Auroville Marathon – A run to remember

Warning: Long Post

 

Timekeepers note down the results at Certitude

The banner along the route of the Auroville half marathon said I had seven more kilometres to go to the finish line.  The body cried, “stop,” the mind said “go” and I was proverbially caught between a rock and a hard place and felt what a rope probably feels during a tug-of-war. What confused me even more was the identity-crisis. Who was the real ‘me’, the body or the mind? I was tempted to think it was the body. 

 

As I learned at the end, the real “me” turned out to be … but wait, we’ll get to the end when we get there. Let’s start at the very beginning; it’s a very good place to start. 

This 21.1 kms half-marathon on Sunday, was the longest distance I would have run at a stretch and with only two weeks of training behind me, I was apprehensive about my chances at succeeding. 

The previous night I went over to Mark’s (a lawyer-friend’s) place and the conversation veered to the Auroville marathon. 

“Those who run the marathon are stupid,” he said.

“Well, I’m only doing the half marathon,” I said defensively, hoping for a few words of encouragement.

“Well that only makes you half as stupid, but you’re stupid nonetheless,” he stated matter-of-factly.  The gavel had fallen, the verdict passed. He sipped his herbal tea, blissfully unaware of the wreck he had left in his wake.

 Giving up with seven kilometres to go would have only reinforced Mark’s point and I was determined to go back, meet him, and flash my certificate of successful participation in his face. I passed by the banner and never looked back… The red-clay route stretched ahead. Unending. 

Auroville is a small township around 8 kms from Pondicherry. It has as its founding ideals, the dream of being a place on earth that no country could call its own – an international township where people from all over the world could live together in peace and harmony. The marathon was started last year to celebrate the 40^th anniversary of Auroville’s founding. This was only the second edition of the race but it had grown immensely in popularity mainly because the route winds through the pristine, untouched jungles of Auroville’s green belt – making this race a runner’s paradise.

 As Chandresh Patel, race director, puts it, “One of the things we have decided is to keep it in accordance with the principles of Auroville and not commercialize the event or market it. It’s about this beautiful place we have, and bringing that to you through running. Simple and sweet. We had 150 participants last year, but this year we have close to 485.” 

By 5:30 a.m we were all assembled at the starting line. There was an unusual nip in the air. A mist hung low, a silky veil hiding Nature’s pretty face under its monochrome greyness. In the next half hour, while the runners were busy warming up, an unseen hand gently – almost imperceptibly – lifted back this veil and little by little, the colours came back to life …

 There was a palpable excitement in the atmosphere as the 200 half-marathoners, in their fancy sneakers, dri-fit clothing, trendy butt-packs loaded with energy drinks and flashy ipods, jogged up and down warming themselves up. Some others chattered excitedly as they met old friends, made new ones and discussed their targets and strategies.

 “Why do you run?” a runner asked another.

Auroville: A potpourri of cultures

“I run because the beer after tastes better,” the other laughed.

“Well, I do it to shake the jelly off my belly.”

A third quipped, “I run because I’ve run out of ideas to look cool. Thought I’ll end up at the finish line!”

  Auroville being an international township, there were many foreigners: Germans, French, Americans, Italians and many more. Indians too had assembled from all over. There were Pondicherrians, Bangaloreans, Delhiites, Chennaiites and Hyderabadis. The result: a wonderful potpourri of cultures both Indian and Western in the melting pot that is Auroville. 

The race started at 6:10 a.m and the herd of runners surged ahead in a stampede like the wildebeest in the African savannahs. Some spectators hooted. Some whistled joyfully and somebody shouted out loud, “Enjoy Auroville!” My target was to complete the race in 1 hour 45 minutes – it was a tall ask given my inadequate training, and meant that I would have to run 1 kilometre in 5 minutes, maintaining it over 21 kilometres.

 The woods were lovely dark and deep, and I loved the rush of the cold, crisp air on my skin and through my ruffled hair. The better part of the race was on red-earth tracks, often under thick avenues with the overnight dew dripping from the leaves above. Drop after drop, cold and fresh. 

I could hear yon distant cry of a green barbet as it called out – hypnotising, regular, staccato. The cicadas, the crickets and the sparrows all sang a complex contre chant…Chirrrrp….chirrrp…chirrrrp. The wind swished and whistled – swishtled – through the treetops of the casuarinas and the eucalyptus.

 I ran through Nature’s symphony.

 I wondered whether the invisible hand that conducted the orchestra was the one that had earlier lifted the misty veil.

  This is what sets apart the Auroville marathon. No city marathon can provide such an atmosphere. Venkat, a software engineer from the Silicon Valley who was on his first trip to Auroville, said, “I have run several marathons and half-marathons but nothing quite matches this experience.”

 “In cities, you run on concrete roads. Here, running on the dirt tracks is awesome. It is immensely beneficial too as it puts much less strain on the joints. I swear, every serious runner should come and run here at least once. I know I’m coming back. ”    

At the six kilometre mark, Svaram, a group of professional percussionists from Auroville had set up their African drums by the side of the road and were beating up such a powerful, peppy rhythm that your feet couldn’t but move to their cadence. They shouted and cheered us on. Some runners even stopped by the side with them and performed a small jig before laughing and running off. 

We were more than thirty minutes into the race now as we ran into the sunrise. The light gradually became brighter and the sunlight spliced through the thick foliage and danced on the red earth below as the wind blew into the sun-kissed, sun-burnished treetops. The light strained down through a leafy sieve.

After the race: Time to put your feet up.

 

 

 There were water-posts at every four kilometres along the way and they provided all the refreshments that runners required. Bits of lemon or oranges to suck on, bananas for instant energy, lemonade, water or dry-fruit cookies – it was all there. I typically drank one glass of water and Splash! Another glass of water on the face and the head to refresh myself. 

The running and the breathing was getting tougher as every kilometre ticked along. By the twelfth, a righteous, burning pain seared through my calves and my hamstring. Every strand of leg-muscle was a mutineer against the mind, the de-facto captain of the ship that stumbled and ploughed its way across the pebbly gravel. I was close to hitting the wall – a phenomenon in long distance running where sudden fatigue sets in as a result of the depleting glycogen reserves in the liver and the muscles.   

 Under these circumstances, the grand edifice of Newton’s third law of classical mechanics which states that every action has an equal and opposite reaction, crumbled. I pushed the ground hard but the ground didn’t propel me forward with an equal and opposite force. Newton had definitely not run a half marathon I thought. And to think that his 3^rd law was the rotten foundation on which a lot of our modern theories rested! 

I thought of walking for a while but theoretical physics had also taught me that the coefficient of static friction was much greater than the coefficient of kinetic friction. In other words, it requires a greater force to move an object from rest than it does to keep a moving object on the roll. I ran on. The reasoning was subconscious. Or perhaps what drove me on was the horror of seeing Mark’s face with a smirky, I-told-you-so expression. 

I trundled along, in a zombie-like trance. Scrunch… Scrunch Scrunch…. Phew Phew Phew…. The feet fell on the gravel, the lungs screamed for air. The mind and the body fought on. I was on autopilot.

 Three kilometres to the finish the banner by the roadside announced. I don’t know where the energy came from but I felt like a gazelle enjoying its freedom in the limitless grasslands of Africa. The feet hardly seemed to be touching the ground as I crested a knoll which seemed like the top of the world!

 I had hit the “runner’s high!” A phenomenon, that runners often experience, characterised by a feeling of invincibility, superior performance and euphoria. Thing is, I don’t drink and I don’t smoke and I can never quite understand my friends when they say that they do this because they love to be “on a high.” 

 Perhaps now I can. And I’ll make it a point to tell them that there are ways of getting high that are actually beneficial to their health. Just run.

 I crossed the finish line with a timing of 1 hour 49 minutes, ranked 20 out of some 200 runners. That was 4 minutes off target but that was all right. The joy of completing hard and strong compensated for that.

Golden splendour...

 The Auroville marathon on its jungle trails is a runner’s holy grail. Running past the Matrimandir as it balloons up in all its golden splendour like a giant golf ball ready to be teed off into uncharted eternity by those same invisible hands, is as much a spiritual experience as it is physical and mental.

 But coming back to the question, who was the real “me”? Was it the mind or was it the body?

Hmmmm….

 

I think it was my runner’s soul.

 

The next Auroville marathon will be held on February 14, 2010. See you at the starting line!)