Running the Mumbai Marathon 2012

I reached the bridge sometime after the first hour. The half marathon runners were coming down the opposite way as I was crossing the sea link. A lot of them clapped and flashed thumbs up to the full marathon runners. The sea link is a recent inclusion in the marathon. AFI president Adille Sumariwalla had been in favour of it for a while: “Since the general public or spectators will not be allowed on the sea link, the athletes will be by themselves throughout this 5.6km stretch. This will give them the opportunity to strategise and could well decide the race leader or even the winner.”

Picture running on this with fog obscuring everything

To sum up, here’s what I took from that quote: Cut throat competition. No crowd, no witnesses. Bridge can decide outcome of race. Athletes will be by themselves. Noone watching. Running across a 5.6km stretch over water which can swallow all that’s thrown in it.A little stretch of road rash style free for all where the marathon runners try to throw the competition overboard using banana peels and throwing elbows!

After the 28 km mark, I was joined in running by rats running around in my tummy. If I had spotted a kid with ice cream or chocolates, I’d have purloined it in an instant. I was already in motion at about 13 km/hr. Wouldn’t be much of a stretch to reach out and grab it. Tiny kid wouldn’t be able to chase me on those stumpy legs. No toddler with truffles appeared so I had to settle for the bananas being provided to the runners.

The thing about the internet is that it gives you a hundred opinions and lets you make up your mind. I came across different opinions on what one should eat before a race. I figured the only way I could be sure of what the right way is, is through experience. So I just downed some fruits to avoid a full stomach. Bad choice. Hunger pangs kept stabbing at my tummy.

There was a foreigner who was keeping pace with me from around the 20ish mark and we ran together till the 35 km mark. I half expected the bystanders to cheer me on, Go India or something else which doesn’t sound so fundamentalist. If this were the elite run, they would have. Why discriminate here? Instead, people were egging him on. “Come on uncle!” Ok so he was older than me and maybe that’s why people were cheering him on. Would the same people cheer me on when I grab a bottle from a toddler? I’m older after all, and my need is far greater than overfed chubby cheeks.

He started to distance himself from me after the 35km mark. Hat tip to the guys who scoff at age and keep running. Now I wish I had tried to keep pace with him.

Over 90% of the earth is water. So where is it when you need it? Seems every marathon I run there’s some clowning around with my water. In the Kolkata marathon, there was a girl standing with a glass of water at around the 39 km mark. I wish she had remained standing while she handed the glass to me. These volunteers were instructed to run along with the runners and hand the glass over like exchanging a baton in a relay race. So that girl started running faster than me while holding out the glass of water as if to say “Come and get it”. Looking at my tongue hanging out and frantic motions to her to hand the damn glass over already, she realized this isn’t the time to be Bolt and relented her breakneck pace.

Tongue hanging out, approaching a water station like a deserted desert traveller hoping you aren’t looking at a mirage. Towards the end of marathons your self control ebbs away. You’re just looking for a reason to slow down or stop to end the pain. I’d never stop outright for whatever reason. Even crawl along if need be. Stopping to punch someone who’s begging for it might be a worthy reason, I really got one here.

That was towards the end of the race. I was beyond exhausted at this point. And thirsty enough to snatch a bottle from a baby in a stroller. Babies are the best to steal stuff from. All they can do is howl, which they do irrespective of bottle thivery. Mommy will just think that the kid is just crying for no reason. Babies take note, don’t cry wolf. If you do no one will listen when a thirsty despo marathon runner comes along and snatches your stuff.

I thought that was the worst refreshment related experience I could have in a marathon. Having the refreshment run away from me literally. Well, worse than having to chase a bottle while a girl eggs you on, is having a bottle of water thrown at your nuts.

Towards the end of the Mumbai Marathon, I approached the first water stand and missed the bottles since the volunteers were empty handed/serving others. Ditto at the next stand. Third time being the charm, the volunteer with the bottle said “Howdy! Catch!” and hurled a pointy bottle at my nuts.

Giving him the most “WTF were you thinking” look I could muster I moved on. Maybe if I had punched him the adrenaline rush could have boosted my speed. But throwing the punch would have drained me more. Plus with bystanders around I might have been mobbed. Not that I considered the pros and cons of a punch in such detail at the time. Instinct said move on, so I did.

The last 8 km were the hardest. I slowed down to the point where my speed dipped to a brisk walk. So I walked a little for a couple of minutes. I remember reading in a book of ultramarathon running that first timers ought to alternate between a walk and a jog in a ultra race. There was something to be said for that. I got my second wind and began jogging again.After a point the full and half marathon routes converged and I couldn’t make out which runners are in the full with me and which are in the half. For the most part the half marathon runners were easy to identify, younger/older/fresher/slower/faster, you could tell which ones are in the half marathon, but hard to tell which are in the full.

The last km of the race threw me off. The road was divided into two parallel tracks and I saw runners coming back from the one opposite to the one I was in. I assumed that I would have to go ahead and then circle all the way back. That made my footsteps a little heavier. Some way ahead though, I saw the words 400m on the road. Then 300m. Realizing that the race is almost over and I may just make it in 3:30 I started to sprint ahead, all fatigue forgotten. Made it dot at 3:31.

Finishing the Marathon was half the battle. In this respect finishing it in Kolkata was a lot better. There was no visible finish line for stragglers in Kolkata. Everyone had packed up and emptied the area around the finish line. In Mumbai, the finishers had to stand in a heavy line for minutes before they could make their way back to the holding area. That was not fun. After a marathon all you want to do is either plop down and stretch or just walk around. Here we had to trudge along in a long line to the holding area.Once there, it resembled a war zone. Runners in varying degrees of fatigue and physical damage were getting treatment here and there. moving forward there were stalls where the finishers were given refreshments, and a finisher’s medal was put around my neck. We then had to walk all the way across the field to get to the road, I ended up walking with some other finishers of the half marathon. We got talking and they were in awe of my timing saying that their running coach himself only does about 3:30 himself. That perked me up a lot but it still didn’t feel like too much of an accomplishment.

Doing a little research online put it into perspective.

• sub 3:00 finishers – 55 (3.8%) - only 5 non-elite sub 3:00 finishers
• sub-4:00 finishers – 179 (12.4%) - 124 runners finished between 3:00 and 4:00

I was in among the top 100 of the 1895 runners who participated in the full marathon.

This is the biggest marathon in India. There were over 38842 runners total in the dream run, full and half marathon, wheel chair including amateurs and senior citizens. With my time, I finished around 40th in the amateur category. which had a little under 1895 runners, excluding the couple hundred of elite runners.

Hopefully, the next marathon I run in, I’ll crack the 3 hour barrier. That would be something to take pride in.

Here is a comparison of the two full marathons I’ve experienced:

	Kolkata, 2010	Mumbai, 2012
Timing	4:30	3:31
Refreshments	Water and glucose.	Water, glucose, biscuits, and fruits.
Volunteers	Small in number.	Very many.
Crowd	People going about their business	People coming out to cheer and give out refreshments.
Route	Wide and encompassing a bigger area.	Up and down, smaller area but the Sea Link is priceless.
Weather	Not cool enough, race started at 7 AM.	Early start at 5:40, overcast skies.
Traffic	After the 3 hour mark, barricades were lifted, had to run in traffic. Cops did make way at intersections	Traffic of runners. When half and full marathon crowd merged, wasn’t much room towards the end
Participants	Sparse in number. Mostly casual runners who dropped out halfway.	All shapes and sizes.