HIGHS:

Running the Sunfeast 10K with over 4000 people in the Open 10K category : the energy and the crowd enthusiasm was pretty awesome and we could feel the excitement pulsating through the air as the whole group lined up for the start at sharp 9 am. This was my first run with such a large group of runners and it was great to see so many people out there.

Lots of runners from the RFL gang who are always fun to be around (despite everyone’s obsession for times!) were all there. I guess that’s a part of running. What I enjoyed most is the after-race breakfast with nearly everyone trickling into Airlines hotel for the customary breakfast of dosas and idlis.

Watching the Elite 10K Women’s category and the close finish was another amazing moment : these women with their long limbs and sculpted bodies striding powerfully through the stadium towards the finish line : presented quite an inspiring sight! These women don’t run – they actually fly! The (joint) winners came in at 32 mins.

LOWS:

The littering! Why were people throwing plastic bottles everywhere? Where were the bins?! The organization was great otherwise, except for this small oversight. There were NO bins!

Could they not have placed some bins at intervals so people could chuck bottles into them? Of course, Indians being Indians would still throw bottles on the road, but at least the damage done would be lesser.

It was an absolutely appalling sight : at one stage it was like running on a sea of plastic bottles. It was like a competition to see how many bottles a person could chuck – they would have probably done well at a baseball game. At one point, even the folks at the water points were chucking the bottles into the path of runners, whether there was someone to catch it or not.

Why couldn’t people just hang on to their bottles till the next stop or till they saw a bin? What is with us Indians? Because I can’t understand how people can litter the roads in this fashion knowing that they’re creating so much work for someone else who has to clean up after them. Where were the responsible runners?

Having run with RFL, I must say that I’ve rarely seen anyone irresponsible. Not only is everyone really careful about where they are throwing garbage, everything including bottles and cups are collected in garbage bags and disposed of responsibly. At the last Bangalore Ultra, I didn’t see a single bottle being chucked anywhere on the beautiful trail. Left to these kind of irresponsible runners, the countryside would have been littered with plastic.

This on the other hand, being more of a junta run, there was absolutely zero sense displayed by the people running.

Maybe, a better way would have been to hand out water in open cups so people couldn’t carry them along. I am sure they could have thought this out better, knowing the absolutely deplorable habit of littering that we Indians seem to have in our blood.

The heat was another low. I’ve been mainly running under the pleasant shade of the Cubbon park trees and only when we were on the road, making our way from Kanteerva Stadium to Chinnaswamy stadium (and it’s quite an incline!), did I realize that I was absolutely unprepared for the blazing sun.

To say it was “hot” would be an understatement. My pounding head after the run was proof of the fact that it’s getting really hot here in Bangalore and a 9 am start in May is the worst timing you can start. I wasn’t comfortable at any point of the run. Usually after around 2-3 kms (which are the toughest for me), I get into a comfortable groove and can keep going at a certain pace.

That didn’t happen at all. All I could think of was the heat and how to get out of it. There was some respite along parts of the road where there were trees. And I was just thinking that the way they’re cutting down trees in Bangalore right now : we won’t even have this little shade in a few years to come.

AND IN BETWEEN!

I’m going to end with something that brought a smile on all our faces. Manoj from the RFL gang ran with this message on his t-shirt. Apparently, he saw a lot of probable candidates registering and decided this was his chance to strike! His offer, I think, is still open!