Not Ready for 10

Those of you have read my experience at Ajmera Life Is Calling Marathon & 10K at NICE road in Bangalore would know that I run, well, on and off. It's been over a year since I started, and I still feel shy to call myself a runner when I see people flying past me. But I'm proud to have started at least.

This post is about my experience at the same course but a different event. The Bengaluru 10K Challenge, on 12 July 2015, saw over 2000 runners from different walks of life. There were the super-fast ones, the moderately fast ones, the slow ones, and then me too. I was surprisingly positive and happy for someone who hadn't run in a long time. So there I was at the start line, full of energy.

The run started quite smoothly on the rolling course, and the first 5K was quite comfortable. Adrenaline was pumping at the right quantity and going to the right synapses. The race was very well-organized, with volunteers every 100M and water stations at every 1K. What more could a runner ask for, right? I was enjoying the run.

And then, suddenly, at the 5K U-turn, my adrenaline supply stopped, or so I believe. Every step after that felt like torture with the sun working overtime. The weather in Bangalore is very pretentious. You would be happy in the morning with the cold breeze and all that, but soon enough it gets so sunny that you can't help but complain. For a moment I couldn't see anything and my legs felt like slabs of concrete. It was just like the time I almost had a baby.

Pushing yourself beyond your limits also makes you have funny conversations with yourself. Your heart and your mind are in constant conflict. My head would say "Why did you have to run when you knew how the course is" and my heart would console me with "Aren't you happy you're trying?" It's a mental game, but what do you do!

All these thoughts and not concentrating on how tough the uphill run was took me till 8K. Then there was this thought that made complete sense. I had not trained at all for this run and there I was at the 10K course. Shouldn't I have done the 5K run instead? Of course, I should have. It's foolish to be overconfident about your body and how much you can take. Training is the key to an injury-free way to fitness. There's no two ways about it.

"Oh wow, I've reached 9.5K. Oh my God, there's a full 500M left. And I struggled like I've never before and crossed the finish line. Someone wise had once said, " The first thing that a person says after crossing the finish line at a marathon says nothing but only the truth." It's so true! When I crossed the finish line, the first thing I said was, "I'm not ready for 10, but I'm ready to begin again."

With the best runner in my family