Running a race

This is flash back as well ....

The seven Mile run

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step”, and so started my journey of 10.8 km, it was a Sunday morning and there were thousands of people standing near the old Siam shopping center of Bangkok, there was smell of muscle relaxant jell all over and people warming up, yes, it was the Thai-Sikh marathon and I was gearing up to take part in it.

It was 6 am when the gun was shot and the race started, there was an exodus with jubilation and excitement, the run was a challenge to me as I had never done 10.8 km at a stretch, the maximum I did was about 4-6 km and took about 30-45 minutes for that.

My friend who came with me was more professional and hence took off ahead of me, I was expecting to complete the track in about one and a half hours and if possible, a little earlier, there was a Mr. Sarabjith, a 50 year old man who was running with me and was kind enough to motivate me and run along all the way.

The first major turn took us to the Grand Palace of Bangkok where cars waited as the exodus came. I was somewhere in the middle, a quiet unprofessionally dressed runner with a clock and a determined head.

I decided that nothing was impossible in the world and wanted to run the race just to prove this fact to myself and help me face my fears with bravery. It might sound like I am making a mountain out of a mole hill, but for me completing this track would mean a lot.

The weather was pleasant but the body was getting hotter, the ten minutes mark passed and I was starting to feel warmer, uncle Sarabjith motivated me by saying to vary my pace regularly and stick with him.

We soon reached a traffic point where the cars again waited for us and we crossed, this time when I saw my clock it read 25 minutes, that was by far the maximum time I ran in a span of a year or more, I never ran that long after leaving my college and the National cadet Corps. I was starting to feel exhaustion and the mental factors were doing their best to get my morale down, on one side, I had these thoughts “may be I am not going to be able to make this distance, it is too much for me, I am better off walking and so on”, and on the other side, I thought to myself, “why should I not be able to make it?, there is nothing impossible in the world and thought that anything that I thought was possible was not impossible for me”, and so I decided to carry on doing what I did and kept my mind occupied on overtaking people regularly, I passed people regularly, old, young and middle aged people.

Then came the water point, out of the blues, I was so shocked seeing the water and so excited that I did not know what to do and continued running without taking a cup of water, it was too late to turn back and had to keep doing what I was doing.

There I was running with Uncle Sarabjith and he asked me if I was sure about not taking water, I put up a sturdy face and ran, thinking there will be another water point, which did not turn up for a long while, at half distance, that is five km, the clock read about 31 minutes, which meant we were looking at another 5.8 km in another 30 minutes, there was a water point there and we decided to pause for 15 seconds, this meant not stopping but walking briskly while drinking, the floor was slippery and as we walked several cups were thrown on the floor.

As we started galloping again, I just turned my head to look behind me, this was the moment when I thought, “I am not doing badly at all”, I saw many people, when I say many, about a thousand running behind me, this made me think that I was not as bad as I thought and this really motivated me.

I then decided that I was not going to let any one over take me from then on and started manoeuvring through people to go ahead, in this process, uncle Sarabjith also ran with me and we were at the point which read “8 km done” this surprised me, I thought that I would not make it and I was almost there, just two more to go and I thought that I must increase the pace.

Uncle Sarabjith said that my pace was good and asked me to run ahead leaving him behind, I felt guilty but tempted, he said, “go for it, you must do it in 58 minutes”, this was a challenge on top of a challenge, what I saw as 1.30 was reduced to 58, so I decided to take it on and started moving ahead.

I escaped every traffic light and moved ahead, and then came the sign post reading ten km done, this was magical, this meant I just had 800 meters to run, I saw many old men running ahead, I started taking one by one and I was running out of breath as I felt the sudden strain on my legs, I decided not to push too much and took a break for a few seconds at the water point.

As I ran, I did not see the clock and from the oblivion appeared a sign reading FINISH, it was 100 meters and I ran for it, I ran for it like it was the last train to earth from mars, my legs were almost numb and I thought I was flying for a moment.

As I finished I read the clock, it said, 1.30.20.

There I was standing with thousands, with a sense of accomplishment and happiness, of course tired, but happy.

The reason why I am writing this is not to be proud of myself, but to tell you that for those of you who think some things are impossible for you to do, do not decide so until you have tried it thoroughly and tried again and keep trying until when you will succeed.

To end, a quote from Swami Vivekananda, “Be Free; hope for nothing from anyone. I am sure if you look back upon your lives you will find that you were always vainly trying to get help from others, which never came. All the help which came was from within yourselves.”