Airtel Delhi Half Marathon IV

Hello,

Yesterday was another wonderful evening.

After skipping the scheduled run of 5K on Saturday I ran it on Sunday but once again without timing the run. The reason for skipping the run on Saturday was that I had gone for Cricket practice in the morning and felt that I would not be able to do justice to the run that evening.

You learn by making choices and I learnt that running immediately after having a mug of coffee is not a great idea. I sweat a lot and on Sunday, when I began running, I was sweating profusely even before I had run half a KM. The regular sweating usually starts after I have run a KM and it does not tire me in any way but the sweating I encountered because of the coffee made me feel lethargic and I would have surely failed to complete any course longer than the 5K.

The planned run for Tuesday was 7K and I was wondering if the tiredness that hit me on Sunday was a one-off thing or was it something that would put a brake to my preparation. 

Such thoughts I believe are not unique. The apprehension that I will not be able to make it made me think of giving up. 

However, the run yesterday was heartening. I started with a plan to go 5K and then plan on the remaining 2K. As a 5K run now seems easy I was hoping that I would have enough steam left to go through the next 2K.

Before starting on the run yesterday I had a couple of glasses of water and a 'Kaju Barfi'. I started at a slightly slower pace and had finished 3K before I actually started to feel the run. The 5K mark was passed easily and I reached 7K only with a slight pain in my knees. I have now got rid of the knee strap and the crepe bandage on the shin and ankles. 

Although I had done my scheduled run I somehow felt I should take advantage of the fact that I was not tired and run further. The spur of the moment thought was to better the 10K run of the previous Saturday or at least equal it and therefore I kept on going.

I met Noel who plays cricket at Sharq United on Fridays. Earlier Victor of Sharq United has also seen me run. I am not sure if they are surprised or aghast about my plans. After all most of them are 10 years my junior and the HM is a punishing distance. I also met Anku, Vinod's son who was walking with his father after having cycled on the previous two days.

These diversions are good as they take your mind away from the running. Other diversions are looking for familiar faces and trying to figure out their walking/running plans for the day. Looking at people and calculating how slow or fast I am in comparison is also a good diversion.

Anyway before I realized I was already at 9.5K and still feeling good.

It seems I made a small mistake here and tried to pick up speed for the remaining 1.5K. I was able to do it but the higher speed affected the kees and the runners knee was back. It was however much lighter this time and after having done the cooling off walk of two additional rounds I went home took a quick sower, dressed up and was at Salmiya market to order for our clothes for the cricket matches.

Things are getting exciting here as well as the season draws closer. We have a good team this year and God willing we should beat a few of the fancied teams. This Saturday we have planned to have a practice match with NBK.

If we do well we will celebrate.

Best regards,
Manoj