As mentioned in my earlier blogs, had signed up for two half marathons in the month of January. The first one was today, the Hiranandani Powai Run, my home run. I have seen Powai Run grow year on year. This apparently is the 9th edition. My first "home run" was the Half Marathon.
Battling some injuries in the previous year, I had apprehensions as to how my half marathon would turn out to be. Also, at the back of my mind, there were fears of the injury that I had while I ran the navy run. However, in the run up to this event, I had made adequate preparations. My sister, Surekha had gifted me an Apple 5 watch - it helped me a lot in analysing my runs - the splits as well as heart rate explaining as to how I performed.
Coming to this specific run, they changed the course from the earlier years - it used to be Powai to Powai, but this time, the start of the run was from opposite to Godrej One on the Eastern Express Highway. The route was from Godrej all the way to Bhandup Pumping (the turn to Airoli) and a U Turn from there to JVLR. In JVLR, we run on the wrong side all the way upto L&T Gate 1 (aarey road) and a U Turn from there back to JVLR. Cross the road below the Powai police station bridge and enter Hiranandani in the Heera Panna road and reach the finish line. I loved this route - it avoided loops which we used to have in BKC generally and it gets bored. Also, the first 12 - 13 Kms was flat track on the service road of EEH. Couple of steep gradients - Gandhi nagar all the way to IIT
and then L&T Gate 1 till Powai Lake.
On this run, I did not have a good sleep. Indira and kids were coming back from their vacation and I went to airport to pick them - the flight landed at midnight and we were back home by 12.45 am. I went to bed at 1 am with an alarm at 3.45 am. Kept rolling on the bed before sleeping at 1.45 am. The alarm rang at 3.45 - got up and left home at 4 am. The reporting time was 4.30 am and I was there on that time. Met my colleague, Pravin Kumar - did some streches and was all set to go for the run.
As mentioned earlier, the first 12 Kms were more on a flat surface. I started well and was going at a constant speed for the first 6 Kms - later slowed down a bit, but still was very consistent. When I crossed 10 Kms, I checked the timings in my watch - 72 minutes - it was my personal best - If I was running only 10 Km, I would have pushed a bit in the end, but the focus here was conserving energy as another 11 Kms need to be completed.
Then came the Gandhi Nagar bridge - ran for some distance and walked the balance till IIT Market. Again ran a bit - kept maintaining the same timing. While taking a U Turn at L&T gate 1, I realised that I have covered 18 Kms at approx 2:15 hrs. . Another 3 Kms left and the cut-off time for qualifying for TMM was 2:43 hrs. I decided that I need to finished before the cut off time. Was very tired, but kept pushing. For the last one km, I pushed - my watch mentioned I covered the last Km at 7:16 mins. Finished at 2:39.51... Chopped off 27 minutes from my earlier half marathon, which was a disaster..
Very happy to have completed the race without any injury and also in a decent time.
Looking forward to Tata Mumbai Marathon on 19th January 2020 !!
Battling some injuries in the previous year, I had apprehensions as to how my half marathon would turn out to be. Also, at the back of my mind, there were fears of the injury that I had while I ran the navy run. However, in the run up to this event, I had made adequate preparations. My sister, Surekha had gifted me an Apple 5 watch - it helped me a lot in analysing my runs - the splits as well as heart rate explaining as to how I performed.
Coming to this specific run, they changed the course from the earlier years - it used to be Powai to Powai, but this time, the start of the run was from opposite to Godrej One on the Eastern Express Highway. The route was from Godrej all the way to Bhandup Pumping (the turn to Airoli) and a U Turn from there to JVLR. In JVLR, we run on the wrong side all the way upto L&T Gate 1 (aarey road) and a U Turn from there back to JVLR. Cross the road below the Powai police station bridge and enter Hiranandani in the Heera Panna road and reach the finish line. I loved this route - it avoided loops which we used to have in BKC generally and it gets bored. Also, the first 12 - 13 Kms was flat track on the service road of EEH. Couple of steep gradients - Gandhi nagar all the way to IIT
and then L&T Gate 1 till Powai Lake.
On this run, I did not have a good sleep. Indira and kids were coming back from their vacation and I went to airport to pick them - the flight landed at midnight and we were back home by 12.45 am. I went to bed at 1 am with an alarm at 3.45 am. Kept rolling on the bed before sleeping at 1.45 am. The alarm rang at 3.45 - got up and left home at 4 am. The reporting time was 4.30 am and I was there on that time. Met my colleague, Pravin Kumar - did some streches and was all set to go for the run.
As mentioned earlier, the first 12 Kms were more on a flat surface. I started well and was going at a constant speed for the first 6 Kms - later slowed down a bit, but still was very consistent. When I crossed 10 Kms, I checked the timings in my watch - 72 minutes - it was my personal best - If I was running only 10 Km, I would have pushed a bit in the end, but the focus here was conserving energy as another 11 Kms need to be completed.
Then came the Gandhi Nagar bridge - ran for some distance and walked the balance till IIT Market. Again ran a bit - kept maintaining the same timing. While taking a U Turn at L&T gate 1, I realised that I have covered 18 Kms at approx 2:15 hrs. . Another 3 Kms left and the cut-off time for qualifying for TMM was 2:43 hrs. I decided that I need to finished before the cut off time. Was very tired, but kept pushing. For the last one km, I pushed - my watch mentioned I covered the last Km at 7:16 mins. Finished at 2:39.51... Chopped off 27 minutes from my earlier half marathon, which was a disaster..
Very happy to have completed the race without any injury and also in a decent time.
Looking forward to Tata Mumbai Marathon on 19th January 2020 !!
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