run

Today I ran.

Jispa has been doing pretty good at her swimming. She recently beat a whole of top draw players to emerge as the silver in the back stroke. She’s also been clocking good timings in the rest of the strokes. This is a good thing. We have been thinking about starting her land training as well. Basically the theory goes that you need a secondary sport to augment your swimming. It helps you develop other muscles than those worked for swimming. Earlier Jispa was doing her taekwondo in school until a change of teacher ensured she hated the sport and she stopped it. Jasmine and I were searching for an alternate.

The running bug has caught up with a lot of people and thanks to this a lot of running athletes have become/ started taking running clubs / coaching schedules. Jispa has been amongst the top runners in her standard. But her running style is quite horrible. Her jogging style is also quite bad. She runs taking extra-long strides making her action a kind of jumping hop run. Her jogging is a scrape at every step. Nevertheless she is fast and hence she was selected for her interschool.

I have tried teaching her to run in the past. She always over corrects and I am left frustrated. I surely don’t know how to teach to run. She is better off without me as her running coach. So having no option we took Jispa to a running club with a coach. Hopefully she may learn and it’s a form of a land exercise. We hope it works well without tiring her out. On the first day she ran while Jasmine and I took a stroll. Seeing the runners I was motivated to start running myself.

I love running and I love the rhythm and the fact that it’s such a simple way to push your body. I love it. But I had to give up running after my knee kept dislocating on the slightest provocation. A jump or a false move or any such aggravation. I tried being active by swimming and playing badminton. I have learnt to be more careful and avoid certain movements. But I hate not being able to run, especially run fast.

So today on the second day I gathered courage to start running as a part of the club. I thought I could surely keep pace with Jispa at the run. I was so scared. In the morning I woke and spent an agonizing five minutes trying to gather the courage to run. I almost did not make it. It was a scary fight I had with myself. Finally I decided I can run. Stay in control and run, I told myself.

At the ground I stretched with Jispa and started jogging. It’s a bit of rusty leg with running muscles being dormant. They required a bit of coaxing and I was jogging with ease in some time. I refuse to put extra pressure. I felt nice with the little that I was doing. It’s a start, a lovely start.

I hope to continue with this for some time and see where it takes us. No big hopes, no promises, just simply picking up the bits of my ability and my knee and starting to run. It’s a big thing for me. I love to run and I was denied my love for some time now. And now thanks to Jispa who knows– I may be able to run again. Afterwards during the morning I could feel the muscles around the knee, as if they have got a good exercise. Let’s see how this dam thing progresses.

I want to run, I love it. It’s going to be tough and I hope I don’t screw it up. The trick is to understand the limits and work within them. It’s a delicate balance.

Because its there

On Saturday Jispa had her sports day. She is a nice light tall runner. I have a lot of problems with her running style but have learnt not to correct them. She seems to be jumping around taking strides longer than natural. I think she loses too much energy and effort in her bid to run faster. But nevertheless – she struck three golds. The max possible. The 50 meter dash, 200 M and the relay.
A few weeks back, she told us that from this year onwards she has a 200M race. It involves a circular track and she was wondering why not all the kids start on the same line. I explained the dynamics of length alongside a curve to her. I also told her that for her good, its probably the best thing to be at the innermost circle. This way, she would always be trying to catch up and suddenly on the last curve she would turn the fastest and find herself in an amazing lead. Being on the outer curve gives the illusion on being in the lead at the start and one could possibly slow down.
When we saw the race on Saturday, we realized that the 200M race allowed for lane change from the start itself. They only gave curved starting line a la the 1500M race. But she was still starting from the inside lane and she ran well to win. She tailed till around the 100M mark, which was more due to the staggered starting line than anything else. Pretty cool. She also ran the first leg of the relay to give her team a good lead which they comfortably held on to, actually increased it, till the end.
Then came the father’s events. I had my knee jammed a few weeks back playing squash. It’s an old injury which somehow came back to haunt me. Basically I twisted my right knee and my ligaments became loose. I had been half nursing the knee. A few days back Jasmine asked me if I was participating and I said no way. She seemed cock sure I would be. She asked me a couple of time more in the days coming upto the event. She did seem a bit eager. On the event day she even kept abreast of the schedule. She seemed so keen that I decided to run. Love is blind and combined with vanity it is completely stupid. Wearing my knee cap I trudged towards the starting line. Ready to run dude. Ready to run. The heart rate moves up a bit in anticipation. The Mind is focused on the finishing line. You take the track line that seems to offer less gravel. It’s a relatively less crowded line. I began observing how the guy was giving the clap. What is the giveaway. As he is about to slap the boards he first takes them slightly away before bringing them together. That’s your cue. That split second gives you the start faster than others. Impossible to catch and perfectly legal. Your muscles just push the ground a spit second faster. I pushed off the starting line. Legs pushing up and hitting the ground hard. Only the ball of the foot and toes hitting the ground. I was in a comfortable lead. Running hard, I felt an effortless glide. It was one of my best runs. I was enjoying every moment of it. Half way through I could see no one beside me, and I also contemplated slowing down for the final leg, till I felt a twitch. My knee. Dam. My knee. The muscles had come lose around it. STOP. There is no glory in walking out of the stadium in a crutch. I stopped and walked off the track. I did it. I screwed my knee completely.
No regrets though. I started well, I ran really nice and I would have won. That’s all I need. And in the process I just pushed my knee recovery a few weeks. Worth it. In mind I stay on as the fastest father. What else do I need? A little bit of prudence, possibly? Next time.
Winning at 36 feels good. When I entered college I was 58kgs with a 28 inch waist. I feel ill often enough. I had no muscles and a really wiry frame. My god I was a thin weakly child. I loved sports but wasn’t fit enough to follow through on it. It’s taken a lot many years to come to a winning position. In my cricket team there is a player who even played Ranji in his heyday. He is now a pale shadow, he put on weight and I outscore him. I got a bit better over the years and the others simply deteriorated. For some people life blooms late.
I never thought I would swim, play squash, cricket or run this much, so late in my life… and actually be half decent at it. It’s a dream I am living. And so when people asked me after the event why did I run, or why would I want to spend half the day in a hot sun laying cricket, or why would I get into the pool early morning in the cold. What can I tell them? What answer do I give?
George Mallory is famously quoted as having replied to the question "Why do you want to climb Mount Everest?" with the retort "Because it's there", which has been called "the most famous three words in mountaineering. I guess no one will understand a real reason and this is the best answer to give.
I play because is there to play. I run because I have legs to run.

run buddy run, then eat

They all run... they allways do..

Jaagte rahooooooo….. all the old independence era movies would show the ubiquitous watchman trying to do his duty with his nightly calls. I guess today there is a slight variation. It has to be bhaagte rahoooo…. Only for a mega metro like mumbai will a obscure number like 738 make a significant amount of impact, in fact this number is not prayed to will ensure a late entry to office, a missed movie starting climax, a late date, and a possible firing. Many have their own numbers which they live by 642, 827, 956. some of us even have made the code more complex by making it alpha numerical, such as 926 BO, 745 C or 648 P. hmmm. The plot thickens. Because many times the 743 CST is followed by the 1 SPL or is preceded by the 142 or of course the alpha numerical 6 LTD. So the entire sequence is 730 5 LTD 755 CST 1 SPL. A complex piece of action orchestrated with clock work precision.

For the dim witted or the plain sleepy towners who haven’t caught it yet the code (730 5 LTD 755 CST 1 SPL) is broken as:- leave home at 7.30 am to catch the 5 limited bus to get down at the train station to catch the 7.55 Chatrapati Shivaji Terminus local to catch the 1 Special that takes them to Nariman Point. As I said Bhaagte Rahooooooooooooooo.
This two decimal point precision is further fine tuned if you catch the bloody train at CST station. Since the trains start there they have installed huge digital clocks that even show the seconds, so as you enter the station you know that you have exactly 36 seconds left to catch you train, or exactly 48 seconds to run to your compartment and find a place to rest your butt (not park it – seating is not that easy with 48 seconds left). You also know that you have potentially 55 seconds left if you want a plastic vacuum packed bag of peanuts. How? Well 48 seconds for the train to leave and another 7 seconds the boy take borrow as he can jump while the train is just about to leave the platform. Ooohhh. We live the razor’s edge… cool nah! Now all that I want to see is the train timetable showing the train leaving at 6.46.38 am.

While on the peanuts I have always wondered on the way the vendors pack the peanuts that are sold at the station. The nuts are naked and packed in plastic packets that seem to have air sucked out of them. Since we assume that this is not a multi million rupee investment on the plant and that the Nehruvian dream of small scale sector is at full play the only option is….. the guy rubs the dry peanuts with his palm, blows the husk away with the air from his mouth. Then blows inside the plastic to open it, puts the nuts inside and then seals it with the heating element. Now how does he achieve the vacuum? Hmm, the only way is by sucking the air manually before sealing it completely. We are not even on the topic of does the bloody thing gets dry in the first place. Also while on the topic it is interesting to note that thanks to the advent of AIDS, we have a lot of cases of TB among the lower strata of society. This TB is getting worse and s getting increasingly resistant to treatment. So much for a blow by blow account! Pretty cool, nah, how the promise of a 2 rupee peanut snack is so beautifully played out. YA.. Anybody hungry for a snack?