We
were still preparing the day before the race. All the stuff was divided into
two haversacks. Padi’s stuff was divided into mine and Nachi’s bags. She was
supposed to ride without a bag so as to keep her going strong. On the race day
morning we all gather at the meeting point which is the Kataria High School ,
Mukundnagar near Swargate. We were flagged off by Raj Thakeray with dhol and
tashas playing on both the sides. That was awesome, going though an arc of
supporters, fans and dhol players.
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| Me, Nachi and Padi just before the flag off |
We cycle for about 3-4 kms till Mhatre
bridge put all our bikes in the truck and go to the start point which is about
40 kms from the city; just outskirts of Panshet village. Lifecyle’s other pro
team consisting of Ludmila Lamont, Sushil Dhende and Ashok Captain were also
with us. All the guys jumped in the truck and enjoyed what was to be a rough and
bumpy ride. The girls (Luda and Padi) were following us in a car.
 |
| On the way to Kadwe (Start Point) |
Its
noon by the time we reach the start point. Everyone is reaching there one by
one and crowding the little village which hardly gets so many visitors. Plus
all of us in bright and flashy cycle clothes n gears must’ve been an alien
sight to the natives. We were going to up a show for them. We had a little
lunch and the race started soon. It was a staggered start, with only 5 teams
being allowed to start every 5 minutes. So our plan was to stick together no
matter what, we did not want Padi to lag behind us somewhere. Just about 2 kms
after the start we hit what I think a category 3 climb; long and hard, made
worse by the hot sun bearing on the riders. Nachiket the leader put up a steady
pace which even Padi kept up. She was strong on the bike, better than most girls I've seen. What felt as a slow progress I found out that we were stronger than our
competitors who were getting dropped by the dozen. Nachiket wanted to push up
the climb to gain a good lead, so I started giving Padi boosts which was taking
a lot out of me, the cat 3 climb had started to feel like a big ass category 1
climb. Despite this all three of us never got of the saddle and were one of the
first teams to reach the top. We pushed on never stopping towards our first
control point, a village called “Vihir” after descending the hill.
Took
the right on the fork and pressed on. We were now pretty much settled in our
saddles now and doing some nice progress through the countryside. On our right
side loomed the big mountains and on our left loomed yet bigger mountains. We
passed through jungles and ravines. The raod wasn’t bad at all; it was paved
for the ST buses to ply through. But this was only until our next control point
at a village called “Ghisar”. It was about 3-4 pm that we reached there. We
were now running low on water. We reached Ghisar and could see the control
point volunteers about 200 meters ahead. I saw a lady offering water to us but
our leader Nachya told us to press on, saying that we will find water at the
control. We did not. I had to run back to refill our rations. This annoyed me
more than it should have.
After
this the route became more n more like a trail and we started going back up a
mountain. This is where the bike and hike section started. Most of the terrain
required us to carry our bikes on our shoulders and climb. Padi with a sore
shoulder had diffculty pushinng the bike up the slope. So me and Nachya had to go
up a little, dump our bikes and come right back down to carry Padi’s cycle.
Every step we took caused a rapid spike in our heart rates. It was tough,
making though the dense shrubbery, against gravity, slipping a lot, scratches
everywhere all along with extreme heat. To make things worse, we lost our way
right at the start of this bike and hike section. We could not see other
competitors or the footpath amongst the bushes. It was all hopeless until after
a bit of wandering we accidently stumbled upon the path when we saw our
competitors from our category going ahead of us. They were none other than
Siddharth Gadekar, Avanti Biniwale and Nikhil Shah. Frustration was apparent as
we realized that we had just blown our lead. These guys were one of the
strongest contenders to win. I did not lose my cool and tried to encourage my
disheartened team mates. Me and Sid kept bumping while overtaking each other. Both
the teams now neck to neck were pushing real hard. The hill was unrelenting, we
were dangerously low on our water rations and we were nowhere close to the top.
The To keep up with Sid’s team I had to work extra extra hard by pushing Padi
and constantly going back down to get her bike. As if the pain and heat wasn’t enough
me and Nachya were preventing ourselves from exhausting our last water reserve
so that Padi wasn’t dehydrated. Lack of water and getting lost and overtaken
took its toll on us and we slowed down. We had to stop several times to sit and recover. Never did we leave a teammate behind. Padi was trying beyond her
normal capability and showed great determination to continue even though any other person in her situation would have given up. Sid’s team was not to be seen. They
were clearly better prepared than we were.
Continued in Part III
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