River Run For Hope - 10kms

4th June, 2016 River Run For Hope 10k

Officially my first timed run this year, never late but registered right around the time Hotlanta Half Marathon was in close quarters. I learned this 10k was conducted to help African community. Also the official t-shirt had the map of Africa and on the race day could see few African families around the start line which was the Church. I drove to the starting point, it was around few miles from my place. Collected my running from the beautiful old lady who greeted very well. Could see couple of Indian faces at the start line. As the usual practice for this run, they recited quotes from Holy bible and took blessings from the God. As I was seeing it, a wonderful day for running with very moderate temperature. I was looking forward for the good run. Ended up doing one of my best run.

Route for the 10k River run was one of the best routes I had run so far. Along the river for few kilometer made it a very good experience and added pace to my run. Run started at 7 am in the morning. As I started, looked at one of the T-Shirt back quote ‘Someone said it’s RUM !!’ moment of smile, I said the guy who wore that t-shirt that’s funny. I took first 3 kms at normal pace, realized I am going good and continued to increase my pace. Saw a lady on the run, who ran along with her son who happened to be on the stroller. That’s great energy and she was consistently running at very good pace, same time managing the stroller. Really amazed with dedication of some people, inspiring. 

Half way mark I had clocked 26mins and still looked better. Went on continue with increase in pace and hoping to complete within an hour. Wonderful climate and the route assisted me all through the course. Sometimes it was wonderful people, some aged 60 and running so elegantly kept me going and pushed me to hit the best run I had so far for 10k distance. Time I hit the last kilometer, I pushed to hit the finish line in 56 mins. A wonderful run and I was excited to see my running time displayed and standing 8th in my age category. Loved the run and efforts that’s went in. I am not a person to hit my best, sacrifice to enjoy the run. This was one of the run I had good fun, same time could hit my best. 

Soon I finished, I could see the lady with the baby stroller finished. I went to her and appreciated her for the run. I told her someday wish I would be able to do what she did today. Reason I love running, people around keep amazing me all time. In all, a very good run.

Here is the result and some pics - 

91

Prashant Patil

Atlanta

GA

5576

31

M

30-34

56:04

56:17

09:01/M

Start of the race

Age category results

At Finish

Finish Line

After Finish

Award ceremony

Me :)

Happy Running !!

Breaking the mind's shackle - Back to marathon !!

Peachtree Road Race 4th Of July Independence Day, Atlanta, Ga.

Last few months it’s been a roller coaster ride of things happening in my life. Trying to find some sort of peace and calmness along the way I am moving in. Missed to run Mumbai Marathon, which could have well be my 4^th consecutive run in SCMM, also TCS 10k run which could have been my 5^th consecutive year in a row. Albeit my running was going on, was looking up for some event where I could final break the shackle of not running a marathon in recent times.

Moved to US in May, my first trip to US. I did settle there in a week’s time. Now what, I started running whenever I could find time, whenever things where getting hard on me. These days I was not maintaining any routine but run whenever I can. I did search for marathons in Atlanta, could find one on 4^th July, Peachtree Road Race 10k. Thought this could well be my chance to run abroad and run a marathon after a long time. But to my dismay, registrations were full and I could gather some information like I may get a running number during expo. Meantime I was running now and then, really not sure about getting a running number or not on the day of expo.

Looking for Running number !!

With Jeff Galloway 

Hoping to get running number I went to expo on 2^nd July, enquired if I can get a running number or number transfer or for sale. I got some information of sale next day at the expo, was happy to hear that. I met Jeff Galloway, running legend, trainer. I was happy to meet, had been reading his articles on running and training for long. Took some pictures, he was kind enough to look for a running number for me with his friends, but there was no luck though.

I returned to expo next day and went directly to AJC booth, where running number were sold. I asked the lady if any free numbers are available. After checking, she got back to me with good news, some free numbers were available. That means I get a number for the race and its free. I thanked the lady and was back preparing myself mentally for the race next day.

With Bib Finally

Again with Jeff with Bib

All Check, All Set

 I had light dinner, arranged the stuff for the D-day. Slept hoping for a good run. I woke at right time, got ready. I was hearing to the my favorite playlist in the morning. Moment I was out, it was raining. I caught train which had thousands of runners, could barely find place to stand in train. Got down at Buckhead and then a long walk till the start point, I saw huge number of people all walking down to start line. I was in line up J and was looking to join the crowd. Did some basic stretch and I was all set to run my first marathon this year outside India, in a crowd where I could hardly see any Indian faces.

Rain intensified right at the start line, I wished couple of people whom I was having a chat, a good run and there I started. Initially slow to adjust myself to the run, but through the miles I was feeling confident, happy and run was going good. High fives, cheers all the way was good. I finished the race all smiling and happy in a 1hr 3min with 10mins wasting to secure my mobile getting wet due to rain. Only this time I carried it not to miss to take picture of my run and the event :)

Few photos of the race below..

Post-race, award ceremony was cancelled since it rained heavily and crowd of 60,000 plus people was beyond anybody’s control. I left the race and went to after race party arranged by Jeff Galloway, hoping to meet him again.  Party was cool with nice snacks and beer. I had both and left to room with some really nice memories of the race and race as a whole.

Happy running !!

Infosys Run - November !!

21th November 2013

These days I am mostly off-blogging, this is just framed by me, this is blogging inside your mind and not putting it actually on to site. Work has taken away bit of toll, not being able to put down some of my experiences in the recent past. Few things still to come over are my cycling series posts and few runs. This November I ran Infosys 10k called Infosys November Run, previously held in September by the slightly different name Infosys September Run. This time I got it all wrong, missed to notice the event date after registering for the run, I assumed it to be on 28th November while the actual event date was 21st November, that's my bad. With few weekend runs I was bit confident on finishing it good. 

This time crowd was fantastic, more in numbers then last year's September run. I started not so good, with little bit of heavy stomach and dizzy feeling, but soon after crossing half mark, I was confident and ran comfortably for the rest of the run. I finished in 59 mins, finish was good. Next on my list was Bangalore Marathon by Ajmera Thump.

Till then keep running, care for environment around you.

Cheers.

Infosys Summer Run 10k 2013

With running becoming popular in Bangalore, most people are now serious about running. Running communities have come up which trains new runners. Few running organizations have already been there for some time now and organize runs, also providing each runner with individual consultation. Runners for life is one such group which has membership norms and is most active in the city. Also few groups are created among runners where you don’t need any membership, you can be part of their running over the weekends, Nike free run is one such group.  With this growing interest in running, people in IT turning out make themselves fit, so as people in Infosys.

Infosys running community organizes 5k and 10k run every six months called Infosys September Run and Infosys Summer Run in September and April respectively. I was part of ISR held in September 2012 and finished 10k with timing of 1 hour 3 mins. Event was good except that I had to skip my work for some time and later had extend the work at night. Summer time it’s called Infosys Summer Run which was held yesterday 24^th April. I had registered for it only couple of day before the run since I was not sure. But things took it course day before when I had to attend a telepresense call at Cisco Belandur office, that is around 18 kms from electronic city office. Well, it was a day of events, I went to attend the meeting in the morning, after the meeting I met my Cisco office colleagues and left to Infosys by 3 pm expecting to have ample time before the run that will start at 5 pm. I went to my room got my running gears and shoes, was back on my office desk by 4 pm. Completed a small work I was doing and then left to the starting point of the run. All through the way I was giving a second thought for the run as I was bit exhausted travelling almost 40kms on bike in Bangaluru traffic. I thought about Chennai marathon which was even worse than this, so made my mind on running comfortably and finishing the race. This time around running crowd was good in numbers. We were supposed to run 2.5 kms loop four times for 10k run. Marathon started at 5.30 pm, as always I started slowly, picked up bit of speed in loop 2 and the next two loops, I was aiming to finish within an hour. Except the stomach stitch in my last loop, run was pretty well. Finished it in 59 mins 11 secs, according to my watch timings, will wait for the official timing to come out. It was a descent run, I need to work on increasing my pace, which would cut down some more minutes. No pictures taken, no certificate yet :)

Happy Running !!