Rebirth of my Ultra running.
Exactly 9 months since I ran my last Ultra in Himachal. I have been thinking and contemplating to get back to my passion - Ultra running.
Few in the team were planning to go for Leh half marathon and bingo i got my Ultra Marathon. What could be better than getting back to my passion by doing Khardungla Challenge.
Khardungla Challenge, a race organised by Rimo Expeditions - Leh, is a 72km run Starting Khardung village @ 13041ft to Leh town @10800ft via Khardung La pass @17618 ft.
I signed up for this run and like every other Ultra in past started preparing by running 100+ km weekly runs.
As the days passed from few of us we became a strong team of 16 RASian's.
Khardungla Challenge - 2
Half Marathon - 12
Full Marathon -2
Action started on Sunday 2nd September with 1st lot arriving @ LEH.
I reached Leh on monday 3rd September, with few of us and rest of them arrived on 4th including few by road.
2 days of rest in room with a little walk around the town I got my head in place, breathing still a little hard. 4th evening the KC team went for the last 5km route recce with the organisers. We walked back tracing the last 5km as that was through the town with lots of twist and turns and connecting bylanes so that. 5th morning 9am started the journey to the startline. The butterfly started to fly in my stomach. We had a briefing, in fact a roll call before we boarded our bus. Pankaj my fellow RASian and I fixed our bag in a bus and when we tried to board the bus the we realised it was blocked by handkerchief. No one know whose but was blocked....after some hair straightening moments we finally got to board another bus for our onward journey towards Khardung Village. The journey was fun, met many great runners and would like to mention about one of the runners I met- Silvia from Spain. 54yrs young Silvia came to try the KC after completing the most grueling Spartathalon & Marathon de sables and finishing amongst top 5 women. Next after KC for her is Badwaters Ultra..phew after meeting her and listening to her stories I was super charged with renewed energy. The journey to Khardung village was great. We stopped at KHARDUNG LA top to have chai. The K top was warm, not a speck of snow, and Buzzing with traveller clicking photos and moving around in shorts and tees. (That was K top a day before the race). Next stop was North Pullu where we stopped and had our favourite Maggi and chai. We reached Khardung Village around 2pm.
At Khardung village the stay arrangements were fantastic. All the runners were given accommodation at houses of villagers. Though the acco was basic but the hospitality and love given to us by the owners was amazing. It felt as if we are staying in our own house. Clean rooms, warm bed with quilts. I was sharing the room with my partner Pankaj.
After dumping our belongings in the room we went to for our medical checkup. We reached the tent for our check up and were told it will start @5pm after the cultural program organized by the villagers.
The cultural program was performed by village kids and was the most beautiful thing I ever witnessed. The kids were simply outstanding, no sign of hardship, difficult living conditions...they were enjoying every moment of their stage performance and making all of us sway with them. I danced along with the kids and felt so connected and rejuvenated.
Due to dancing my Blood Pressure shot up and during medical I was told, "it's too high". I sat with doc took to my deep breathing exercise and got my BP down to normal in 5mins flat.
We were served early dinner. 2 bowl of soup, dal rice and veggies and i was all set to retire.
Pankaj and i reached the room. No electricity. (Got to know that the village gets just 4hrs of electricity in the whole day, 2hrs random during day and 2hrs in night. Room had no switch as the villagers say not required since we don't know when the electricity comes so easy to figure out when it comes). Amazing life these people live. They are not concerned with these issue of which we in Metro's make a big hue & cry of. A big salute to the people living in harsh conditions and still ready to serve strangers with all they have.
Back to prep:- We unpacked with the help of our headlamp, Bibs fixed, clothes lined up for morning, water bag filled with water I carried from Leh, checked my gels, the batteries for my head lamp. Prepared my drop bag - for South Pullu to dump all my warm clothes, for finish line with my change, protein etc. I ensured the bags were tagged properly.
Since we had no idea about electricity, we decided to remove the bulb from the holder so we could sleep.
Pankaj and i fixed our bed and 7:45pm we went off to sleep.
Morning was usual - cold, got up @1am quickly got ready so can eat the breaker @1:30am, after breaker we came back to the room, got ready for the run - bags packed, drop bag ready. Said good bye to our host and off we went ot the start line. Dropped our bags in the respective bus. I did my usual warm up drill with a little jog and mobility exercise. Felt a bit uneasy in my head but thought it's pre-race jitters so ignored, checked by headlamp, hydration bag. 10mins to countdown and we had a roll call. A total of 132 "present sir" and with quick customary pre race photos I was ready to rock and roll.
The race started on time 3am.... Only thing visible in the star lit night was headlamps of runners, lot of people started with running the first leg till North Pullu -14km from start line. The Rockstars - Ladakh scouts and Fauji bhai log sprinted as if they are running a half marathon....I had decided that I will jog 1km to see how I feel and if all good then jog a bit more else will do brisk walking. 2km in the race I decided to brisk walk and that was the best decision I took. I more or less maintained my speed of walk all through the first 32km of my climb from Khardung to Khardung La. 10kms into the race I felt rain drops and suddenly, as if the weather God had some plan in place for us, it started raining. It rained till about 18km into the race. The clothes became wet and the temp started to drop. We were greeted with warm water @North Pullu by the army post and God bless them as I was feeling cold and warmth of water was all that was need to get the legs moving. My glasses were all soaked, so removed my eyewear @North Pullu and the challenge started for me. I can't remain without glasses for long and 6km after North Pullu i started feeling the numbness in my eyes and head started to hurt so had to clean my glasses with my wet shorts 😁 and used my gloves as wiper to keep walking. While walking i realised the transparent water suddenly turned white...looked up saw snow across the Khardung La range. Oh teri it is snowing, damn ab kya ....nothing keep ur head down and keep walking...the temp dropped suddenly and walking became a bit tough. Thanks to my foresight 😜 I was wearing trail shoes which gave me a good grip on the road. The snow followed by sharp cold wind wherein the watch showed temp as -8 deg, could be I thought or maybe watch is also scared.Surprisingly I found my gels almost frozen, couldn't open them, the spout of my hydration bag not drawing water from the bag. But route support was amazing, found the mobile aid station with boiled potatoes, enerzal, water and sandwiches. Had my fill so that I don't have to rely on my gels. I wanted to check the time and watched showed 5am, can't be can't be, checked the damn watch also froze 😂😂, ठंड के मारे. Had to restart the watch. So now all the km calculation whooped, now had to rely on TOD (samay) to get into cutoff zone.
Due to snowfall the last 6km became really tough. Could see the K-top at a distance but the route was long and climb intense. The freezing winds were adding to the the misery. I had a great companion in Subodh Dave in last 6km who kept egging me on. My headache was getting worse, about 2km from K-top i told Subodh to carry on as i wanted to take a minutes break to get my breathing right and control the headache. I walked for 400m and again stopped to take a breathing break for a min. Thats when I decided no more, this is not gonna defeat me. Next stop only K-top and then finish line. Enough of feeling miserable. I just kept my head down and started my brisk walk again. Reached the K-top in 5:37hrs welcomed by a hot bowl of hot garlic soup. What a blessing. Without waiting for long I took some water and enerzal and started my decent to LEH. My headache had increased and everytime I tried to run hard, headache aggravate making it difficult for me to run fast.
I just kept egging myself and kept reminding that it's the legs not my head that has to run. Legs were all juiced up, felt very strong but the blinding pain kept me slow. I reached South Pullu-the first baggage drop station, thought of reducing the layers but the rain had started again and the temperature was still in low 5-6deg. So kept the layers on. At South Pullu I met Silvia again and from that point onwards we decided to run and push each other. She was also going through the same headache as mine. Run walk strategy changed to walk run strategy. Kept meeting runners and kept the momentum without a break as a break at that time would have meant end of race.
Every aid station would be a blessing. Cheering volunteers, team ready to assist in anyways they could. My stock of Karachi halwa (dates and nuts) was the energy booster all through the downhill.
Last 12km felt like 120km, I crossed mendak mor with 3hrs to spare and then onwards could see the LEH town close by. The twisting winding roads were endless, the sun was in no mode relent, temps upwards 28deg. Now the feeling of "so near yet so far" strated creeping in. Mind is a different animal and sometime u need to kick this animal in his centre to shut it up. I did the same. Blanked my mind to all the stupid thoughts and set myself to finishing race. Silvia and I started saying "72km and no more", just with this in head, started the final descent to leh town. 7km from finish line, camera person was waiting to take a small clip of our experience, fun guy to talk to.... Gave all smile and good things to him and moved on. Finally we saw the 5km turn point towards Leh. Same route we had walked 2days before On route recce. I screamed YEAH YEAH it's gonna be over. Silvia and I hugged each other in joy, and off we went "5km and no more". The route was full of cobblestones, broken road, so became difficult to run fast, we slowly jogged our way.
2km from finish line, I saw a very familiar face, ah Manu, he was standing and looking straight at me, I thought "why is he not responding" I passed him, still no movement, I screamed Mr Pant, suddenly he jumped, oh coach, I asked him, didn't u recognize me, he said sheepishly "sorry forgot to wear my glasses so couldnt see u coming", can u imagine...
Then the whole action started, phone calls to the next station, coach has been spotted. I requested Manu to inform someone at finish line to organize a headache medicine.
1.5km from finish line, the whole team was standing, Anuj, Malvika, Anu, Naveen, Manish, Rita, Dr Vishesh. They all started cheering, shouting yeah yeah, and running with me. That gave me confidence and push to finish strongly. I started picking up pace.... And enjoying the last part of the run....
500m from finish line, we entered the main bazaar, no clue where to go, everyone started screaming this way this way, the crowd was amazing, whole town was there, I asked Anuj, "arey where is the finish line" he said just round the corner. Finally I saw it and started running faster.... AND YEAH I FINISHED THE KC IN 11hrs 27mins....
Thanks to my team who were there supporting throughout my stay and the run. Without them this would have been very difficult. Three cheers to RASian's. God bless them all...
Amazing experience this was and one big take away was to not to take it easy. Next year acclimatise properly and do it in respectable time of less than 10hrs. So that's the challenge for next year.....
Till then practice and practice and practice....no easy days as Malnad 110km coming next on Oct13th.....will be back with that experience...Cheers!!! Keep running and keep smiling
Exactly 9 months since I ran my last Ultra in Himachal. I have been thinking and contemplating to get back to my passion - Ultra running.
Few in the team were planning to go for Leh half marathon and bingo i got my Ultra Marathon. What could be better than getting back to my passion by doing Khardungla Challenge.
Khardungla Challenge, a race organised by Rimo Expeditions - Leh, is a 72km run Starting Khardung village @ 13041ft to Leh town @10800ft via Khardung La pass @17618 ft.
I signed up for this run and like every other Ultra in past started preparing by running 100+ km weekly runs.
As the days passed from few of us we became a strong team of 16 RASian's.
Khardungla Challenge - 2
Half Marathon - 12
Full Marathon -2
Action started on Sunday 2nd September with 1st lot arriving @ LEH.
I reached Leh on monday 3rd September, with few of us and rest of them arrived on 4th including few by road.
2 days of rest in room with a little walk around the town I got my head in place, breathing still a little hard. 4th evening the KC team went for the last 5km route recce with the organisers. We walked back tracing the last 5km as that was through the town with lots of twist and turns and connecting bylanes so that. 5th morning 9am started the journey to the startline. The butterfly started to fly in my stomach. We had a briefing, in fact a roll call before we boarded our bus. Pankaj my fellow RASian and I fixed our bag in a bus and when we tried to board the bus the we realised it was blocked by handkerchief. No one know whose but was blocked....after some hair straightening moments we finally got to board another bus for our onward journey towards Khardung Village. The journey was fun, met many great runners and would like to mention about one of the runners I met- Silvia from Spain. 54yrs young Silvia came to try the KC after completing the most grueling Spartathalon & Marathon de sables and finishing amongst top 5 women. Next after KC for her is Badwaters Ultra..phew after meeting her and listening to her stories I was super charged with renewed energy. The journey to Khardung village was great. We stopped at KHARDUNG LA top to have chai. The K top was warm, not a speck of snow, and Buzzing with traveller clicking photos and moving around in shorts and tees. (That was K top a day before the race). Next stop was North Pullu where we stopped and had our favourite Maggi and chai. We reached Khardung Village around 2pm.
At Khardung village the stay arrangements were fantastic. All the runners were given accommodation at houses of villagers. Though the acco was basic but the hospitality and love given to us by the owners was amazing. It felt as if we are staying in our own house. Clean rooms, warm bed with quilts. I was sharing the room with my partner Pankaj.
After dumping our belongings in the room we went to for our medical checkup. We reached the tent for our check up and were told it will start @5pm after the cultural program organized by the villagers.
The cultural program was performed by village kids and was the most beautiful thing I ever witnessed. The kids were simply outstanding, no sign of hardship, difficult living conditions...they were enjoying every moment of their stage performance and making all of us sway with them. I danced along with the kids and felt so connected and rejuvenated.
Due to dancing my Blood Pressure shot up and during medical I was told, "it's too high". I sat with doc took to my deep breathing exercise and got my BP down to normal in 5mins flat.
We were served early dinner. 2 bowl of soup, dal rice and veggies and i was all set to retire.
Pankaj and i reached the room. No electricity. (Got to know that the village gets just 4hrs of electricity in the whole day, 2hrs random during day and 2hrs in night. Room had no switch as the villagers say not required since we don't know when the electricity comes so easy to figure out when it comes). Amazing life these people live. They are not concerned with these issue of which we in Metro's make a big hue & cry of. A big salute to the people living in harsh conditions and still ready to serve strangers with all they have.
Back to prep:- We unpacked with the help of our headlamp, Bibs fixed, clothes lined up for morning, water bag filled with water I carried from Leh, checked my gels, the batteries for my head lamp. Prepared my drop bag - for South Pullu to dump all my warm clothes, for finish line with my change, protein etc. I ensured the bags were tagged properly.
Since we had no idea about electricity, we decided to remove the bulb from the holder so we could sleep.
Pankaj and i fixed our bed and 7:45pm we went off to sleep.
Morning was usual - cold, got up @1am quickly got ready so can eat the breaker @1:30am, after breaker we came back to the room, got ready for the run - bags packed, drop bag ready. Said good bye to our host and off we went ot the start line. Dropped our bags in the respective bus. I did my usual warm up drill with a little jog and mobility exercise. Felt a bit uneasy in my head but thought it's pre-race jitters so ignored, checked by headlamp, hydration bag. 10mins to countdown and we had a roll call. A total of 132 "present sir" and with quick customary pre race photos I was ready to rock and roll.
The race started on time 3am.... Only thing visible in the star lit night was headlamps of runners, lot of people started with running the first leg till North Pullu -14km from start line. The Rockstars - Ladakh scouts and Fauji bhai log sprinted as if they are running a half marathon....I had decided that I will jog 1km to see how I feel and if all good then jog a bit more else will do brisk walking. 2km in the race I decided to brisk walk and that was the best decision I took. I more or less maintained my speed of walk all through the first 32km of my climb from Khardung to Khardung La. 10kms into the race I felt rain drops and suddenly, as if the weather God had some plan in place for us, it started raining. It rained till about 18km into the race. The clothes became wet and the temp started to drop. We were greeted with warm water @North Pullu by the army post and God bless them as I was feeling cold and warmth of water was all that was need to get the legs moving. My glasses were all soaked, so removed my eyewear @North Pullu and the challenge started for me. I can't remain without glasses for long and 6km after North Pullu i started feeling the numbness in my eyes and head started to hurt so had to clean my glasses with my wet shorts 😁 and used my gloves as wiper to keep walking. While walking i realised the transparent water suddenly turned white...looked up saw snow across the Khardung La range. Oh teri it is snowing, damn ab kya ....nothing keep ur head down and keep walking...the temp dropped suddenly and walking became a bit tough. Thanks to my foresight 😜 I was wearing trail shoes which gave me a good grip on the road. The snow followed by sharp cold wind wherein the watch showed temp as -8 deg, could be I thought or maybe watch is also scared.Surprisingly I found my gels almost frozen, couldn't open them, the spout of my hydration bag not drawing water from the bag. But route support was amazing, found the mobile aid station with boiled potatoes, enerzal, water and sandwiches. Had my fill so that I don't have to rely on my gels. I wanted to check the time and watched showed 5am, can't be can't be, checked the damn watch also froze 😂😂, ठंड के मारे. Had to restart the watch. So now all the km calculation whooped, now had to rely on TOD (samay) to get into cutoff zone.
Due to snowfall the last 6km became really tough. Could see the K-top at a distance but the route was long and climb intense. The freezing winds were adding to the the misery. I had a great companion in Subodh Dave in last 6km who kept egging me on. My headache was getting worse, about 2km from K-top i told Subodh to carry on as i wanted to take a minutes break to get my breathing right and control the headache. I walked for 400m and again stopped to take a breathing break for a min. Thats when I decided no more, this is not gonna defeat me. Next stop only K-top and then finish line. Enough of feeling miserable. I just kept my head down and started my brisk walk again. Reached the K-top in 5:37hrs welcomed by a hot bowl of hot garlic soup. What a blessing. Without waiting for long I took some water and enerzal and started my decent to LEH. My headache had increased and everytime I tried to run hard, headache aggravate making it difficult for me to run fast.
I just kept egging myself and kept reminding that it's the legs not my head that has to run. Legs were all juiced up, felt very strong but the blinding pain kept me slow. I reached South Pullu-the first baggage drop station, thought of reducing the layers but the rain had started again and the temperature was still in low 5-6deg. So kept the layers on. At South Pullu I met Silvia again and from that point onwards we decided to run and push each other. She was also going through the same headache as mine. Run walk strategy changed to walk run strategy. Kept meeting runners and kept the momentum without a break as a break at that time would have meant end of race.
Every aid station would be a blessing. Cheering volunteers, team ready to assist in anyways they could. My stock of Karachi halwa (dates and nuts) was the energy booster all through the downhill.
Last 12km felt like 120km, I crossed mendak mor with 3hrs to spare and then onwards could see the LEH town close by. The twisting winding roads were endless, the sun was in no mode relent, temps upwards 28deg. Now the feeling of "so near yet so far" strated creeping in. Mind is a different animal and sometime u need to kick this animal in his centre to shut it up. I did the same. Blanked my mind to all the stupid thoughts and set myself to finishing race. Silvia and I started saying "72km and no more", just with this in head, started the final descent to leh town. 7km from finish line, camera person was waiting to take a small clip of our experience, fun guy to talk to.... Gave all smile and good things to him and moved on. Finally we saw the 5km turn point towards Leh. Same route we had walked 2days before On route recce. I screamed YEAH YEAH it's gonna be over. Silvia and I hugged each other in joy, and off we went "5km and no more". The route was full of cobblestones, broken road, so became difficult to run fast, we slowly jogged our way.
2km from finish line, I saw a very familiar face, ah Manu, he was standing and looking straight at me, I thought "why is he not responding" I passed him, still no movement, I screamed Mr Pant, suddenly he jumped, oh coach, I asked him, didn't u recognize me, he said sheepishly "sorry forgot to wear my glasses so couldnt see u coming", can u imagine...
Then the whole action started, phone calls to the next station, coach has been spotted. I requested Manu to inform someone at finish line to organize a headache medicine.
1.5km from finish line, the whole team was standing, Anuj, Malvika, Anu, Naveen, Manish, Rita, Dr Vishesh. They all started cheering, shouting yeah yeah, and running with me. That gave me confidence and push to finish strongly. I started picking up pace.... And enjoying the last part of the run....
500m from finish line, we entered the main bazaar, no clue where to go, everyone started screaming this way this way, the crowd was amazing, whole town was there, I asked Anuj, "arey where is the finish line" he said just round the corner. Finally I saw it and started running faster.... AND YEAH I FINISHED THE KC IN 11hrs 27mins....
Thanks to my team who were there supporting throughout my stay and the run. Without them this would have been very difficult. Three cheers to RASian's. God bless them all...
Amazing experience this was and one big take away was to not to take it easy. Next year acclimatise properly and do it in respectable time of less than 10hrs. So that's the challenge for next year.....
Till then practice and practice and practice....no easy days as Malnad 110km coming next on Oct13th.....will be back with that experience...Cheers!!! Keep running and keep smiling
