The (re)making of a trail runner

One of my running buddies, a colleague, showed me this site last month asking whether I knew AB. I didn’t, but reading his website (he has done the UTMB 100 mile plus other such mega runs) rekindled the dormant trail runner in me; it evoked an overpowering desire to get back to long distance running, an activity I had set aside over ten years back when I decided alpinism and climbing would be my main sports; sports that demand upper body strength. I immediately set up a meeting with AB, followed by a trial run with him and realized I was massively inspired by this dude. Although I had never run longer than two hours/half marathon distances in over ten years, I knew I had a solid base and felt a few solid training sessions are all I would need to be able to run longer than the traditional marathon distance. I managed to get solid hill training over the preceding two Sundays.

I couldn’t wait to test my hypothesis. I started my 2019 December vacation with this Sunday run up Nandi hills. I chose to go solo and parked my car at Nandi Upchaar restaurant, to make it a committing out and back run. I took the road as I didn’t know the trail.

It went very well. The run itself was spectacular. The weather was perfect, very cool and misty, and the road so smooth, the setting reminded me of mountain pass roads of the Swiss Alps.

But my run had no tranquility or meditative solitude: I had underestimated the weekend motorised hill-seekers. Literally several thousand cars and 2-wheelers passed me during my run. Several hundreds of them (one out of the every five vehicles or so) slowed down to cheer me, say something nice and feel inspired. Unfortunately many Indians still can’t handle the sight of shirtless men unless it is a film star or a religious guru (I run shirtless for functional reasons). So I did get cat-called/booed by a tiny minority idiots. Sigh!

Anyway that’s how I ran this run; all of 42.26 kms out and back to the car, with 822m net elevation gain in about 4:50 hrs, self-supported. Cut and ate a whole watermelon to rehydrate myself, a strong coffee at Nandi Upchaar to revive me and a pleasant 30-40 mins drive back home listening to old Rajkumar songs on radio was how I ended the trip. How happy I was feeling is beyond my abilities to express properly; even after a good night’s sleep I am still experiencing the after-glow of the run as I recount the experience.