Well well, its been a while I have been thinking of writing down my running experiences, at last I have found some time to pen it down...
I am a newbie to the world of running, I started running because I was bored of same gym schedules and wanted to do some other activities to stay fit and healthy... I thought about various things like Zomba, dance, aerobics and I did go for trial classes, but nothing impressed me... Then I thought of going for Jogging in the morning, but then it died in my thoughts only as I couldn't continue it for long...
So almost after a month of leaving the morning Jogging sessions, One day when I was at work, I heard about the race called TCS World 10K which was gonna be held at Bangalore sometimes on May 2014... So once I was back home, I did some searching on Internet and got lot of information about the race. I thought if I have a goal, at least for that shake I will get interest in running so without even thinking twice I registered for 10K race a day before (25-Apr-2014) the registration date was getting ended... I did motivated some other fellows to register for it and they did register for it... ;)
Now the registration part was done and the race was on 18-May-2014... I fairly had 3 weeks to prepare myself for the race... As I knew planning only not gonna make me complete the race until I have a will to prepare for it... So first thing I did was getting back to my performance tracking app (MapMyRun) and start the the practice run and I did start from the next day (26-Apr-2014) of registration itself.... The preparation didn't go as I had planned but was sure that I have to complete the race in 1 hour 10 mins (this was the target, I had kept for me).
I hardly did 9 practice runs before the Big Race Day...
So the day (10-May-2014) came when I was suppose to collect the BIB and goodies bag... So I went to collect the same with my best buddy Rekha (who thought I can't complete 10k race) to Active Expo which was being conducted at Koramangalam Indoor stadium... I was happy to receive my BIB number... and rest of the day went quite well, we gossiped, shopped, roamed, had good lunch...
In the evening, Pari was with me to give a company back home from Rekha's place, as I went to drop her home... It rained crazily that evening but still we went to Art Blend Cafe (interesting place to have a good meal) for a nice dinner...
First Learning
The First thing I noticed in BIB was a timing chip which was attached to it, this was to tracks the timing during run... I had been told that while running I need to make sure that wherever there is a scanning mat, I need to place my feet properly, so that it can get scanned and timing data gets captured.
Shoes Selection
I didn't know what kind of attire I would be needing, but then I knew that I need to have a good running shoes... Luckily in Active expo all the major shoes brands were present... This is the place where, I got to know that there is something call GAIT analysis which tells you what kind of shoes is best fit for you while running, so I did go for the GAIT analysis and found that my one feet is prefect for any kind of shoes but one feet is slightly overpronated... So I asked the guy what kind of shoes is best for overpronated feet.. he asked me to go for the shoes with Dynamic support...Now the hunt for Dynamic support shoes started... visited multiple stores at multiple locations and multiple brands ranging from Nike, Reebok, Adidas, Puma... And finally brought this running helper (shoes)...
The Race Day & Some More Learning
The Big Day arrived, I was anxious but thrilled thinking I am gonna do my First Ever Run... So the day before the Race Day I tried sleeping early and woke up at 4:00 AM... I had Rohit and his two friends to accompany to go to the race venue... So we started from home at 4:45 AM to the race venue... I could see many vehicles at 4:45 on the road on this day, and all of were heading to the Sree Kanteerava Stadium (the race venue)...
Second thing I learnt was, when you are going to a Race Venue, do found out about the parking space availability the day before the actual race, if parking is an issue never ever go by your Car, best thing is to book a cab and go... Well we did struggled a bit that day for finding the parking... but some how we manged to get the parking at one of the narrow street near main stadium...
Parking was done, now it was time to enter inside the stadium... the stadium was filled with people, I wouldn't had expected to see so much crowd... They had 6 gates from letter A to F... based on your experience and performance in previous running the gate numbers were assigned during race registration... Mine was Gate Number F.. So I started for gate number F... Race was yet to start, I saw people doing stretches and getting ready for the race...
Finally the announcement took place and siren to start the race was blown... I saw flood of people moving from the start line... I decided to go with the last batch of people... I was so focused on my running that when I began from the start line I forgot to notice the Hunk <3 Jonh Abraham <3 on the stage, my bad...
It was nice to see people motivating each other to run well, be it the people running behind me or beside me or the people who were cheering up for all the runners. First few km was fairly easy to complete, once I crossed the 5 km mark was sure that will be able to finish the run... The arrangements done by the organizers were commendable... They had proper arrangement for water, glucose, oranges etc for runner, so that they don't get dehydrated while running...
When I was done with the 8 km mark was tired but I kept on telling me, no You can do it, You have to do it and was able to run the next 1 km... now it was the time for the last km, I told myself.. Its just the last km so run as fast as u can, and I just ran as fast as I could and completed the last km...
I was so delighted when I touched the finish line, I asked one of the guy to click a pic of mine from my phone camera... Then I called up Mum to inform her that I did complete 10 km race. Its like Kid in me didn't stop and I informed most of my close friends that I finished My First 10K race ^_^
Then I went to collect my finisher medal from the counter, it was filled with people, after almost half an hour my turn came and I collected my medal, and clicked few pics...
I did complete my first 10K race but I took 45 seconds more than what I had planned for, due to the water breaks I had taken in between I guess... Never the less, was Quite Happy to see my result ^_^
