DISCLAIMER: the first paragraph is a little bit of a downer hence can
totally be ignored!!
REPORT:
So like everyone knows already, I wasn’t feeling very well before the race.
A week before the race I was soo excited. I ran with Sheila on Sunday in the
park [10 miles] and it was great. Sunday night however, I caught the flu.
Monday went to the doc and rested tues, wed..thrusday went to work and then
relaxed.. Friday went and picked up my bib in the evening with chandree, by
then i was feeling better [or at least i told my body that feeling sick was
not an option anymore]...my friend nikhil called me during the day and i
told him about the flu and me feeling super weak and he said, " u know this
always happens to us. We never get anything easily, we always have to
struggle for it...u and I will never be handed anything without a fight...
and ALL the things that can possibly go wrong, before our *the *day, WILL!!
So be prepared for more shit and stay strong, and u know u will still get
thru it all, coz giving up is not an option!!" and I agreed. And that’s
exactly what happened!! Sat was a mess... fever relapse with some more
emotional personal drama... I was kinda physically and emotionally exhausted
at this point...wasn’t even thinking about the marathon anymore. Was just
pissed off... my sister and my friend sonal g. [sonal gor] came to my apt's
rescue and made sure I didn’t break everything in it... they spent the night
with me and abhi [abhishek rathi] came over later in the night too. He and I
planned on running together just like 2007 mcm marathon. I was much better
by 9pm just coz I was around all my besties...
Sat night was of course every runner’s nightmare night...couldn’t sleep. I
was to run a full marathon tomorrow morning ...yikes!!
Sunday 5am abhi wakes me up, "lets go, we r gonna be late"... me "its day
light savings' day, we get one more hr. its only 5am not 6am...go back to
bed"... he didn’t believe me, so he woke up, went and brushed his teeth, got
fresh and then came back to bed and went to sleep...i toooold him..it just
took him 15 mins to believe me...what can I do?
6am, we reawake... I head to the bathroom to do my business and abhi got
dressed in the mean while.. my sis and sonal were woken up just coz we were
all in the same room...I got ready too... my tights with a full sleeve dry
fit nyc marathon tee, an asha singlet over it, then another full sleeve
random CP race tee [to be thrown away later] and then my thin running jacket
for additional protection, a loose [so that I don’t get a head ache] winter
hat with big holes in it to allow for evaporation, running gloves on and
this little fanny pack thing I got at the expo to put all my stuff in... I
am afraid to show pics of me with the fannypack to the world... not in a
million yrs did I think I would stoop to that level of fashion compromise. I
am officially on my own fashion "D" list...but what to do, I had a lot of
stuff I needed.. Cloves [to keep me from coughing], Advil, gu's , cliff
blocks, small pack of tissues for runny nose, dates for natural nourishment,
etc... ohh did I tell u that the cell phone and money and keys were not
included in the fanny-pack...I had another arm band for it. Yes I thought it
to be very imp to run with my whole house on me!!
I quickly toasted my bagel while abhi packed his breakfast and we both said
our goodbyes to my sis and sonal g. I wasn't nervous at this point, coz I
knew I was gonna do it. There was no 2 ways about it... I mean it was just a
little weakness...it’s the same as a hangover right? And I did have practice
of running with a little hangover on quite a few of my long runs, so it
shouldn’t be a problem I told myself...
abhi and I headed to the spring st 6 train stop. Waiting for the train, I
had half a banana and abhi had his first hagan das choco ice-cream bar.
[Second one he had on the ferry..yes he did]..Yup, that’s my boy!! We
finally got to the south st ferry and met up with Monica, sheena, amit,
ketul, sumit on the ferry... was great to see them...all of them made fun of
me for being over dressed.. Just to have it come bit them in their behinds
later!! hehahahaha [evil laugh]...suckers!!. once we got to Staten island
and had to wait for an hr b4 going to the start lines, everyone was cold...
I even lent amit my 3rd [but extra] full sleeve tee I had carried with me
JIC [just incase]...and I put on another sweatshirt I had in my bag...yup,
by now I was wearing 5 layers [4 of which were full sleeves] and I was just
about a-ok...seriously!! ..I don’t care if all u guys think I’m a freak, but
it was required man. I promise!!... We picnicked under a tree for a while.
Stretching, eating, potter-potting, etc..sonal r. [sonal rashmi] joined us
at that tree after some time..yup we had our own asha tree moment in SI...
soo sweet!!
10.20 am was our start. By now all had dispersed to their respective
corals... abhi and i had the same corals and infact our bib numbers were
like 6 digits apart... sonal r. joined us to the start. We started
together...
Mile 1: was UH [uphill]..I have a strict rule about uphills that I guess u
all already know...never run them! It’s a great rule IMHO ... sonal r. said
goodbye to us. She didn’t like my rule..abhi and I walked up verezano br...
The view was just beautiful ... once on the br, we started running and then
I started feeling good, because?... because we were going DH [down
hilllllll] ... yeahiee...now I was feeling better...buy the time we finished
the bridge abhi had almost embarrassed 6 uncles who were peeing on the
bridge sidelines by saying things like "one more, tsk tsk, all in the open,
its soo cold!!, how can they do it?, should I go too? etc, etc" loudly
enough for all of them to hear it... again that’s my boy!!
Mile 1- 13 was just amazingggg...brooklyn is the bomb!! Every block had
music, every block that tonssss of ppl cheering, sooo many many children
high-5ing... abhi went mad. Seriously... ppl who don’t know him, should know
that if there is anyone in this entire world who is the living equivalent of
an energizer bunny, it is him!! He, I am sure, "maybe" missed only about 5%
of the kids who were out there. He high-5-ed all the others!! I maybe got
40% of them, coz yeah its an effort to do so continously..and I like pets
better than kids...j/k [my gawd u women!! stop giving me those looks..]
We went thru an entirely Hispanic area with the cutest kids and salsa music,
and then an entirely Jewish area [looked super conservative and I felt like
I wasn’t even in nyc anymore...very weird...but cool] and ofcourse a lot of
other mixes of areas...was great!! Y haven’t I lived in brklyn yet?
Seriously!! I love that area... the best part of the entire brklyn was this
one gospel band which was playing outside some church and had the whole
community out there, the biggest crowd ever, all clapping and singing at the
top of their lungs, "in the name of the lord"-types...was soooooo coool!!
Amazing!! Amazing!! Amazing!!
Oh and in brklyn at mile 5 we had met up with monel, janki and sonal ra.
[sonal rathi, abhi's beloved wife]... yup our entire marathon yesterday was
filled with "sonal"-es..hehehe.she was our 3rd... monel and nitin joined us
again later at like mile 9 or something and buddy ran with us for a couple
of miles... we also met Paul at mile 8 and then the asha gang!!! With the
posters and all the loveeee...hugs and sweat collided!! Sweet stuff!!
abhi in all this time has made an entourage of friends around us...an older
gentleman named "DON", some old ladies, the juggler.. everyone in a 0.2
miles radius, we know... a group of 2 middle aged and 1 older Italian
men was his favorite...they taught him some Italian song, they were singing
as a cheer while running and abhi taught them "Go Asha!!!" ... till we
reached the end of the race, they kept at it. One of the Italian men was
like 69 yrs old and was one amongst the first 3 Italian men to run the nyc
marathon in 1979... He didn’t speak English…but abhi still spoke to him for
a long time. [Not kidding]
At around mile 10, my head was hot...I took off my hat and asked monel, "is
my hair flat?”
Monel: yeah, but its ok..who cares, ur running a marathon, noone's gonna
care how u look!
me: hell no, I’m still single and determined to find me a cute boy along the
way
...and I put my hat back on...
Abhi: u want to get hitched, ill find u someone, not to worry
...abhi to the 3 Italian men whom we by now know pretty well,
Abhi: my friend here is single and looking to get married...u know
anyone around who's available?" ...
IM1[Italian Man -1] : yes, this guy is. (Pointing to IM2). he's divorced,
hence single. IM 3 and I are unfortunately married ...
Me to IM2 : will u marry me? (wink wink) ...
IM2 to me: *blush*...
Me to IM2: I can sing, sew and cook!! [I know, I lied about all 3.. I’m a
bad person.]...
IM2 at this point is only smiling and laughing alternately... finally the
other 2 Italian men and the rest of us decided for IM2 and me that it’s a
done deal!! aweeee.... soo sweet!! U r all invited to my wedding as soon as
I track IM 2 down..
Every time the crowd was dull abhi yelled "go asha!!" or "yeahHHHH", and the
dull crowds would join in and start cheering..hahaha...this guy I’m telling
u... he didn’t let anyone on the way sit in peace. They had to cheer weather
they liked it or not... "HE" was running and they needed to acknowledge
that..hehe.. we also sang cheesy hindi songs at the top of our lungs along
the way…like “hum he rahi pyaar ke” and “bum chica chica bum”… I know, we r
a full package of cheeseballs..we r like that only!!
At some mile we saw a large group of Japanese ppl cheering with huge flags
and banners... abhi got sooo excited seeing them and almost yelled at me,
“look!! Japanese ppl...arre, they make my clothes!!" ...he ran towards them
and started screaming ...
"AAyyeee, Uniqlo, Uniqlo !!" ..I picked up my feet and
my jaw that was hitting the ground at this point, and ran in the opposite
direction of abhi as fast as I could. I did not know this man I said. The
Japanese kids stunned, but still in the spirit of the marathon cheered him
"GO AB, GO AB!!” .phew!!.. we survived... I’m still recovering form this
amusing horror... FYI, for those who don’t know, "UNIQLO" is a Japanese
brand of clothes with a store in soho that our friend abhi luurvvvs..
Queensboro br. was a lot of walking coz it was UH…then we started running DH
for the second half. And into the arms of Manhattan!! My CITY!! Met geeta
and divya along the way. Them my sister, archi, archi’s mom, chand, sonal g.
and sonal ra. under the bridge. My sister I can see is almost on the brink
of tears. I know she’s proud of me right now. I wish mom-dad and my other
sis were there too. Tons of hugs and a thought, “f@*k the world, im doing
this for my family!! Coz I love them to death and they love me!!!”
The rest of the run was great too... A lot of ppl we know in the crowds.
Karthik and someone, somewhere on the way. I think I waved to karthik
atleast 8 times b4 finally moving on. Then the sheela, Vishnu, shiks, pawan,
ravi, shanka gang again… in the mean while, chand, vasu, sonal ra., archi,
lok, monel and nitin take turns to buddy run with us at different points.
Didn’t like 1st ave at all!! …all UH…arrghhh…but we kept running slowly…
abhi’s had a meal by now… bananas, dates, gu’s, my brains, etc… I stuck to
dates. I like natural stuff much better for some reason. Bronx was barely
there. Met Sheila and srini in the Bronx. Stopped to talk to them for a bit,
gave our love to shiela, srini said he’ll stay with her…and we moved on….
back into nyc .. Harlem was pretttyyyy…
Now u have to know one thing that’s going thru my head all this while and im
telling u my secret mantra to running a marathon…I kept telling myself, “ONE
MILE AT A TIME” …so I wasn’t counting the miles at all…only concentrating on
reaching *A* mile marker… no T-8 and all… only one more to go all the
time…when I would cross a mile marker I would tell myself “just one more to
go”. When the goal is just one mile, it’s not that daunting. Worked like a
charm for me!!
We finally entered the park…priyanka and someone else [I forget] on the
way…then remya and ritika as soon as we entered the park…they joined
in…FYI, ritika poor thing ran with us in her knee high black patent leather
catwoman boots!! ..that was SOOOOO FUNNY!! She poor thing did not intend to
run but did and got a lot of comments from the sidelines which ofcourse she
fashionably ignored for the sake of running with us…Team ASHA!!…very cute I
tell u..u should have been there to see it... thanks hun
CATS HILL…yeahiee…we flung are arms up in the air and let ourselves run wild
like horses..eeeeh hoo!! … DH on catshill is the best ever… I love it…I
think it was the fastest mile we ran!!..nitin , with his “GO TEAM ASHA” sign
hung around his neck like a homeless guy tells me “ I cant believe ur
running this fast at mile 24!!” … I look at him, smile and think to myself,
“for the past 3 yrs I have run this same god damn path 4 times a week...I
owe it to the park”..abhi and I race..he wins ofcourse!!
The rest of the way was HISTORY … we ran the last 1.2 miles alone..just abhi
and I…sis and others again appears just b4 the finish line..we hear our
names in loud cheer…we finish the last mile in 12 mins or so…. We cross the
finish line together.... holding hands!!
6hr and 15 mins from the time we started … 14.20 mpm pace… about 1.5 mins
faster than our avg. pace for our 20 mile run 4 weeks ago… 25mins faster
than our first marathon 2 yrs ago..we get our PR!!
We hug each other… we did it. It was the FUNNEST race ever!! We got our
medals. Posed for more pics.. Picked up our bags and I stole an apple from
the lady who gave us our bags. It was a GREAT DAY!!
Thank you all for everything…coach Courtney, coach uli, JSS, the entire team
from 2007, 2008 and 2009, my mentees, my friends [all of u], my donors,
ASHA, the kids, the bag watchers, my family and my poor feet. I genuinely
love you all!!
Erinnerst du dich an die Zeit vorm Internet, als wir dachten, die Ursache für Dummheit wäre der fehlende Zugang zu Informationen? DAS war es jedenfalls nicht!
Du strengst Dich zu arg an.
Und Prutha ist so oder so immer gut drauf. Das ist der Haupttrick.
Wenn ich auf leicht beleibte Inderinnen stehen wuerde, waeren wir laengst verheiratet mit Kindern und einem Haeuschen am Stadtrand.
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