Onwards

After two kilometres, I saw Shikha bounding down Niti Marg. She was running forty kilometres compared to my measly time on feet run. But I think we both were happy to run together for the short time I had ahead of me.

As usual, we kept the conversation to a minimum. But I was curious to learn more about the her ultra run ahead.

She was running the Silk Route Ultra edition as part of the Ladakh Marathon series. When I checked it out later, it seemed brutal – starting at about 3000m and climbing to well over 5300m. She said she would reach nine days before to acclimatise for the run.

Can you feel it, I asked. The altitude. A somewhat dumb question, I thought.

Oh yes, she answered. Above 15000 feet, you can’t run, she said. I bet, I thought.

It was Independence Day, flags were everywhere, flags attached with bamboo sticks to car grilles, including police cars, many pillion riders holding the flag up, and runners too, flags at road crossings, clutched in the hands of little kids selling them – an assortment of the tricolour – just the way they sell a veritable carousel of merchandise depending on the time of the year – Santa Claus hats on Christmas, pichkaris for Holi – and if nothing else – there is always tissue boxes for cars. Thinking about this word independence, I looked it up.

Not hanging from, a literal description of this word, that offers hope and history.

Onwards to reading tomorrow’s plan, to intervals and training that was already making me calculate lap paces.