Maharashtra Police International Marathon – 2020. A recap.

This was their inaugural marathon. And it didn’t appear they had hired any external event organizers. Meaning, the police force managed the whole event themselves!

Commendable work, considering it was their first event! What with over 15000 runners participating from many countries and 1000’s of their own colleagues from police force from various places in Maharashtra coming to participate in their own run!

And…I got my FM PB of 4:03:25 in this event!!! Being in Mumbai it matters, with humidity, the various inclines, and the infamous Peddar road!!!

Thanks @⁨Coach Dan Zico⁩ and @⁨Coach Melwyn⁩ for the wonderful training. Hats off to your commitment to your runners!

The event start was good…though a bit silent. No Bollywood beats 😬😬But we had great weather and comraderie. Not cold but the weather was unusually breezy. And less crowds. Great support too all the way till the very end. The full marathon event in TMM had 7000 plus runners participating 3 weeks back. And this event had only about 700 runners doing the full marathon.

The race route was good. And the run on the Sea Link was fun as always. The cool breeze weather helped the body keep its cool.

However, in the last one km I lost about 2 mins with the cops stopping the runners to let the traffic pass!!! 😱😱and I had to ask twice to know where the finish line is …and navigate honking aggressive vehicles to reach the crowded finish line…with a truck parked right across the finish line!

And the post run arrangements were pathetic. Long queues for medals and breakfast and horrible crowd management. But it’s their first time so gotta understand. Many runners didn’t get their well-deserved medals. 😕😕Though to their credit the organizers did send SMS to all participants the day after asking if they wanted their medals home delivered.

Happy nevertheless! And yes, thanks everybody for the shout outs. Meghana, Sonal, Satish, Bimal, Neha and many more I am too dazed to recall!

Have a good time guys, and keep striving.

For those of you who have read Ikigai, the essence of good living is:
1) something to do
2) something to love
3) something to hope for.

Running helps in all these three departments!!! Over to some well-deserved rest now!