BBCh Twilight Criterium - Wet and Cornered

About 2 months ago some of Pune's best road bikers finally came together and started training together. Sid and I were trying to get this started since a year. At the core of the group was Sid, me, Nakul, Apurv and Mahesh. The training rides were sparked by the use of the app strava. The chance of getting on the leader boards and being the KOM motivated everyone to get up and train. And before we knew, the rides have became a habit. Everyone showed tremendous improvements in their cycling. I always knew Nakul and Mahesh as a fairly average weekend riders, but when I actually rode with them, I was baffled at their tremendous improvement.

 We were joined by the youngsters like Aunsh and Rohit, Michael the awesome triathlete  from Germany as well the veteran PT. And soon enough we were raging all over Pune and its outskirts on our shiny new roadies. Then as you'd expect with testosterone high males, we started our own "pirate racing". The friendly competition provided another huge boost for everyone to train and improve themselves. We were doing so good that we even managed to awaken the long dead cyclist in Nachiket. He too started training with us, and with hardly any miles under him he went on to grab a podium at Bangalore Bicycle Championship ( BBCh) . It was he who proposed that the whole group should take it up a notch and go down to Bangalore for the Criterium held on 17th May 2014. 

After The First Pirate Race

The criterium or crit is a race held on a small closed road circuit which is usually flat. And the race is run by time and not by distance or laps. The Cat II race lasted for 45 minutes with riders doing multiple laps of  Bhartiya city circuit of 1.4 kms each.

With hardly 2 weeks in hand, we started our interval training for the Crit. These hardcore sessions were very consuming on the body. An hour of interval training in the morning guaranteed that I slept in office. The week before the race was spent on total resting, I used the bike only for commuting. Everyone was nervous and anxious for the race. On the Thursday before the race, we got Vinoo Chari's awesome pickup to transport the bikes. We managed to fit in 5 bikes on it and the rest 3 went on Mahesh's Polo. Thursday evening and night was spent in wrapping and loading the bike, which was a very stressful and tedious and thanks to Sunil, AC  and the LC staff who helped with it. AC gave a tactical briefing which as always proved invaluable for us. 

Bikes Getting Packed for the 900 km journey

The road trip to Bangaluru was awesome as you'd expect from a bunch of young men. Everyone we passed on the way gave us bewildered looks. You dont see a pick up carrying shiny bikes everyday. Gotta love Vinoo's car for that.  With hardly 5-6 stops we reached the southern city by 8 pm. Thanks to Brijesh Nair we had an apartment to stay in Bangalore, but Nacho failed to mention it was unfurnished, so the boys had to stay and sleep like animals. Saturday i.e the race day started a bit late. I had spent the night comfortably at my grandparents house. Met the boys hogging on a carb laden breakfast of idlis and dosas. Then back to pillion and rest till noon. It was also the birthday of Apurv "the Hulk" Verma, so the age old ceremony of cake smattering on the face was carried out. 
 The Bhartiya City circuit was at the other end of town, it took us 2 hours to reach the place. Barely 2 hours before the flag-off. It took us almost an hours to assemble the bikes. We hardly got any time for warming up. Someone had took down my saddle and since its height wasn't marked I could not get the saddle height to perfection and had to race in an uncomfortable position.  

Road Trips aren't complete with group pics at every stop

The Race - 

The race began on time despite the rain gods showing up to watch the race bringing along heavy winds and water. It was going to be a wet race, a big concern while cornering. Once the under 18 and women finished their race the cat 2 riders took to the line. We were just about to start when I hear a shout to stop the countdown. It was Mahesh who was struggling to zip up his jersey over his one mile broad chest. In his efforts he broke the chain and was momentarily shirtless till Aunsh got him a replacement. In that moment we could hear whistles, shouting and even a woman cheering him to race topless. Poor Mahesh was red with embarrassment. However it dint last more than 2 minutes and we were soon on our way. 

Being Salman!!!

 The wet roads proved to be a downfall for all the inexperienced riders including me. There were shouts and skids even as the peloton reached the very first corner of the race. It was here that my leader Sid fell behind, so I fell back to get him back into the bunch. I did manage that but in the process sacrificed my own race, as I couldn't stay with the bunch after riding in the wind. My cornering improved with every corner I took, but it was too late as I was first amongst the team to get lapped. It just wasn't my day, I tried hard to get back but the wet corners, improper saddle height  got me out of the race. By that time the peloton had split up into a long trail of struggling cyclists. Only 4 cyclists remained in the front bunch of which 2 were from TLCR viz Nachi and Michael. It was heartening to see them controlling the race. The rest of the boys were scattered all along. Sid who struggled with the corners was the second to get lapped behind him came Apurv. 

Mahesh had surprisingly held himself till the last 5 minutes until he too got lapped. Now only 7 people remained in the whole race. Sushil and Nakul from TLCR were now working together to remain in the race and they did just that by finishing 6th and 7th. In the last 2-3 laps Mike and Nachi broke away from Opendro Singh (Team Cleated Warriors) to comfortably seal the 1st and 2nd positions respectively for Team Lifecycle Racing. 

Mike and Nachi Finishing like the Bosses they are

The Boss and the Captain!!!!

Podium Dominated

The whole team before the Race start

Making a splash : The Race was covered in detail by the Pune edition of Indian Express

Tidke ka Tadka!!! -------- The Deccan Ribhanger!!!

Whoever invented the words impossible, quitting, giving up, etc has clearly not met Prashant “the Missile” Tidke. What he did on the 22^nd of February is a feat you don’t get to see every day. I was one of the three lucky crew members to be with him when he did this. It’s overwhelming to see ordinary humans doing extra ordinary things. You read it right; he is still just a human being. I have known him for just two years now and I’m already writing about him. This is the story of a man overcoming great pain with his sheer will power to not just complete a race but also to compete in it. Unlike my usual tales from the saddle, this is a story from the car seat.  

The Crew (from left- me, Sushil, Roopesh)

Prashant Tidke aka PT took up cycling fairly recently and has already accomplished so much. In his youth (which seems never ending) PT was a long distance runner, which I think set him up nicely as a cyclist. He’s a reigning champion of Pune, winning the PBCh two times in a row, he has won the Sabarmati cyclothon, rugged sahyadri to name a few. Anyways he’s hardly a man who needs introduction. I’ll just get started. 

WEEK BEFORE THE RACE

The Deccan Cliffhanger is a 640 km cycle race from Pune to Goa. It was held for the first time on 22^nd February by our favorite Divya Tate. I was personally planning to do this myself until a crash broke my wrist in January (I’ll be writing about it shortly). By the second week of February  it was clear that I wasn’t going to race due to my cracked radius so I notified Divya that I’d be crewing.  PT did not call me until one week before the race. Only when I put up a post on fb intending to crew for anyone; did he ask me to crew. Had little choice but to decline other requests as crewing for my LIFECYCLE RACING teammate was a priority (as ordered by Mr. Boss Nachiket Joshi). I was craving for some action since almost 2 months of fracture induced boredom, thus crewing looked awesome. I had to arrange for 2 other crew members and Sushil Dhende was my first choice to help with all the mechanicals and Rupesh Pate to help drive the car. I met PT on Monday the 17^th to discuss our prep and make a checklist. It was then he told me that he would be going to Sinhagad on Thursday. I immediately thought it was a bad idea. I also told him not to do it. And we all know what happened on Thursday, he broke his 3^rd and 4^th ribs on his way down from Sinhagad. Everyone, including me thought that PT was out of the race.  He got it checked and said the docs have cleared him and that he’s still going to do the race which I honestly at first thought was crazy. We all tried to put sense into him by talking him out of it. On Thursday afternoon he tells me that it’s hurting too much and he’s dropping out. I immediately called Divya and asked if I can crew for anyone else. So by Thursday night I finalize to crew for Gyanendra, a rider from Gujrat. Then on Friday morning PT calls me and says he’s going to go for it, come what may. Apparently it was Captain’s last minute advice telling him to race that made him do it. I couldn’t comprehend that, why would Cap would let him ride when he clearly isn’t fit enough. Setting my doubts aside I told PT that I’m 100% behind him and would support him and be ready for any eventuality. So on Friday afternoon me and Sushil start running everywhere to complete our checklist. I was preparing the car and all ride requirements till Friday midnight. Honestly I was stressed and cursing PT on why he had to break his ribs at the eleventh hour. Couldn’t even get any sleep that night nor did Sushil or PT himself. 

RACE DAY

After hardly an hour of sleep, I went to Sushil’s place at 4 am; pick him up and his cycle which served as a backup in case PT’s breaks down. Then picked up Rupesh, who as always is late (typical Pate). PT has already reached before us. We do the pre race formalities and at exactly 5.45 am we are off. I’ve been watching PT ride for two years now and it was clear that he wasn’t comfortable nor in his best shape. The early morning pace was way below par than his normal capacity. Many riders and their cars overtook us in the first 20-30 kilometers. It dint look good to see PT being overtaken. He dint look worried though. He said he’d catch everyone on the Pasarni climb (Mahableshwar) and he did just that exactly. It was a splendid sight to finally see him in his usual ‘high gear’ hammering style on the ghat. The promise of strawberries and cream at the top only increased his speed. He dropped everyone on that climb, even Kartik who was leading the men’s pack.

PT reached the control at 10.58 and moved straight onwards. We stopped at the top of the climb for PT’s strawberry break.

PT's Strawberry break

After that it was a great big downhill. On the way down we saw Hiren all battered, bruised and bloody. There was only one pothole on that downhill and Hiren was just unfortunate to fall because of it. His wounds looked real nasty, we couldn’t stop as PT was going fast and strong. The next section was a 30 km flat rolling terrain towards Satara. PT had slowed down to due to the heat of the afternoon sun. There were some sections where there was no road at all!! I gave him his first gel here, and boy it did wonders on him. By 1 pm we were outside Satara. We had raced ahead and arranged lunch for PT there. The lunch took about 20 minutes. He was overtaken by 2 riders at this point. After this he rode nonstop to Sai International Hotel to be second only to Shu, reaching there by 5.05 pm. He had covered 276 km in about 11 hours. At Sai, me and Sushil helped change his Kinesio taping to the ribs. It was apparent that he was in pain, without the relaxing effects of the tape (these tapes are very effective and I recommend for all the athletes out there). 

PT at the finish (note the Kinesio tape)

The rider and the crew both refreshed themselves with chilled glass of lassi. We were on our way after half an hour break. Soon it was dark and PT still wasn’t showing any signs of slowing down, he was easily cruising at 25-30 kmph, but the toll of the broken bones and pain killers was showing as few riders overtook him in this section (from Sai to the next controle near Nipani at 354 km mark). We reached Nipani controle by about 2100 hours, so a total of 354 kms in 14.5 hours. To reach this controle the riders had to climb the Tawandi ghat, which has a easy gradient of 3-4% and a max elevation of just 700 m, but after riding against the headwinds in the flats after Kolhapur this climb can get pretty imposing especially in the dark of the night. It was my idea to make Sushil run alongside PT when he was looking down and tired. Sushil ran along with him till almost half way through the climb, seeing and talking with Sushil seemed to have done the trick. The next half of the climb was under the belt in no time.

                       Sushil running with PT on the Tavandi ghat

                       Perfect handover skills of Lifecycle Crew

PT had a quick nap at this control while the crew had their dinner. We pushed off from this point at about 2200 hours. At this point PT had fallen way behind the race leaders. It was here the ‘Bald and the Beautiful’ team caught up to him. The pain killers were starting to really screw up PT at this point. He was starting to have acidity issues which we managed to keep at bay using heaps of gelucil antacids.

Roadside Bed

The roads in Karnataka were just beautiful but lonely. After reaching Belgaon PT wanted to have a quick nap, but there were no dhabas so we made a roadside bed for him. On the way to Dharwad, there were many moments of fun when Divya overtook PT who was now struggling to maintain 25 kmph. It was on this stretch that PT caught up with Gyanendra and what followed was hilarious; when PT was overtaking Gyan he tried to talk to him, apparently he dint say anything to PT and ignored him. This enraged PT and he attacked Gyan till he dropped way behind him. When we got to speak to PT at Dharwad control he said “Tyane mala olakh dahikvli nahi, mhanun me tyala kadhla” (He ignored me, hence I attacked him). We couldn’t stop laughing in the car, but also we couldn’t help but admire the determination of this man. He just would’nt give up.   By about 0500 hours next day he was pretty much drained out.  I told him to get some more rest, so we all slept for about half an hour on the roadside. After this the ride for PT got worse. The painkillers did a number on him. He was suffering from extreme acidity and puking out every time we stopped. He couldn’t even hold down water. This slowed him down considerably, but we were still very much in time. 

Divya Overtaking PT

Driving like this all the time

 The rest of the ride till we reached outskirts of Goa was slow but beautiful. The jungles of Anshi were a refreshing change from the dull plains of the highway. However the progress was very slow due to some very bad roads. The descent into Goa provided breathtaking scenery along with much needed increase in pace. PT upon hearing that it was only 30 kms to the finish increased his speed. He soon caught up with other younger riders. The last 20 kms were very exciting to watch. PT kept attacking everyone on the climbs but got a bit slow on the flats. Every time we cheered him from the car he used to go a bit faster. It was nice to see him overtake Gyan, Hitendra Mahajan and even come close to Mahendra Mahajan. Although, they finished within minutes of each other. The finish provided a huge sense of achievement and I was so happy and overwhelmed I went yelling and hugged PT!! No one would have believed he would do it until he actually did it. He completed the last stretch through sheer will power and never quit attitude.  Prashant Tidke you have earned my respect and admiration for a lifetime. Hope you keep on riding and motivate others to ride like you.

Lifecycle Racing Team at the finish

The overall crewing experience was amazing. Got to learn a lot, especially after the detailed conversations with Shusannah. Although the idea of sitting in car for 30 hours straight without sleep with 2 other grown men seems daunting; I will always cherish this experience. There were plenty of issues. Since the crew were tired and sleep deprived we had our own moments of disagreements. Thankfully these situations never got out of hand, which is possible only when you have the right people with you. To all the riders out there I’d like to tell you one thing, choosing the right crew is very important to your race, regardless of how strong you are. They have to be extremely patient, understanding and resourceful beyond limit.

I could not decide between the two titles, hence I put them both. Also I have to mention the help provided by Akash Koregonkar (Our go-to guy in Kolhapur) by helping us restocking our Redbulls and priority service at his petrol pump. Thanks a ton Akash. And as always I am very thankful to Nachiket Joshi for sponsoring us and Ashok Captain for teaching us everything we know about cycling.

Cheers

PBCh 5 Year of the Second Coming!!

The Pune bicycle championship edition no 5 was held at Lavasa on the 20^th of October, 2013. This would probably be my last race of 2013. Was really determined to win this one.  Dedicated 4 mornings of every week to improve my climbing. Waking up at 5 and climbing up Sinhagad at least twice a week, then one day Katraj hill climb and Lavasa at least once every week. This complemented by spinning which helped me shed some unwanted weight which in turn improved my climbing prowess.

The Poster

I had borrowed Nachya’s mtb to use for the race one week before. My 29er was great for practice but needed a lighter machine for the race. Couple of modifications later (stripping of all unwanted things and fitting sleek tyres with ACs help of course) I achieved my personal best timing of 36.04m at lavasa (Hotel Prasad till the top). Thus shattering my previous best of 39m to smithereens. This gave me a nice confidence for the race which was pretty much needed when news arrived that Sangli boys had registered for the race.

Team lifecycle (me, Luda, Sushil and AC) had planned to reach the evening before the race and stay the night near the start point so that we get more rest and head start in warming up. So me and Luda took 3 bikes on my car thanks to Nachi’s bike rack. While on our way when we approached the Chandani chowk climb the top hooks of the bike rack became lose and the bikes fell on the road still attached to the bike rack which in turn was still precariously attached to the car. I was constantly checking on the bikes through the rear view mirror. One moment they were there and gone the next. Fortunately I was going dead slow and there wasn’t much traffic. The bikes were unharmed. But it gave both of us a big heart attack. Put on the bike rack back on, this time made sure it was on properly fitted.

Reached our destination without anymore drama. The rooms had been booked at a Bhakta Nivas (Hotel for Pilgrims). The rooms were clean and adequate and comfortable, more than I expected. Did some last minute checks on the bike, ate dinner and slept off early by 9. But for some reason getting sleep that night was harder than climbing up lavasa. I was getting the pre race jitters. Did not sleep at all that night. Even went out for a late night stroll. Kept imagining myself climbing each and every turn of lavasa. Hardly an hour of uneasy sleep I would’ve got.

Woke up early and the first thing I did was check out the bike. Was surprised to meet Sunil Chatekar and his company of volunteers who had slept off in the car all night as we had occupied all the rooms. They weren’t really in a happy mood.  Got down to the start line as fast as possible.  Reported and started warming up. Got chased by 3 big German shepherds, which was a nice warm up. Disaster struck when the front shifter stopped working; however AC came to rescue and fixed it in no time.

The race was flagged off at 7 am sharp by Milind Soman. This showed the awesome time management of the organizers. The first ones to go were the road bike category which had Siddhartha Gadekar from Team Lifecycle. His practice timing was enough to get him on the podium. Then the next group to go was the Hybrid category with Sushil Dhende as favorite from TLC. And he proved himself by dominating the race. Then came the moment of my flag off; the MTB category. The biggest category in the race with more than 50 participants. The moments before the flag off were full of anxiety. Getting ready to explode needed intense focus. I just closed myself to the world took a deep breath, everything went silent , I saw the flag go down and bang I exploded.

 

On the offensive

I got delayed by 2 seconds which I needed to get my shoes hooked onto the pedal clips. Once in I went all out on the highest gear, my legs pounding like an engine’s piston in smooth easy circles. And within seconds I was leading the race. Nobody seemed to be interested in working at the front of the peloton. With me as the pacemaker, I dropped the hammer and attacked like crazy with hardly 2 mins into the race. Only 3 other riders managed to latch onto me. The 2 boys from sangli (which included the National level cyclist Hussien Korbu) and a strong American rider Malcolm Brown. Nobody seemed to be taking the lead, so I kept attacking the stuff out of them. It was taking all they had to latch onto me. My strategy was working perfect. The attack was hurting the climbers. Soon Malcolm started helping me to increase the pace and we tried to throw off Hussien and his crony. Hussien on the other hand had a nice strategy; he had his crony as a pacer all along till the dam where the climb began. Just when the climb started Hussien’s domestique quit as he had exhausted himself. I was afraid that Hussien would attack anytime soon, so was hyper alert for the impending attack. And there it was he attacked right on the steep slope which marks the start of the lavasa ghat. Behind him was Malcolm and then me. Malcolm seemed to be suffering and couldn’t catch him soon enough, however since I was expecting the attack I managed to stay on Hussien’s wheels.

He was setting up a steady pace which helped me recover and also Malcolm caught onto me. Soon we reached the Dam top and I was feeling all fresh and awesome. I knew there would be an ease in the climb soon, a perfect place for an attack and obtain a decent lead. Both of them were looking stuffed and my attack would have been successful. But alas things aren’t always perfect in this cruel world. Just as I got up and shifted onto the highest gears the sudden surge in power caused a chain slip. I had to stop and put on the chain then back on the bike and clip my shoes back into the pedals. This delay set me back by at least 40 seconds on Hussein. The two soon disappeared amongst the twisting labyrinth of lavasa. I could not see anyone behind me, so I knew I could come in third just by riding comfortably to the finish. But who wants that, the crazies in me wanted to bust a gut and get back my lead. And bust a gut I did. Regaining ground on the lead two was one of the hardest things I have ever done. I rode on 2-6 gear combo all along. Everything in my body was hurting. With some powerful riding I soon caught up on those two. I bet they never expected me back. When I saw them Hussein had developed a lead of about 30 seconds on Malcolm.

Setting Malcolm as my primary target, I got off my bum and pedaled like crazy until I caught up to him. He wasn’t giving up easy; I barely managed to hang onto his wheel. He even covered up to me after a mediocre attack. I couldn’t sustain anymore long attacks. So I just settled on his wheel and kept pedaling with whatever I had left in me. Hussien was now just a little beyond reach. Covering the ground had depleted my energy reserves. Just before the short flat short section Malcolm found second wind and hit me with slow spurts of speed, which worked as I fell off from his wheel and he got a 15 second lead on me. I was running pretty low myself. But I knew that these attacks must’ve left Malcolm depleted and vulnerable for an attack. So I just steeled myself, shut the mind from the pain that was gonna come. I get off the saddle, get on the highest gear combo and start pedaling like crazy; again I catch him, the flat bit near the finish point had helped in recovering a bit. Now only a meager 50 meters were left to the finish. I just couldn’t accept coming in third. There were people who seemed to be shouting and cheering. I even saw dad near the last hairpin. But I couldn’t hear anyone. Everything was quiet, the pain became distant, the loud thumping heartbeats became quiet, everything became slow, all I could see was the finish. This lasted only a moment, but the next moment I attacked and zoomed past Malcolm who did try to catch me but couldn’t hold on (I have no idea how I got that power, amazing what the mind can do). That attack threw me in a world of pain, drowning in it; lungs exploding; heart beating at the speed of light; head bursting; stitches were severely stretched and in this moment of intense pain I got a cramp. It was so severe that I couldn’t keep myself from screaming. It was an intense flash of sharp sharp pain in my right calf. Still I kept going for the last 20 meters of the climb. Looked back to make sure he wasn’t coming in before me. Mind was blank when I crossed the line, couldn’t even breath. Slowed down to some random stranger who I told to hold me as I couldn’t unclip from my pedals. Did that and just fell on the ground trying to get back to reality. Someone poured water on me.  Recovered in about 10 minutes. At least enough to walk and talk. Malcolm came up and congratulated me, what a nice fellow!! Great competitor.

Then it sunk in that I had come second, was a bit depressed for losing out on the first spot. But then again realized I had just managed to trouble one of the best cyclists around and make them sweat. That was rewarding and the thought made my day.

On the Podium

Team Lifecycle Racing. Sushil got first in Hybrid cat, Luda got 3rd , Prashant got first in seniors MTB and AC got first in seniors Hybrid.  

The race organized by Lifecycle was organized very well. No room for any complaints. The new sponsors SPRINT and GIANT gave away some awesome prizes. The breakfast hosted by Lavasa corp was lavish as always. PBCh a great race to participate and win!!!

Getting my prizes from Giant Sprint CEO Pravin Patil and Lifecycle's Nachiket Joshi

Cheers

Skylark Challenge!!! Challenge was to not to get lost!!

Another race coming second. Its frustrating to lose when you dominate the entire race especially if you are stronger and faster than your competitors. 

The race was on Sunday the 29th of September. Had been training for it right after coming back from rugged. It was Luda's idea to run the race. Did a lot of training on Sinhgad plus ran outside my office after work. My running really needed some work if I was to keep up with Sushil n Ludmila. Luda due to her recent Ladakh trip was super strong and I was desperate to not be the weakest link. 

The race was gonna start in Velhe village, which is at the base of the historic Torna fort. The village is surrounded by  a jungle n a huge river flows by one side. Very laid back village, no coverage disturbed only by the steady stream of trekkers to Torna fort. Its about 40 kms from Pune right at the edge of Sahyadris. 

Me, Luda, Ashok Captain our coach/manager, Sushil's wife Priyanka all left for Velhe the night before the race in my car. Reached early, had a nice dinner of chicken cooked on choolah. Man that taste can never be replicated. So delicious it was. They had allocated a separate room for us, Captain's magic, otherwise all the other participants slept in a big hall. Sushil joined later at night. 

Wanted to talk with the missus (who's in Australia) but no coverage anywhere, so tried to walk all through the village to get a signal to send a text home; no luck. There was no phone booth with international connection either. So just took out the car and drove 5 kms out, all the time holding my phone out the window for one fucking signal; no luck again. Drove back. Finally gave in to Luda's insistence of using her phone which had some signal. 

Yes AC does sleep, despite popular urban myths

Had a nice sleep in my sleeping bag with the calm sound of a creek running near by. The next morning was oh so beautiful. The mountain was covered in clouds and they were fast descending on us. The locals said it gets very foggy late in the morning. Was surprised to find the village full with athletes. Didn't expect this kind of turn up. Met some fellow cyclists too. But Captain told us to be focused n we went on a short warm up run. The race got delayed for about 2 hours, finally we were let off at 9.30. By that time it had started to rain pretty hard. The terrain which we had to run was all through muddy trails n fields. 

The Map

Started with a nice steady pace, with Sushil leading , Luda in the middle and me bringing up the rear. The trails were super slippery due to the rains. Very very hard to run, was all wet in minutes. Shoes got heavy too. Thanks to our training, all this had little affect on us. The scenic route to the first control was alongside a huge backwater area (Gunjawne Dam). We had to trudge through knee deep creeks and ankle deep mucks of paddy fields. The rocks were slippery too, almost slipped couple of times. The swampy land was slowing us down considerably and I wished for the mountains which I later regretted. We were the first to reach the first check point. All along we were closely followed by a team of super strong athletes. After the check point they made their move and overtook us. We however maintained a steady pace and tried to keep up with them. They were way too fast for us, soon they would have put up a nice lead on us, but the girl in their team unfortunately slipped and scraped a knee. That slowed them down and we took back the lead. 

 

  

  These pics hardly do justice to the Terrain!!! (Pic courtesy Sunil Nanaware and Santosh Zurange)

Soon we hit the mountains and we had to run up steep slippery slopes. The pace reduced to almost a crawl now. Luda got a little winded here and I pushed her up the slope to get us going faster. Sushil strong as ever could hardly feel a thing. After a particularly steep slope we reached the third control which almost made us crawl on all fours. The route then went down a mountain side. And there we thought going down would be easier than climbing, haven't been so wrong. Descending was almost as slow as ascending, thanks to the slippery terrain. After a brief slope down the mountain we hit a totally deserted woods, no sign of civilization for miles. It was here that we got lost. Things got worse when the fog came down on us. All I could see was Luda running in front of me. So hopelessly lost we were that we had to stop and think for 5 minutes (that's a lot of time to keep still in a race) . There were no other teams who followed us there. It was all very frustrating. We went down the wrong path twice, wasted at least half an hour until we finally managed to find the arrows on the road again.  Once back on the road, we soon came down to the village and the tar road. Discouragement had set in. But we still managed to increase our pace in our hurry to make up the lost time. While going through one of the fields a small lamb hardly 2-3 months old started giving chase to Luda. The cute little thing did not let up for about half a km. Sushil had to stop and get rid of it as its owner was cursing us to stop. Just after the third check point we hit another steep climb. The climb was very slippery, even walking up there was a task. It was here I started to get cramps in my groin muscles. Had a 2 minute break at the top, drank lots of water which took care of them. But my leg muscles were screaming to stop. All the hammering and pushing Luda had taken its toll. Kept on running even though in pain. Soon we reached the last check point. It was all downhill until the finish from here. So we increase our pace and soon enough I can see the finish all the way down the mountain. Here the formation changed a bit, I was leading, Luda in the middle n then Sushil. While descending a steep patch I look back to make sure Luda is following me, only to see her slip and was hurling towards me, I catch her just in time other wise it was all hurts for me and her. 

Soon we cross the finish without anymore drama. It took us 3 hours and 1 minute finish. The First team finished 10 minutes before us. Coming in second was a huge disappointment. After some stretches I had a huge lunch. Got into dry clothes, and by the time we collected our 4 grand prize it was already evening. Had a huge dinner at Velhe and soon left for home. Once in Pune , went out with Luda to meet the Pune Rando peeps over a stubbie, then dropped her home. It was almost midnight that I finally got to rest my tired ass.  

Maharashtra Times 2nd October 2013

A great race organized in a very scenic place. Most recommended for the runner in you. 

Cant thank AC and Lifecycle enough for their support to Team Lifecycle Racing. 

Cheers