A Playlist for the 2018 Tata Mumbai Marathon

In a little over a month, I'll travel to Bombay to run my first marathon: the Tata Mumbai Marathon 2018.

I ran all my previous long-distance events without accompanying music because I wanted to experience every minute to the hilt. This time, with 42.2 km and a lot of minutes to experience, I thought I'd better have some music. The prospect of the Wall, and the motivation I'd need to beat it, are major factors in making this decision.

The purpose of this blog therefore is to list the songs I think I'd want to accompany me on my run. A secondary objective is to have readers make suggestions for songs they think might serve me well. Therefore, this blog will be subject to change as and when I receive suggestions. The way I've written the blog so far may make it sound like I'm using songs as tools rather than for sheer listening pleasure. This is true in part: while running long distances, and especially marathons, having the right music can really help. That being said, I'm not using beats or rhythm to pace myself: the songs are purely to distract from the physical torture. The songs listed below are therefore mostly jumpy, cheerful, or guitar heavy. Some I know I want because they have certain characteristics. Others simply came to mind at random.

1. Astronomy (Metallica Cover): Oh wow. The guitars. The "Hey!"s. The trippy lyrics. I want this song to be playing when I hit the wall.

2. Cat Scratch Fever (Motorhead Cover): Lemmy's gravelly voice is the perfect accompaniment to running on roads gravelly or otherwise.

3. Galway Girl (Ed Sheeran): If you're a close friend reading this, don't say anything. Yes, I've started listening to Ed Sheeran. No, he's not my new all-time favourite artist. But I do like this song. It's cheerful and fast and just about right for marathon running.

4. The Trooper (Iron Maiden): Another Wall song. The Light Brigade charging the Russians is pretty much equivalent to us tired runners charging the finish line.

5. The Boys of Summer (Don Henley): Very senti, yes. But it's got the pace and the lyrics and it evokes the right memories.

6. The Heart of Rock and Roll (Huey Lewis and the News): Jumpy and good to sing along to, though I probably shouldn't do that.

7. Born to Be Wild (Steppenwolf): apparently the villain in the new Justic League movie is called Steppenwolf. I'm not going to waste my time watching it, but I will listen to the song while running.

8. Two Princes (Spin Doctors):

9. Brown Eyed Girl (Van Morrison):

10. Tunnel of Love (Dire Straits): I've a very strong feeling that won't be the last Dire Straits song on this list.

11. Modern Love (David Bowie):

12. Child in Time (Deep Purple):

13. Kashmir (Led Zeppelin, Celebration Day Version):

14. Time (Pink Floyd):

15. More Than A Feeling (Boston):

16. Sabbath Bloody Sabbath (Black Sabbath):

17. Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap (ACDC):

18: Stranglehold (Ted Nugent):

19. Short Skirt, Long Jacket (Cake):

20. Tom Sawyer (Rush):

21. Breaking the Law (Judas Priest): Because the video is ridiculous and thinking about it will cheer me up.

22. Les Champs Elysees (Joe Dassin):

23. Cemetery Gates (Pantera):

24. Paranoid Android (Radiohead):

25: Run Like Hell (Pink Floyd):

26: Rock and Roll (Led Zeppelin, Celebration Day Version):

27: War Pigs (Cake): The second Cake song on my playlist. I have a feeling there'll be more!

28. Save Tonight (Eagle-Eye Cherry):

29. Are You Gonna Be My Girl (Jet):

30. Am I Evil (Diamond Head):

31. Sunshine of Your Love (Cream):

32. Walk of Life (Dire Straits):

33. Sometimes I Feel Like Screaming (Deep Purple):

Fake Accents

Wait, what?

Another blog post? But I just published one the day before yesterday! Is my perennial laziness finally waning? Nope. I just feel like writing and hey, why not?

Okay, so fake accents.

We've all met that guy. Or girl. Or maybe a number of guys and girls. You know the kind I'm talking about: the ones who've gone abroad for some (mostly short) span of time and returned to the motherland with an accent. I've noticed that British and American are the most popular fake accents out there. Somehow nobody wants to come back with a Singaporean accent, even though it's a pretty popular destination for tourists and business folk. My theory is that people don't find Singapore as glamorous or show-off worthy.

I know a fair number of people who went to Old Blighty and I have concluded that of all the accents out there, the British one is either:

1. The hardest to shake.

2. The easiest to put on.

3. Perceived as the most impressive.

I must admit, putting on a British accent IS fun. I've tried it on occasion, especially when quoting P.G. Wodehouse. There's nothing quite so satisfying as saying "Tinkerty tonk" with a degree of stiffness in the region of the upper lip.

But would I do it consistently over a prolonged period of time? No. It hurts. After a while my face begins to feel like what Voldemort's must. Nope, the facial discomfort of a stiff-upper lip is too much to handle.

Okay then. What else? 

Back when I was in The Hague, my favourite pub was this Irish place called O'Casey's. I started going there for the pub quizzes and Guinness and before long I was regular enough for the chaps behind the counter to start calling me by my first name. Good times. I decided I'd try out an Irish accent and did so for an entire evening. Although it was a lot of fun, it was even more tiring than the British one and so I laid it to rest.

Taking a cue from some of my colleagues at the former workplace, I learned there were ways to circumvent the difficulties any particular accent posed. A college senior (who as far as I could tell had never spent any considerable time in the US of A) used to dish out a pretty decent American accent. She'd butterrrr her toast, and take a break at the waterrrr coolerrrr where we'd discuss the thangs going on at wurrrk and in general. Of course, her Bengali roots did show themselves especially when it came to switching As with Os (still can't figure out why they don't say Kolkoto instead of Kolkata).

Another person, one of those YOLO, FOMO kind of chaps, decided to up the stakes. He'd been to a bunch of places and decided that no single accent was good enough for him. I'm not sure what he wanted to sound like, but in the end it seemed like all his accents had wound up in some kind of bacchanalia with regrettable events occurring afterwards. The results, which took a lot less than 9 months to show themselves, was a sort of American-British-Indian-Dutch-Spanish-Whateverelsehaveyou hybrid. Dumbass.

But, all said and done, I DO sympathize and am guilty of putting on a fake accent myself. You don't believe?

In college, I took a week's trip to the USA. And not just anywhere in the USA. To Cambridge. That's across the river from Boston. I thought I was prepared to order Clam Chowdah in typical Boston fashion, but the accent defeated me. To demonstrate what a Boston accent's like, here's Matt Damon on The Late Late Show:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXSjCJvN5Zc

Halfway through my trip I realised I'd never be able to acquire an accent like that. But I was determined to go back to college and impress everyone with a brand new accent. So I went ahead and walked into class with something that sounded like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6VX8qFlxK0

(The accent only; not the dialogue. Back then I was 'umbble geologist from Indiranagaraaa.)

Some of my friends have pointed out (and these are the Xavier's bunch who have their own range of accents depending on which part of Bombay they're from) that I have a Tamil twang to my voice.

Now this is where I must concede that I sometimes fake accents on a consistent basis. 

You see, there is another reason why someone might fake an accent, particularly one from abroad. It reminds them of a time in their lives they were fond of and through their accent they're simply trying to relive those times in their own way. I remember with great fondness the days I spent in boarding school in Tamil Nadu, where a fair number of people went around saying things like "Ehhh, what da macha", "Podi!" and the like. 

So yeah, fake accents can be annoying but maybe, just maybe, the person behind it isn't being the usual pretentious ******. But it's unlikely. They usually are.

Tinkerty tonk!

The Ladakh Marathon, or The Greatest Run in the Universe (Part 1)

Okay. Just to be clear, I didn't run the Ladakh Marathon. I ran the Ladakh Half-Marathon. The latter doesn't sound as dramatic so I didn't use it in the title. I wanted to make the distinction clear because one of my greatest pet peeves is the general lack of understanding among fledgling runners about what actually constitutes a marathon. Case in point: a former professional colleague once completed a 5k and went around saying that he was a marathon runner. Dummkopf.

I'd wanted to visit Ladakh for a while, but didn't like the idea of going all the way there just to sit in a cab and be driven around the usual string of sights. Nor did I particularly relish the thought of doing a motorcycle trip or a bike ride from Manali to Leh as is common with so many tourists. So when I turned up at the Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon Expo in January 2017, I was more than a little excited to see a booth run by Rimo Expeditions advertising their Ladakh event. I broke the habit of a lifetime and actually picked up a flyer, promising myself that I'd do the run if my schedule permitted it.

It turned out that my schedule, ably supported by the multitudinous professors who rejected my hard-written PhD applications, did indeed permit my participation. And so, in July 2017, I screwed my courage to the sticking place and registered for the half-marathon (I didn't qualify for the full because I didn't already have a full marathon timing under my belt).

I invested in a running coach. My experience at the SCMM wasn't bad, but I did have one too many uncomfortable experiences along the way with nagging injuries and inconsistent running. With most of the Ladakh run happening above 11,000 feet and on inclined ground, I didn't want to take any chances.

And so, at the end of August, I found myself cursing the poor quality of the passenger's waiting area at Delhi Airport while en route to Leh. I reached Leh after managing a window seat on my Vistara flight and being (only slightly) disappointed by the view: the Zagros mountains as seen from an aircraft window beat the tar out of what you see flying over Ladakh. Hard to believe, perhaps, but true.

Touchdown Leh, and the air was oh-so-thin!

I'd heard about altitude sickness from two broad categories of people. The first were Ladakh 'veterans' who'd been there dozens of times, taking the same old pictures of Pangong and the horribly annoying selfies at Khardung La. These people could very easily have OD'd on Diamox, given the quantities they'd recommended I pop. I (not so) guiltily wish they had. The second were Ladakh 'veterans' who'd been there dozens of times, taking the same old pictures of Pangong and the horribly annoying selfies at Khardung La. These people never took Diamox and were not terribly averse to highlighting (usually in loud voices) their lack of need of bottled Oxygen at Khardung La or wherever else. They also seemed to be immune to altitude sickness, at least as far as their unverified stories went.

My taxi driver told me to sleep it off all day and drink a lot of water. I slept all afternoon and thought I'd have dinner in the hostel mess that night. Alas, the call of momos was too loud and I ended up walking 2 kilometers into Leh to satiate my rumbling tummy. Big mistake. I got lost on the way back and barely made it to the hostel before my head felt like Bertie Wooster's on the morning after the Boat Race. Altitude sickness is real, kids (I didn't take any Diamox, but spent the next day relaxing in the hostel and reading Ice Station Zebra).

No, this wasn't on the same day.

Okay. Ladakh is so beautiful. I got Leh'd, yaaaaaaaar. Nada nada. Whatever.

I tested the waters by running up to the Shanti Stupa. There aren't a lot of hills where I stay in Bangalore, but I'm generally comfortable running on inclines whenever I've had to. This time, I wasn't comfortable. At all.

I ended up using 'practice' and 'acclimatization' as excuses to take a bunch of photographs instead of running any further.

With Hrushikesh Palande, volunteer with the Ladakh Ecological Development Group (LEDeG), and the peaks of Hemis National Park in the background.

I gasped. And gasped. I gulped down air like a drowning man. Nothing worked. I had to stop several times in between, completing what couldn't have been more than a kilometer and a half in about 15 minutes. Is this what the half-marathon would be like? Curses.

My next run was a little more ambitious, and more than a little foolhardy. I decided to run up the road to Khardung La. Just so we're clear, I didn't run all the way to Khardung La. I just ran on the road that leads there for about 6 km or so.

With views like these, could you really blame me for wanting to run?

Having left my cell phone (primitive Apple technology) in the hostel, I don't really know how far I ran. Unlike my previous attempt at the Shanti Stupa, this run was mildly easier. I still gasped and gulped, but with a little effort I managed to get pretty far out.

The Nilgiri Ultra 2017: Glorified Cross Country

On a somewhat gloomy evening in August 2006, I majestically brought up the rear in the inter-house cross country finals at the Laidlaw Memorial School and Junior College, Ketti.

As punishment, they docked 50 points from Plummer: the poor house I was dumped in when I joined the school.

I vowed never to run cross country again. The next year, being what was referred to in LMS slang as a 'Big Jang' in standard 12, I took great pleasure in skipping cross country in favour of 'studying'. In reality, I would hightail it down to the dormitory and take a long, leisurely bath before anyone else could hone in on the hot water.

Fast forward 10 years, and I was back in the Ooty to run 25 kilometers in the Nilgiri Ultra. Whoda thunk. By this time, I'd discovered that running was pretty cool if you didn't have the carrot-and-stick arrangement to worry about and I'd taken to the sport with some frequency.

The course began and ended at the YWCA in Anandagiri. Staying here was most satisfactory: it is conveniently located, very clean, and run by friendly and helpful staff. The rates are very reasonable too, especially if you're sharing a room.

At 1, I shuffled into the dining hall for the pre-race briefing and bib collection. I sat down at en empty table and was soon joined by a group of elite runners, recognisable by their GPS watches and air of comfort in a room where I thought everyone would be nervous. One of them, who introduced himself as Shashwat (and about whose ultra-running exploits I would read about at length in his blog) asked me about the cheap (but really solid) Decathlong watch I was wearing. I said something stupid and revealed my true colours as a fledgling runner. Ah well, I'm sure Shashwat had to start somewhere too!

At half-past 5 on Saturday, the 2nd of December, the runners in the 25 km and 50 km editions lined up for a final briefing with Globeracers lead Kavitha. Following instructions to keep our headlamps lit and our reflective jackets on throughout the course (visibility was down to single digits, in feet) we were off.

Remembering my coach's advice (never run too fast in early stages and waste energy), I kept things slow. We turned off onto the Coonoor road and hit our first incline. At this point, a couple of Army runners decided they'd had enough of us slower folk obstructing their path and they shot off into the rain. They'd eventually finish first and second.

I negotiated the first couple of hills without too much difficulty and soon found myself near the Coonoor - Lovedale junction. At this approximate location, me and a few friends were almost caught by our Principal one weekend as we returned (just a tad) late from an Ooty outing in 2007. He didn't catch us and we made it back to school in time for my all-time favourite LMS dinner: Chapati and Chicken.

Okay enough nostalgia. I took the turn towards Lovedale and the (relative) grime of Ooty town was soon forgotten. Pine and Eucalyptus trees all around, I ran with the Nilgiri Mountain Railway to my right and turned towards (insert evil and dramatic drumroll) The. Lawrence. School. Lovedale. Da da da daaah.

Lovedale Railway Station

Shortcut to Ketti with the Lawrence School behind the trees beyond

Okay, Lawrence isn't that bad. I had a couple of friends there and although our schools were rivals of sorts that didn't stop us from having a lot of fun during badminton tournaments (the only sport I didn't TOTALLY suck at. Okay, maybe I just sucked less than everyone else).

The run was getting prettier by the minute. Mist descended and any view I might normally have had of Ketti Valley was obscured by clouds. I pulled out my third-rate cellphone (primitive Apple technology) and took a few photographs, reproduced below for your pleasure.

Before long, I reached the half-way point where I stopped to take more photographs. Although I broke one of my cardinal rules and took selfies during an earlier run in Ladakh, I refused this time around and asked the pit stop person to take a couple for me. That's me right there, wearing my Wildlife Rescue and Rehabilitation Centre (WRRC) t-shirt. Do look them up on Facebook and Instagram and do consider supporting their work. If you work at a company in Bangalore that engages in CSR activities, you could also invite them over for a talk or two.

Photographs taken and primitive Apple technology stowed away, I confronted the uphill climb back to Ooty. It was here that I realised, in the midst of the fog and rain, what a real Ultramarathon must be like (though the 25km event was part of the larger Nilgiri Ultra, a real Ultra is by definition longer than 42 kilometres). I screwed my courage to the sticking place and lumbered on, overtaking a couple of runners along the way. My coach's advice to take it easy at the start was paying off.

Running and walking. No, mostly walking. Okay, maybe equal amounts of both. I reached the final pit stop and ate a boiled baby potato. I chilled a little too long and one of the runners I'd overtaken caught up. Determined not to lose my place, I bolted back past Lawrence and Lovedale and found my way back to Ooty. This is where the runners high hit me (instead, mercifully, of the wall) and I ran faster than I'd run all morning back towards the YWCA. I overtook one runner easily, and then another, before storming up the slope to the YWCA reception. Mine was the third name in the finisher's list.

What a run, and what an experience! I can't wait to get back to the Nilgiris next year, though perhaps for the 50k division! If only I had another shot at running cross-country :(

I decided to celebrate that evening in the company of old friends (pictured below):

Sustainable running

I attended an interesting talk last Saturday. Mr. U.G. Murthy, my running coach, told us about Sustainable Running. 

Sustainable Running isn't exactly what it sounds like. These days, the word sustainable often has environmental connotations. Sustainable running is something else altogether. It has more to do with being a runner for an extended period of time with no negative side-effects. Although a concrete definition for sustainable running probably doesn't exist, it isn't difficult to jot down a couple points outlining your own understanding of the term.

As a fledgling runner who is 27 years old and aspires to continue running for the rest of his life, here are a few things which I think constitute sustainable running:

1. Having the physical ability to run long distances at age 65 (for argument's sake; it could be higher than that).

2. Having the enthusiasm to run long distances at the same age as above and in the intervening period.

3. Improving as a runner throughout said period. This improvement need not exclusively be in terms of speed or distance.

I don't mention injury free running among my points. I think it's impossible NOT to have a few injuries along the way. However, it is not impossible to minimise these injuries.

So, having established what sustainable running means to you, how do you practice it?

Mr. Murthy's presentation highlighted some points that should seem obvious, but often get obscured for various reasons. They included keeping expectations realisitic, training according to level of fitness with slow and steady increment, and consistency. It's easy to overlook these pointers, especially when you're a beginner and full of enthusiasm.

For example, I recently started using Instagram and started following several running accounts. A lot of the runners on these accounts have finished sub 4- hour marathons on their very first attempt. The phrase 'qualifying for Boston" is thrown around with alarming frequency. Ultramarathons happen around the world in exotic locations. All put together, beginners such as myself might be led to believe that distance running is easier than it looks.

This is where having a coach, as opposed to a mass-produced online training plan, is really helpful. While there are certainly those who might be able to achieve excellent marathon timings on their first attempt, others without such talents could injure themselves quite seriously if they pick up plans that are too intense.

So what am I going to do to make my running sustainable?

1. Try and keep the injuries away for as long as possible. I will do this by running a relatively small amount each week, gradually raising the bar as I improve. I'm at the ~40 km/week mark at the moment.

2. Include core, leg, and general strength training in my running training.

3. Have a lot of fun while running! For example, one of my motivations in lugging myself out on Sunday mornings for a long run is the delicious Koshy's breakfast of appam and stew.

Welcome to Running on the Rocks!

I'm a geologist living in Bangalore, India. This blog is an attempt to document my journey as a runner.

Like most, I discovered my passion for running after a couple of years lounging around in a comfy office chair. That wasn’t to say that I had never run before: the boarding school I attended insisted that all students who were lousy at cricket, football, hockey, and whatever else had to run cross country. Being more of an intellectual (I like to tell myself that) I was forced to spend my evenings running around Ketti Valley in the lovely Nilgiri Hills. What made me loathe running back then was the fact that if you didn’t complete the course on time, you’d be ridiculed by the Principal at assembly the next day and have points docked off your house championship tally. Being an intellectual (refer above) I devised an elaborate strategy to run the course in time. Did this comprise a strict training regimen supplemented with nutritious food? Nope. I became an expert in taking shortcuts through tea gardens, the staff quarters, underneath fences, and just about anywhere I could to shave a few minutes off my running time.

Then came the fateful day of the inter house championship. Staff were positioned strategically along the route to ensure that intellectuals such as myself (refer above) did not use our little grey cells for nefarious purposes. Even worse, we had to collect tickets every kilometre or so to prove we had passed by fairly! Some people will stop at nothing I tell you!

I completed the course three seconds late and had fifty points deducted from my house and several loud words directed at me (and a couple other poor sods) by my house captain. Life was hard.

After boarding school, I went to Bombay for college and promptly forgot everything about running. Five years later and I was in Bangalore, about to start my first ever job. A colleague was a runner and we exchanged stories: his about a PR at the Chennai Marathon a year earlier, and mine about the time I ate wild passion fruit that was growing along one of my favourite shortcuts in Ooty.  He convinced me to dust off my shoes and I started running again, doing 5, 8 and 10 k runs for the next two years.

In January 2017, I ran the half-marathon at the Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon. My training regimen was less than stellar, but having made the decision to crowdfund for a few animal welfare NGOs as part of my run I was determined to complete the course. I managed to finish without hurting myself, the NGOs got Rs. 22,000, but Life was still hard, especially for the next few days.

I then made the monumentally irresponsible decision to run the Ladakh Half-Marathon. I had always wanted to visit Ladakh, and when I saw a booth advertising the Marathon at the SCMM Expo, I made up my mind to do it. This time though, I decided to get help. A half-marathon in Mumbai was bad enough. One at 11,000 feet? This was no joke.

That brought me to Mr. Murthy and his Excelbased training plans. Running in Ladakh was one of the most superb experiences I’ve ever had thanks to the training, and I hesitated only a little to sign up for my first full marathon: the reincarnated Mumbai Marathon, now being sponsored by Tata. Ladakh was also rewarding for other reasons: I crowdfunded for a cause once more, raising Rs. 81,850 for a wildlife conservation NGO I worked with in my childhood.

Besides giving me the opportunity to write (something I enjoy immensely but usually use some kind of excuse to avoid doing), I hope this blog finds its way to the screens of other fledgling runners like me and helps them understand that training for long distance running is serious, but extremely rewarding, business. So without further ado, welcome to my running journey!