As I mentioned, running came to me as part of the promotional run for the CRY NGO I volunteered. After my initial discussion with Raji & Tangamma [CRY Team], I came to know plans are already being sketched out to bring in more people for the run. T-Shirt design was in the process, they were expecting badminton celebrity to turn up for the event. I took charge of spreading the word across my friends, colleagues. T-Shirt was priced at 120 /- which was very reasonable.
As part of my workout, I started to run in the gym on daily basis. I usually ran around 2kms, sometime more. Since marathon was something I was not usually associated with & this was a new thing to me, I tried not to exert myself & moreover this run was for a cause.
On the D-day 5th June 2011, all the volunteers in their white T-Shirt designed with CRY Logo & messages where there at the venue, Kanteerava Stadium early morning. Some were not running & they took care of kiosk. Most of us who registered carried banners, placards & some slogans to shout on the way. As the race started, I initially walked along with others holding the banners and started off with the run after sometime. I don't remember exactly what time I took to finish the race but it was somewhere between 40-45 mins. Felt good to complete it.
I was very much moved by the event and running. Event itself was huge success with almost all Bangaloreans ran with some outside runners, celebrities, kids, aged, specially-abled kids, veterans, lot of NGO's running for their causes. I thoroughly enjoyed the race although it was small distance. I began browsing about marathons and started reading articles regarding it. Soon realized I can take running further, probably to try out bigger distance.
This is me on my first marathon. Bib # 25441. Now that I had run & it was successful run, thought I could do better & started looking for longer versions of marathons. Around the same time registrations were started for Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon 2012. That's how I pictured running my first half marathon. Yes, running in Mumbai. Without much of the thoughts and after some hurdles during online registration, I registered for Mumbai Marathon which was going to be held on 15th January 2012, that's exactly two days after my birthday. Follow me here.
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