fight another marathon or give it a shot.

While the debate was raging in my mind – I noticed the pain ease a bit. Did a few runs and even though was tempted did not exceed 5kms. The mid-foot pain was not there.

Yesterday, I ran for an hour at a very gentle pace and managed a little less than 8kms – thankfully no pain.

Will do a couple of short runs this week and be ready for Sunday morning. 21kms I have done so many times the past few weeks – and if no pain surfaces can manage it.

Whoever said Running is fun. Damn you – it has added more stress to my already stressed out life. grrbrr.

Running Notes : Week 10/16

Monday I went shopping in Godrej Nature Basket. Picked up Sofit – Soymilk the plain version ( not adulterated with sugar – which is hard to get ), Tofu and Gooseberry.

Went for runs according to plan on Wednesday,Thursday and Saturday and did the knee exercises.

Sunday morning I was delayed – partly because of the rain and partly because I was lazy. I started the run at 8am.

Set 29kms as target.

My legs felt tired right from the go. I checked out the park but it was fully soggy and unrunnable. Came back to the concrete parking lot + the inside asphalt road. It is going to be a boring 29 loop run. Was debating whether next time I will go to Aarey colony road – but the slopes will kill my confidence.

Crossed 10.5k and took a recharge break. I now switched on the audio book – Wizard of Earthsea. The headphone’s right side had stopped working. This keeps getting better.

Ged gets good advise from his master. He starts chasing the shadow. The hunted becomes the hunter. They meet one more time and this time Ged tries to clutch the shadow with his hands but the shadow escapes. However now the shadow has taken the shape of Ged ( but there is no shadow when it walks ) – and is on the run. Ged follows it till he comes to a town where his old friend Welch stays. Welch joins him in the quest to put an end to the shadow.

I continue to run gently and after 17kms, I start doing my run-walk-run routine. Run till the nike App says – you have x kms to go, your current pace is y.. then I will walk for sometime  – will keep telling – ok I will walk to the lamppost and then run – and I will cross the lamppost and then will tell myself – ok the next lamppost but no cheating alright – and so on.

During my research during the week I read something very interesting.

“Learn to differentiate between pain and discomfort”

I could feel some pain come on the foot or ankle or my knees – but I told myself – this is just discomfort and it will go away after sometime. I was getting more and more tired.

Around 20.5kms I took a recharge break. Still 8.5kms to go.

Around 24km – suddenly my senses became super alert. The last time I felt something close to this was during my 4 day Art of Silence course. I could see the road very clearly – each and every micro pot hole was visible. This stayed with me throughout the day.

Reached 29km finally. Was hungry as hell. Have run 4 Hours 18 minutes. Longest ever.

Both my hands were hurting near the joint. Will have to research and increase my upper body workouts a bit. Currently I do 10 push ups and 10 dumbbell lifts. My legs were aching but thankfully none of the fancy pains were there.

Now – the doubt of completing marathon has reduced, but a new one has started increasing – you are one greedy mind – Will I be able to complete within 6 hours – else I will not get a medal. Also the aid stations will all be shut down by then – what if I badly need water or something to eat – I will be damn hungry.

If this was the D-Day I would still have to go 13 more kms. The last km I did in 8.50 minutes. This will only get worse towards the end. If I assumed 9 minute pace  – I will need another 2 hours to complete the marathon.

That will make it 6 hours and 18 minutes. Gotto shave off 30 minutes – so I will have some buffer.

Next Week Torture plan – same as this week, but with 32Kms target for long run.

Running Notes : Week 8,9/16

Week 9 

And Monday we had a team outing at Thungareshwar. It was a 4km climb on a gently rolling hill – for a temple and a waterfall near Vasai. I went up and back without any fuss. Patted myself on the back – couple of months back I could not have pulled this feat. The body adapts itself really well.

The next 3 runs I kept myself to less than half an hour – so I could spend more time doing the knee strengthening exercises.

Sunday morning it was raining heavily. I was worried about the park.

As expected I found the track very muddy and un-runnable. I left the park and came to my parking lot. However this time I did only 25% of a run in it. Rest I did it on the tar road.

As expected after 5 kms, behind my knee I started feeling the pain. Don’t know it was the mind playing tricks on me, or it was really hurting.

Choose to ignore and continued listening to the book – which was quite engrossing. Our hero puts a spell – in a duel with the Malfoy character – which brings out a nameless creature from the unlife.

It starts tearing him apart, and is rescued by the Dumbledore like Head Principal – who dies in the process.

I run 10kms without a break and recharge with a banana and a liter of water.

Sparrow Hawk graduates as a wizard and goes to protect a village from Dragons. He successfully does it and tries to return to his School. However the creature has become his shadow and he is not able to get near his school – since the school is protected by spells which prevents such creatures from coming near. He has to fight the creature all by himself. Oh btw – this nameless creature – is the Voldemort in HP. Oh JK – what a rip off you did?

My legs start showing signs of pain. I run 1 km, walk a bit and run again. I continue doing this – guess this is my rhythm.

At 21kms I again eat a banana and half a litre of water.

Still 5 kms to go.

Around 23kms a gentleman – who was cycling earlier – but later had given the cycle to his wife and he started running – called out to me. Way to go man – and gave a thumbs up and an expression of admiration. I said Thank you and continued.

Typically my ego is in check – always humbled by the distance and pain. But now it erupted to its fullest glory and was very pleased. However I did not do anything foolish – but kept my run a km, walk a bit routine.

I reached 26 and stopped. Wow. I think the marathon is on.

I think for next week I will continue the same plan.

Monday,Tuesday : Rest
Wednesday,Thursday : 5km with a good dose of knee exercise.
Friday : Rest
Saturday : 5kms with knee exercise
Sunday : 29kms.

Week 8

Monday,Tuesday I took rest.

On Wednesday it was raining heavily. I thought I will do skipping. Did a 100. Found I was not sweating, and did a 100 more.

Then a pain came up on my left ankle. Not good.

The next 2 days I was mentally kicking myself whenever I thought about this.

Then on Friday went for a run, and thankfully there was no pain. Saturday went for a short run in preparation for Sunday long run.

Again started my run after setting 26kms as the target.

Around 18kms I felt pain somewhere behind my right knee. Thankfully the left ankle did not hurt.  I walked for a few minutes, and again ran – and again the pain was there.

I somehow managed 23kms and quit. My mind was furiously working on Plan B. Just do a half marathon it said. You don’t have it in you – need more training. Again do you want to face the ignominy of coming last in the full marathon?

However I felt that I still had some energy in me. I was not spent like the earlier runs on Aarey Colony – where I had to run on slopes.

Afternoon I had to take P to a chess tournament. I had 4 hours to kill and I was researching all about running and the pain I was having.

Found the name : ITBS – Illotibial Band Syndrome. And found one of the remedies is not to run on concrete surface.

A light bulb went up. At 10AM they close the park and at that point I would have completed 16kms. Then I come back to the parking lot – and after running a couple of kms – around 18kms – that is when this pain starts.

Also I found a good site on knee exercises. Decided to incorporate them after every run.

This one : http://www.nhs.uk/Livewell/c25k/Pages/knee-exercises.aspx

Oh – and I started a new book : A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K.Le Guin. Harry Potter is a straight copy  of this book. HP is all about the boy who will do no wrong etc. In this story – our hero who goes by the nickname – Sparrow Hawk – has skills, but also has the follies of a normal human being. It is way darker and our hero keeps making one wrong decision to another falling deeper and deeper into trouble.

And similarities – walking through walls, a school where they teach wizardry, illusion tricks, a Malfoy like character. JK Rowling.. disappointed with you.

Running notes : Week 7/16

Since I was shifting my long run from Monday to Sunday – it was a short week. Only 3 runs in total.

I was bringing 7 years in Tibet to a close. The interactions between the young Dalai Llama and Heinrich is beautiful. China invades Tibet in 1951 and the book ends on a very sad note – with an appeal for help to keep Tibet free.

This time for the long run I did not go to Aarey colony. Was back in the park behind my apartment complex.

I set 26km as goal and started running. It was drizzling and the rain clouds went away.

Did a 9km non stop run, before getting back to my Apartment Complex security where I had kept 2 water bottles and 2 bananas. After downing a liter and a banana, continued on the 2nd round.

At 18kms, I again got back to my pitstop and downed the 2nd water bottle and another banana. My legs were quite heavy and tired by now. Sat for quite some time, and pulled myself up and started running gingerly

I saw a long brownish black snake swiftly go into a few rocks near the running track -was quite scary – I continued running, and did not dare look back.

Around 10:00 AM, the park security shooed me out. I went back to running in the concrete parking lot – and it broke my running rhythm. Also the Tibetan book ended on a sad note, and I pulled up a podcast which was a bore. Should have prepared something earlier to distract myself.

Beyond 20kms I started feeling pain at 2 places.. somewhere above the left ankle and  behind my right knee – I think this is the lactic acid building up. I walked for sometime so the pain went away, and started running again but the pain kept coming back – after 5 minutes.

At 22.5 kms I stopped. I don’t know if this is where my limit is.

Since I did not run on the slopes I was able to stretch my legs properly and even though the legs hurt – it was not as bad like the last 2 times.

I started researching how else I can improve my running. If today was Marathon day, I still would have 20 kms to run 🙁  There are still 8 more weeks to go. Have to hack my body.

1. I have to start doing Fartleks – run fast and slow alternatively. Every material I read keeps harping on this.

2. I have to start adding more protein to my diet. Did a math – I should take 60gms of protein. Right now I am having an egg a day and some legumes as evening snack. Since I eat red rice for lunch, I am covered on Carbs. But protein I am falling way short. Planning to introduce tofu for a mid-morning snack – don’t like the taste that much but I don’t have a choice now.

The meat eaters in the family are tempting me – just a few bites of chicken and your daily protein requirement is met they tempt me.. grr.. not falling for it.

I am this close to hitting the panic button, will wait for the coming weeks run and attempt the 26kms one more time and then decide to panic or not.

God give me strength.

Torture plan for next week

Monday,Tuesday : Rest

Wednesday : 8kms
Thursday : 11kms – Fartlek

Friday : Rest

Saturday : 8kms
Sunday : 26kms.

Running notes : Week 6/16

The euphoria of running a half marathon died down rather quickly.

I actually cheated last week. My goal was 23kms, but I stopped after crossing the half marathon mark. Not meeting the long run target was a mistake.

The week was uneventful – it did not rain much and I clocked a few runs according to my plan.

Last week my long run was on Sunday. This time I pushed the long run to Monday – being an off-day ( Team ADDA works Tuesday thru Saturday – no Monday morning blues for us ).

I reached my running spot at Aarey colony and found it devoid of runners or walkers.  Today is a working day and all the poor unlucky folks are at their desk I thought.

I got to know the reason why there were no runners at around 8:30AM. The main road connected Western Express Highway (WEH) to Powai and is full of traffic during peak hours and is jammed. The Aarey colony road is the only alternative to the world famous JVLR road. Moment there is a jam, all the cars and bikes take a detour through my running trail – #)$$*$#))# – and they kept coming on and on in an endless procession.

When one of these vehicles whizzed past precariously close to me, or I had to get down from the asphalt to let the cars go – I plotted how I can get back on these guys. I even invented a portable nail device. When my mind oscillated to the angelic self – it thought of posters that can educate these drivers. Yeah right!

This time I decided to conquer the Aarey colony slopes – so I ran up the 2.5km incline – on both loops – one step at a time. First loop I ran the entire distance of 12kms. Second loop I had to take quite a few walking breaks.

When I was 22kms I closed shop. I was done.

I was kind of down after the run. I could not reach my goal of 26kms. My legs hurt like hell. I had only one thought in my mind – how am I supposed to run 20 more kms? I still have only 2 more months to train and looks like I have hit my limit.

Later when I was running through the run ( 🙂 )  in my mind – I realised. Here I am an ordinary runner – who had struggled to finish a half marathon 3 years back – had just completed 2 back to back half marathons. And I had run up the slope and not walked. And this could be the first run in a long time when I ran without songs or audio book – and so I could not disperse the dark moods that kept clouding my mind.

I should be happy with my performance today – of completing 22kms on a hostile environment.

But men are a greedy lot and so am I. Instead of basking in my achievement – I decided to sit depressed. Later I spoke myself out of it and was at peace.

I have to either move my runs back to Sunday – so other runners can join me in pelting a car – or – find an alternate place to run. Have to do it before the next run – and this time I will reach my target of 26kms – no one can stop me.

Runs for Week 6

Plan for next week

Tuesday,Wednesday : Sweet Rest

Thursday : 8kms

Friday : Rest

Saturday : 8Kms

Sunday : 26kms.