Tolerance – The basis of humanity

When we performed science experiments in our school or college, we learnt it’s impossible to get the ideal result in the lab. The reason being the losses due to various factors in real life scenario.

While we all appreciate and understand the basis of this, we do not apply this to humanity in general. We are tuned to apply this learning to all inanimate objects like an electric circuit for example.

It isn’t very rare that we talk about corruption in government and polity in general. We all have been there and play a higher moral ground and also make severe criticism of the people holding important positions or the entire government in general.

Two things struck me during a short WhatsApp conversation with my school buddies and wanted to capture it before it evaporates.

Firstly, it makes no sense at all whatsoever that we as people take such moral stand when most of us cannot claim to be a yogi ourselves. one may argue that it’s democracy and expressing opinion is our fundamental right. As I’ve heard earlier, the real test is what a person chooses to do when he is in a position to take advantage. Would he/she still do the same that would be expected of others? Would I? Would You? Something to ponder about.

Secondly, back to my science experiment analogy, life is real and certainly far from ideal. Humanity as such has been corrupt from the word go. There’s an evil in us deep down which needs to be managed or controlled. That’s what I would like to refer here as the tolerance or the losses of our experiments in school.

As human while we have the gift of engineering and striving for improvements all the time, it’s important to remind ourselves that we can minimise the losses and keep the tolerance to the lowest but never get it to a not.

Songwriting: My first song

My Son’s first song he wrote for a competition during the lockdown period. Please like and share.

Ishan diaries blogging

Quarantined

I’ve reached the heights of boredom

Been so homesick of home

Never been so lost

Just please let me go roam

Can’t recognise my friends

I’ve been gone so long

Been sanitising my brain

And writing this song

Can’t feel the morning breeze

With no sign of tomorrow

I’m beginning to sneeze

Well, I’m allergic to sorrow

I’ve wasted my whole vacation

Doing a whole lot of nothing

All this is a setup

Who would do such a thing

I’ve been to the year 3000

Humans live underwater

The apocalypse is rising

Cause the earth is getting hotter

Say goodbye to the world

Before it’s too late

There’s a small chance we can save it

Well, that’s just fate

– Ishan Pathikonda

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RAN to celebrate a year of CYCLING!

It is close to one year since I got on the saddle – the long last love! Looking back at the year, I feel that it has been one of the best years of my life.

Out of sheer happiness and joy I did something I had never imagined I could or would have ever done. I RAN to my office which is 18.36 kms from home. It took 2:01:05 at an average pace of 6:35. Even though I’ve completed half marathon, this is a special event and very close to my heart. The run itself was a phenomenal experience. At work, I hit the gym stretched and did some push ups. During the workday I felt completely normal with slight tightness in the calves. None of my colleagues could notice a sign of fatigue during the busy day 🙂

Route taken: Bannergatta road > BTM layout > madivala market > koramangala ooty chocolates road > inner ring road > Domlur > thippasandra > bagmane tech park.

This is my way to celebrate the joy of 1 year of cycling 🙂

Following are some splendid memories from the year:

• Trek 7100 from BOTS on 21st april 2011
• first commute to work – 18+ kms one way in 55 min
• making office commute a habit. 4-5d a week for nearly 6 months
• first 50, first century, first 150
• got a cannondale five from RR madivala in August
• Nandi ride from home
• bike rack for my fiat adventure from Kynyny racing
• weekend rides with cyclingandmore.com. I guess I’ve participates in 4-5 events so far
• first Mysore ride on kanakapura road and the second one on the state highway
• multiple weekend rides around Bangalore including my favorite harohalli-jigani climb
• brevet 200
• recent office commute at 23.9 kmph avg – 18kms in 45min!
• Over 5000 kms of cycling in all

With all the energy and inspiration drawn from cycling, i extended into the following too:
• taught Ishan my 4 year old to cycle without support wheels. I could run continuously behind him discovering my new love – running!
• Bangalore ultra 12.5 kms in 1:21
• auroville HM in ~2:30
• trekking with treksandmore.com
And finally my celebration RUN to office!

As you can see it has been one hell of a year. I believe this is my turning point. I’ve got inspired by many and have hopefully helped a few in embarking their own journey.

One very special thing happened in the mean time. I’ve made a zillion friends along the way.

I would like to thank everyone for the motivation and inspiration! Everyone I have met and interacted have made a difference in way you cannot imagine and I cannot explain! Thank you all!

Blog written up in April 2012. Quite late but publishing anyway 🙂

The Nandi Climb!

The Nandi!

The Nandi! This one’s on everyone’s list at all times or so it seems. New riders want to do their first, experienced riders want to beat their best! On top of that every now and then people you meet talk about having done it during their childhood. The latest is my cycling buddy Anil Kadsur doing the climb running bare foot!

What’s all the fuss about anyway? Nandi may not be the toughest climb but is certainly the toughest around Bangalore! It is roughly 400 meter climb in just over 7kms.

Like any Bangalore cyclist, I wanted to do the Nandi climb too. As always, after a few email exchanges Shankar, Kalyan and few others signed up. Others dropped out over night leaving 3 of us behind 🙂

The next morning Sep 03 2011, I started from home at 5:30am on my Canondale Five MTB reaching Hebbal Flyover (24kms) at around 6:40am. After a short wait Kalyan arrived on his sparkling new Trek 3700 MTB. He told us later that he cleaned his bike for every ride. Hope my bike did not hear him say that 😛 Shankar caught up at Chandra cafe in Yelahanka. We finished our breakfast and started the expedition.

Shankar had done the Nandi climb 4.5 times on his MTB none in the last one year. On this ride, he wanted to do it on his road bike targeting sub 40’s. Kalyan had done it once before a couple of weeks ago. He just wanted to be better at it. Me, no expectations whatsoever! All the things I heard about Nandi had me rather confused. All I wanted was to kill my curiosity 🙂

Shankar was keen to avoid the busy Airport rode and all the construction along that way. We decided to take the alternate road through Doddaballapur road. We were to ride 50kms more to the base and then the 7km climb.

As we started, Shankar shot off on his road bike while Kalyan and I rode together on our MTBs. Being my first time I rode conservatively so I could give it all during the climb. We took a couple of short breaks on the way. The weather was very good at this time, cloudy and not much winds. The traffic seemed a little aggressive but was okay. The long deserted road just after we made a right turn at Doddaballapur reminded me of Mr Bean’s holiday where he waits for a lift forever 🙂

Kalyan posing during on the Mr Bean's Holiday Road

Shankar and Kishan posing on Mr Bean's Holiday Road

We arrived at the base at about 10:30 or so I think. I had clocked 75kms from home by now. I was a little tired probably due to the small breakfast but no lack of enthusiasm!

We took a rather longish break over there. All three of us had maggi which almost seems like a tradition! In the meantime, 3 riders one of them with his son arrived one after the other, Rajesh, Hari and Ravi. Rajesh was complaining that he took 2 min more due to the winds (he had done 24 min!!). These guys are racers and professionals at cycling. It was an good experience to meet someone of that standards.

Rajesh Nair and Kishan Kumar at the Maggi Place

Bikes at Nandi Base

The Climb that matters!
We rode over to the junction (small bull statue) which marks the start of the Nandi climb and began our expedition. We set out stop watches and started together. Our roadie took off and was almost out of sight in no time at all!

Kalyan took off too and was about 15 feet ahead of me. I paced myself and was focused on my own effort. My aim was to cover the distance and not to break a record. So, I just took it easy. To my surprise, I was on 2×6 I suspect right at the start. I’m a 2×7 rider and this kinda felt sad buy it’s the Nandi – right? It’s got to be like this I thought!

Kalyan started mash up’s right at the start at about 100 meters into the ride. I said to myself “no mash up’s dude” and kept going. I saw him make a short loop and continue on the ride. I guessed it was his way to build momentum (It was not until the next day while talking to Sreeharsha i got to know that the technique is used when a gear does not engage during a climb). I was not sure what gear selection he was on nor how he was approaching the climb but to my surprise, I was overtaking him even before we both had done 1 km! I was still doing 2×6 and quite comfortable at it.

I was happy to see the Nandi Hills 7kms sign soon enough. That is a source of inspiration and a natural countdown, something to cheer me up at regular intervals! I worked through the first 4 kilometers shifting up and down in the second gear. When I saw the 3 kms to Nandi board, I wondered if I could to the entire distance in 2x combination. Wouldn’t that be something? That became my soft target now. I was very eager now.

I quenched by thirst on the go to avoid breaks early in the ride. Fortunately, there were a few breathers till this point allowing me to do that. While my focus was completely on the ride I did pay attention to some details on the way. Firstly, the groups of monkeys spread at regular intervals staring at me and probably saying “Humans…!”. The next one worth mentioning is the passing motorists all with different expressions on their faces. I could read a few which were like “What the…”, some showing a thumbs up, while others screaming to make me look silly. The third one rather humorous is the regular sighting of young couple acting like they had stopped to make some adjustments to their hair or the motorcycle or if nothing else seating position 🙂 needless to mention the lonely motorcycles and scooters parked by the sides. Wonder where the riders were!! 😉 Last but not the least is the breathtaking view of the landscape from the hill!

By now I had seen the 3kms sign and was still on 2x selection. Just when I was feeling strong about it, I encountered a killer hairpin bend. I stuck to as left as possible to get the best line. The right hand side of the road looked like a slide. Infact, a ford ikon that passed me was probably Lowe than my knees! This is when my soft target vaporized as I had to switch to 1×3. After getting past the hairpin, I was able to move up and down 1x with occasional switch to 2x.

I made it this far without a single break. Hey, why not make that my new soft target? Fortunately, I was not too thirsty now. I could do this ONLY if I controlled my mind and the temptation for a break due to the toughness of the climb.

I crossed the 2kms sign board now. This next kilometer was crazy. Every stone and rock was inviting me to rest my leg on it. I tried to look away from those darn things but it was not easy!

I managed to hold it together and reach the 1km sign! This is when the darnest thing happened! I was very tired by now and losing momentum steadily! I was in 1x combination for most part and arrived at another killer hairpin i took a brave decision to mash up in 2x, gain momentum and then switch back to 1x. It was a simple plan but failed miserably! As I had imagined, I switched to 2x, mashed up but then my bike would not switch back to 1x. I was basically screwed! There I was right in the middle of a hairpin bend stuck in between 1x and 2x!! I tried various things like giving it a pause, pedaling backwards slightly, etc. None seemed to work. I was adamant not to put my foot down – literally! I switched back to 2x and continued mashing up. I saw another hairpin bend and eagerly tried switching again but failed too, forcing me to go back to 2x! I gave it my all and continues the mash up.

To my great and most pleasant surprise, just after that hairpin bend, I caught the sight of the Arch. I’ve never in my life felt so good on seeing an Arch (other than my wife Archana whom I call Arch!). The last kilometer was really not a kilometer fortunately. I saw Shankar sitting just next to the Arch surrounded by people. I had made it! I entered the arch, got off the bike, shook hands, parked it and sat down! I had clocked 50min to the top without a break. Kalyan arrived a few minutes later. He clocked 1:02 and Shankar had done 37min, his first roadie and sub 40.

We all posed at the arch and celebrated with a drink and a couple of popcorns. We did not mind a monkey snatching away one of our popcorns too. We were all too happy for that 🙂

Kalyan

Shankar

...and that

The descent was fun! We did not bother to time it but we were probably down in 10 min! Kalyan recorded the descent on his iPhone camera . I’ll add the video as soon as I have access to it!

We had lunch at the base and started riding back. We faced some terrible headwinds on the way back. In fact it was so bad that I was using similar gear combinations as the first 4 kms of the climb!

Kalyan split at Chandra Cafe, Shankar and I went on for another celebration at the corner house before we split. I rode till the hebbal flyover with a great interest in doing 150 but gave up on that and dumped myself and the bike in an autorickshaw. I hide my guilt of cutting short the ride behind the fact that my nephew was waiting for me to setup his Xbox 🙂

And that’s all folks. Thank you for your interest and sparing the time to read my wonderful experience! Look forward to hear your comments/views…

Following are a few related links:
Nandi hall of fame
My ride on endomondo
Kalyan’s album on picassa

Century ride!

I was pretty close to finishing my 21 consecutive days and also coincidently one work month of office ride. It was a Thursday and I knew nothing could stop me from achieving the target. What I needed now was a good way to celebrate it. I checked with my half century buddy Anil Kadsur if he was up for the weekend ride. After exchanging a few texts we both were set for doing a 60 or 70 kms ride on kanankapura road. 100 kms was always our hidden agenda but none of us really wanted to talk about it 🙂

As expected I completed the 21 rides on the Friday. It was celebration time now! Few more last minute texts with Anil and we were set for Saturday morning. This time I was determined to be punctual and arrived at the meeting spot at 5:42 am. Anil was there soon enough not even wanting to stop to say Hi! I scrambled to resume the runkeeper app, pocketed my iPhone and stepped on the pedal!

Weather seemed to be perfect for the ride. We were hoping that Sun does not shine on us through out the way.

The first incident: Even before we rode 5 kms, we faced the first incident! A jeep parked on the left side of the road suddenly made a U turn right in our faces. I braked to a screeching stop while Anil rode around in front of him screaming B*****D! The shamelessly guy turned around and fled away. We continued.

Surprisingly we were at the Sri Sri Ravishankar Ashram in no time and also at the Guhantara right turn from where we had made a U turn to complete our half century just 2 weeks ago! Now growing strong about my century intention, We decided to target kanankapura village which would be the 50 km mark.

We made a quick stop at a small tea stall.

There’s Anil texting away someone

Well we had our tea quickly and continued on our way. We were determined to go a good long distance without breaks and we did! We were doing about 22-23kmph most of the way. The route is really very beautiful with lakes, greenary, small villages and most importantly climbs and downhills all the way. I was getting thrilled to see every climb as it would be a downhill on the way back 🙂

I was thinking there could not have been a better road for a century ride! As we completed 35 kms, the monotony started to get to me. The distance began to seem too long as every km appeared to pass very slowly. It was like time had slowed down. Anil probably realized this and started to distract me from my attention towards the passing miles! He was talking to me about the buildings, economics, politics and so on. He was also trying to get me to think about future goals after we complete this one 🙂

We kept going and kept going and finally there it was the green board “Kanakapura”! We had reached half the distance.

We pedaled around to find a decent breakfast place and narrowed down on Rathna Upahara. They served really yummy food. We hogged as much as we could and headed back. We really wanted a picture with the father of our nation in front of the local college building.

We had a strange experience taking this picture. The college kids were intimidated when we requested them to take our picture with Mr Gandhi. Then Anil was like “Why don’t you guys stand and we will take the picture” 🙂 Finally, one brave soul came forward and did us this favor!

We had refueled and also defueled by this time. We were now ready for our return journey. Weather was still holding up and looking good. It was around 8:45 and some sunshine but not very concerning. Anil told me let’s go non-stop for at least next 1:30 hrs. I nodded and got started.

Anil was already 50 meters ahead of me at the word GO! I knew I had to take it easy being my longest ride. I pedaled nice and easy working through the gears to keep my cadence constant. Anil was always in my sight but then I never really tried to reach him too. After clocking about 65 kms overall something strange happened to me. My legs felt stronger than ever and worked up the gears increasing the pace. I started inch closer to Anil and finally caught him. He asked me if I had crossed my longest ride which I had indeed. I told him that I felt like reserve energy had got released in my legs which he acknowledged. He then told me that he was constantly in 3×4 gear all the way and he did not look like he wanted to change those! I felt like all my effort in catching him suddenly looked trivial but I enjoyed it anyway!

Second Incident: After this point, we traded spots with each other for a short while. I would pass Anil in the downhills and he would get me at the climbs. We were passing a small village where we were riding together and a Good carrying Rickshaw cut me off forcing me to brake and stop instantly. Anil again taking the outside line yelled at him “Kameenay Diktha nahi hae?”. As we continued Anil tells me that he never uses his brakes unless he knows for sure he would hit something! That is an advise I’m going to ignore for a good long time to come 😉

We had negotiated a few badass climbs by now and were looking for the mother of all those by Sri Sri’s Ashram. We decided to take a short refuel break and gulped 400 ml of soft drink each. I remembered just then that I did exactly this during my school days. I was infact known for drinking pepsi all the time! Now I know why I did that. I used to cycle everywhere and would kill for a pepsi at the end of the journey 🙂

Anyway we continued our journey but only this time Anil simply disappeared out of my sight. My legs were really tired but my heart was ready for another 100! The average speed had dropped to 20’s. I did not want the overall average to drop below that but then I was more interested in clocking ONE followed by TWO zeros! This is when I had to negotiate the toughest climb of the route – The Sri Sri climb! Having negotiated this during the half century I had the confidence to take it. I think I had to switch over to 1×5 and for a brief period even 1×3 to make it through!

Third Incident: Anil was still out of my sight till now. As I got through the Sri Sri climb and rode a little more distance I thought I saw a cyclist on the side of the road messing with the chain. It was Anil. I stopped and rested by Bike against a tree or a pole. Anil tells me he had fallen down! I said WHAT!! He had actually fallen off as his bike got off the tarmac briefly and his footwear could not grip on the road to stop. He sustained minor bruises on his knee. He has actually fallen on the road fortunately no busy traffic at that very time.

His chain had slipped off the rear cogs and stuck on the side. I told him this is my area of expertise and took charge of getting it back on 🙂 From here on we cycled together. Anil and I decided that we shall celebrate our (rather MY) victory at the same place as we did our 50 – Adigas 7th block. We hit the traffic which took further toll on our averages but in the end I felt awesome that our average was still above 20’s.

When We reached Adigas we had both clocked over 100 kms in less than 5 hours. It felt awesome! The craziest thing of all was the salt remains from the evaporating sweat all over the body!

Anil as always a great ride buddy that he is was a strong moral support through out the way. He felt good for me too. We both sat around enjoyed a good kesari bath, carrot halwa and hot tea before we split!

Off to work on pedals!

I bought my Bicycle (Trek 7100) a Hybrid on Apr 22, 2011 from BOTS, Bangalore. I was told to get the bike back for a quick routine service within the first 3 weeks. That’s when I set my first target to cycle from home to work and back before this first service! Rohan’s encouragement and wifey’s confidence were great morale boosters!

I live at Vijaya Bank Layout off Bannergatta Road and work at Dell India R&D Center at the Bagmane Techpark in CV Raman Nagar. It is about 36 kms round trip.

I have cycled quite a lot during my school days but that’s a long time ago. Now, I’m 34+ with a less than fair focus on fitness. I had my feet on the ground though. I knew that I would need to consistently increase the distance everyday and taking one day at a time while practicing!

I had been using runkeeper app for iphone to track my morning walks. I used the same app to track my cycling sessions (distance, pace, calories, etc). With this app and loads of music on the phone, I was all set for the job!

Initially I did 5-10 km rides exploring paths around my neighborhood. During the second week, I rode to Bowring institute on St. Marks road covering 24 kms round trip with a 3 hour break in between. That same weekend, I carried the bike to Mysore hoping to continue the practice. On Sunday morning, I covered 18 kms at a stretch which is the distance to my work place too! These two events gave the much needed confidence for the office ride.

I looked up weather.com and May 12th looked like a good day (less chance of rain). I left the laptop and change of clothes at my work place the previous day.

On May 12th, I started my ride at 7:10am happily covering the 18.5kms to my office in 55 minutes. I felt awesome and confident to get back home easily. Since rain was expected in the evening, I left around 2:30pm riding in the hot sun. It took nearly the same time but was completely exhausted when I got home. The target was achieved 🙂

As I complete this write up which happens to be my very first blog, I feel great that I did my second ride to work and back today (May 18th). This time with much ease and less exhaustion!