Yogini Runs

Lalita Babbar broke the national record at the   Airtel Delhi Half Marathon by finishing it in   1:10:52 around 6 minutes after her Indian Male counterpart.   I wondered reading the news whether  she could beat that time. That got me thinking on woman and long distance running   , more so because of my recent read “Born to run” by Mr. Cristopher McDougall.   I have time in hand , nursing my ankle injury ,so catching up on all the literature on running. On the point of Woman and Man and endurance running Christopher has an interesting part where he talks about the research done by Dr. Dennis Bramble on Mankind and history of running. In that context he quotes Dr. Bramble   about woman and running. “ “Women have really been underrated,” Dr. Bramble said. “They’ve been evolutionarily shortchanged. We perpetuate this notion that they were sitting around waiting for the men to come back with food, but there’s no reason why women couldn’t be part of the hunting party.” Actually, it

I work out in   the evening, not a morning person at all.    Yesterday like all days I got my gym clothes in the car and planned to do the usual, until of course I realized I will be delayed at work.   So somewhere during the course of the last meeting I decided I will skip the gym. And then I did what I didn’t imagine I could have done. I did not drive past the gym, I actually went. I checked my watch and it was 8:20pm. I still had a voice in my head asking me to just get back in the car and drive home, because it was way too late. But I locked the car and walked inside, with some surprised looks in the gym reception. My trainer was equally surprised and commented “so late, I didn’t think you would come in” I smiled and just blamed work and Bangalore traffic. I surprised myself by killing all the voices in my head and then I heard Jillian in my head saying “What really matters is that you showed up”. For those who read my blogs, know that I absolutely love Jillian Michael’s wo

The year has been a roller coaster ride for my  running . I started the year planning to get on the running wagon completely with planning out my race calendar for the year. I may have gotten ambitious by deciding on the Boston qualifier as well. It doesn't cost much to dream, does it. Well officially I still have a shot as the Spice Coast Marathon is scheduled this Sunday.  But the truth of the matter is, let alone 42 Km I cant run a mile with a ankle injury. So all my dreams of BQ are down the drain. I hurt my ankle in my practice runs post Bangalore marathon. Lesson learnt that I need to run more often and trying to achieve too much in a short time is not possible. Also running in the dark may not be the best time to run. To be honest, even if the injury wasn't there , I had no chances of getting to my target time, cause I haven't been practicing. why I haven't, well I don't want to spend the whole blog whining so may be another time. This is what the plan

Today I started working out after the new gym after a huge gap of 4 months. There were the in between runs and marathons but nothing consistent. To add to it all the vacation time I binged.  I thought I would do Ok and 4 months wouldn’t have made a difference but boy was I in for a surprise. I felt dizzy and weak after 20 minutes of the circuit, serious enough for the disappointed trainer asking me to finish the workout with a couple of crunches. Don’t know what it was, the no pre workout snack (just a small banana) or the exertion, I felt like  sh *@. The disappointment was worse when it hit me, wondering and self doubting my conviction of whether I would ever be healthy. I cursed myself for all the inertia of the past four months .How could I do this , and while I gobbled the breakfast sandwich I told myself , I should say goodbye to running the Boston marathon. Until this video hit me like a bullet train.   http://www.wcvb.com/news/runner-with-muscular-dystrophy-vows-to-finis

This is not a fitness post just my empty mind playing games I always wondered what it would be like to not be a corporate horse. When the kids are away at school ,and I have the whole house to myself; how would I feel having time on my hands. I got a taste of it now. I am taking a break before joining a new firm. Princess is away on vacation with her grandparents and hubby dearest is at work as usual. I finished all the household chores, watched television ,nothing to watch really, and was wondering how do I keep myself busy. Quite frankly I don’t know what to do. I tried working out but I feel lazy. At the start of the vacation I had so many plans of going on runs and exercising and getting into the habit of waking up at 5am. All of those convictions just flew out of the window, partly the weather(it is so hot) and partly my procrastination. I even got my sketch books out but  the weather is wanting me to just doze off. The only saving grace is that I have finished most of my

My first marathon for the year was the Pinkathon Bangalore 2015 on the 22 nd of Feb. I had almost decided not to run it, but thank god I did. It was the most liberating experience to run   with 11,000 women from different age groups and strata. The month of February has been the toughest for me. First it was my mother who had the flu then my hubby dearest, followed by my princess and last me. A month of tending to the sick and then having the viral flu taking away all the reserved store of energy from my body, left me with zero exercise or workout.   I looked like a train wreck and work took away what little was left of me. So on the morning of the run while I looked at my sleep deprived self in the mirror I wondered whether I should just go back to bed.   The clocking reminding me that it was 4 am wasn’t helping, and then somewhere I mustered the strength in the deepest corner and got dressed. Tied my shoe laces and drove off to the venue. All the way I promised myself that i

The title of the blog is no pun intended. A study revealed that even a little dehydration can decrease your mental acuity by as much as 30%. That explains a lot of the stupid decisions that I have been making. Seriously,I am not joking. I have been told a zillion  times by health practioners, trainers, parents friends and tons of people to drink water and keep mysel hydrated. all to deaf ears, that also can be blamed to dehydration cause I have to be stupid not to take up such a simple advice. Back to the research I came up on it by chance while reading a book where the author decided to develop the habit of drinking water when he read about this. So I had to do some research of my own....the google god of course comes to rescue as usual. Here is what I found from the tons of results " The Brain is 85% water. Optimal brain function depends on water and lots of it. Water is what keeps the brain signals going. When the quality of water is compromised the signals are shor