Injured my leg. Did not rest at all during the earlier 5 day rest period. Having a heavy leg from Friday. Had knee pain for the first few days. Now there is no pain but there is the general stiffness. I can't stand to give a lecture for 1 and a half hours. Went to the general physician today. His name is Satish Chandran. He comes to ISI. I went to his clinic. He has given me some tablets and some calcium tablets. He has asked me to eat non-veg. I opted for veg food in the mess for this month. I am paranoid you know. Yesterday I slept all afternoon and hence I couldn't sleep in the night well. Around 4-30 I felt a vomitting sensation and found the bathroom door locked from the inside. My neighbhour had locked. But fortunately I did not vomit. It was not there today. I checked my temperature with Chandru and he said ok.

The King is back.

Did a 45 minute run on Sunday ? Ever since then I am having a heavy leg and troublesome knee. Today I went for a jog can't do my usual 30 minute. I think I have injured my knee. I am going to take a week off and start my running only from next thursday. Hope I don't get over enthusiastic and start running after a 2 day break.

35:18 today with 21 rounds. I won't be blogging my running details anymore. I have opened a training log in the runnersworld and soon the link to see my training log will be given. Only the interesting things will be blogged say for instance if I take part in some race.

ssundar

33:29:15 today with 20 rounds.

30:17 with 18 rounds.
Struggled a lot today. Is it due to walking the entire Lodhi gardens, Janpath yesterday or am I giving some lame excuse ?

Olympics

Writing this post after having drunk two bottles of beer. As I was drinking beer in Mandarin court ( a hotel opposite ISI) ,I was watching some olympic highlights. I thought of writing this post about some of my memories from watching olympics. I was born in the year 1984 an olympic year. But I could not have remembered anything that happened in my life in the year 1984 let alone olympics. I don't remember anything from 1988 olympics either. The only rememberance that I have of the 1988 olympics in Seoul is that my brother Walters broke the " manual remote"( the channel turning device ) in our television while swithing from some channel( must be Rupawahini, a srilankan channel as DD and rupawahini are the only two channels available in Tuticorin in 80's and the early 90's) to DD to watch some football match. So let us start with the 1992 Barcelona olympics.
1992 Barcelona: Can not remember much. I can remember sergie Bubka running for some pole vault event. Did he win that olympics ? Some random gymnasits doing some bars, some diving that's all.

1996 Atlanta: I watched the 200m and 400m men's competition in atheletics when Michael Johnson set the world record. I still can remember the huge margin that he had over the silver medalists in those events. Agassi, silver medalist ( I don't know his name) and Leander Paes in the medal ceromony, some gymnasts and some diving and Carl lewis doing longjump. That's all

2000 sydney: Can remember a little more. Thorpe losing the 200m freestyle to Van der Hoogenband, Inde jui bruin ( a dutch swimmer ) winning her freestyle event, Thorpe anchoring Australia to the relay gold overcoming the US and ofcourse the Cathy Freeman's 400m run. I also remember Marion Jones winning her 100m gold with a huge margin. Some Srilankan sprinter came second, I beleive. Who can forget the 10K run when Haile Gerbaissle won the gold medal. I also watched the hockey finals but I don't remember who won. Is it spain or Netherlands ? I think it is spain.

2004 Athens : I was in my second year B.Sc in my college. That was the only other time except now when I used to run regularly in the morning. I can remember a day when my friend Thiruviyaraj and I was discussing how India lost to some team at the last few minutes in a preliminary round. I distinctly remember watching the 200m freestyle swim tagged the battle of titans by the Hindu which was won by Ian thorpe followed by van der Hoogenband and Michael Phelps. Also can remember telling Thiruviayraj about Phelps' exploits. El Gourrej winning 1500m and 5000m, Australia winning the hockey gold and more gymnasts are my remembrance from 2004.

2008 Beijing: I haven't watched anything live. I have wathced all the events only in Youtube. This is alos the first olympics when I was away from my home. The only live events that I have watched are Federer losing to Blake, 100m ( Some style) where liesel Jones won her gold medal and ofcourse Usain bolt's 100m run. I missed Phelps' swimming and Bolt's 200m. But thanks to youtube I had watched all of them.

ssundar

21 rounds in 35:47:31.
Saturday: rest day
Now the goal for the next week is to break the 25 rounds/45 minutes barrier.

33:14:27. It is raining now. Got up a little late at 6.30 today and went to the park at 7.00. Struggled with the run a bit.

Finally got back on track. Did 20 rounds in the park in 34:29:87. Did 15 minutes on Monday evening. My running got shifted to evening in the past few days and I finally managed to wake up today to go for a run.

Today I ran the qutab culture complex route. I started from Qutab hotel and reached the park in the culture complex and ran in the park. It took me 17 minutes to reach the park from Qutab hotel to reach the park and ran a little in the park adding upto a total of 30 minutes. The distance from the Qutab hotel to the park is 2.32 Km. From the walkjogrun.net, The following facts are found:
1) Speed 7.7 km/h
2) Pace 7.6 min/Km
3) 1 round in the park in the culture complex is about 700m

I ran exactly at the same pace as that of Yesterday. Since I ran 18 rounds yesterday, it follows that a round in the chota park is nearly 225 m. This is in contradiction to my earlier post. So I have to do more experiments to find out the distance of a round in the chota park. But I should point out that in my earlier experiment I was not using a stop watch and I got stuck in the traffic. I should do different routes and I should run in the morning to avoid traffic.

ssundar

32:27 with 18 rounds

The worst has happened. Injured myself. My back is paining a lot. I kept doing the toe touch exercise and hurt my back. Runner's world says that one should not do the toe touch exercise. Also the push the wall stretch also seems to be wrong according to Runner's world. All the time I was doing my stretching in a wrong way. Will take rest till Friday and hope to resume running from Saturday. I should learn the correct technique to run and to stretch. My goals for August have gone for a toss.
ssundar

38:56:87 with 21 rounds

32.44 minutes

Ran for 40 minutes today. I don't think I will run tomorrow. Feeling tired. Went to connaught place around 11.30 returned just now. The temptation to eat out forced me to go. Ate full meals with sambar and without aaloo in Saravana Bhavan. Had sakarai pongal at the end. In ISI every meal will have some aaloo. Aaloo bhindi,aaloo pumpkin,aaloo sandwitch etc.... This combined with Dal makes one to fart all day.
Connaught place consists of three concentric circles with several radial roads connecting the circles. There is a park at the centre. There are lot of shops. One can get anything. I bought a timex watch which has a stop watch facility. I should not have gone in the morning as it was hot and I could not see many places. Will go once again in the night ?( ofcourse to eat my favourite Dosa in Saravana Bhavan)

Heavy rain today. So no running was ( is) possible. It looks like the rain will continue for a few days.

Did 38 minutes with 23 laps in the inner track. A disaster is averted. There is a way that connects the outer lap of the park with the inner one. It was blocked today by a string with nails. I didn't see that today ( I was running my 21st lap) till the last moment when a bhai told me dekho. Otherwise I would have had major injuries. Thanks sab.

ssundar

36 minutes in the morning.
20 rounds in the inner track with a final outer lap.
It makes a distance of 4Km.

ssundar

Sunday: 30 minutes
Monday:30 minutes with 19 rounds
Tuesday will be a rest day

Did 35 minutes in the morning starting at 6.25 AM. My stopwatch showed 35:27:21.

Finished running for the month of July. Nearly 450 minutes of running in July. I had covered atleast 45 Kms this month. I am having 20-25 minutes as my comfort zone level and always struggling in the last 5 minutes. Let me set some realistic goals for the month of August which I should reach by the end of Aug.

1) To make the comfort zone as 30-35 minutes and to push for 40-45 minutes.
2) Run atleast once a 5K route.
3) Run in the morning no later than 7.15 AM
4) Run atleast 20 days covering a distance of 60 Kms

30 minutes with 18 rounds

Same 30 minutes in the morning. Will push for 35-40 minutes tomorrow.

ssundar

After a long time I ran in the morning. Didn't do any experiments. Just ran for 30 minutes in the usual park. Struggled a lot with the breath. What is the correct breathing technique ? Inhale through nose and out through mouth ? Breath through the mouth ? Don't open the mouth at all ? I remember my PT teacher in my school used to scold for people opening the mouth while running. He used to shout "Vaaya moodu " and the students respond with "S***tha moodu". Any help here.
In the mornings, a baba with his disciples walk in the track and block the track completely. Every time I have to tell them "Sab, Side disiye Side disiye". Really frustrating !
I hope that I will continue running in the mornings. Difficult to keep up. Let me try.

Friday: 35 minutes. Till now the maximum. Completed one week without a puff.

Wednesday: 30 minutes with 16 rounnds

Monday:rest day
Tuesday: did 32 minutes with 17 rounds in the park.

Today I tried to understand my jogging a little bit. So I decided to run a route which can be plotted in walkjogrun.net to find the distance. I also wanted to run atleast 20 minutes so that my average speed can be worked out. So I took the route from Qutab hotel to the culture complex in the Press Enclave Marg through the Aurobindo Marg. The total distance is 2.41km. I took 23 minutes. As a result I find the following facts.
My speed is 6.25 km/hr which is really slow but I am comfortable in this speed. So it is ok. The distance of the track that I usually run (Recall the track of the "Chota park") is 180-185 m. The calculation is based on the statistic that I run 14 rounds in 25 minutes. So to run 5K it is necessary for me to run 45-48 minutes. So the next goal to reach is to push for 45 minutes of running which I will do gradually after consolidating my 30 minutes of Jogging.
Next Sunday, I will cross check this data by running from Qutab to the Panchasheel flyover through the IIT flyover. It covers a distance of 2.66 Km. See you with another piece of bullshit statistics next sunday. Till then Goodbye from Sundar.

Time: 7.00 PM
Duration:30 minutes

Yesterday I gave up my quit. Started my quit again today. Not going to count the number of hrs. I will count only by weeks and include the weeks in my blog.

Finally did 30 minutes of running. Felt great. Going to do 30 minutes twice a week and do 25-30 minutes the other days for the next few weeks till the first week of August. I should consolidate this 30 minutes start before pushing any further.
96 hrs without smoking. Was desperate yesterday ? Somehow managed to hang in there. I am going to treat myself at Karim's if I stay smoke free till this Sunday. Four days not able to concentrate properly because of not smoking.
Should get back to work from tomorrow. Should complete the local index formula computation for SU_{q}(2) for q=0 by this weekend. The important thing to remember is that I can jog and stay smoke free even in Chennai. It is for the work that I have come here. So make full use of it. Stay motivated.

Time:7.00 PM
Duration: 22 minutes

Got back to running finally after rain and other physchological troubles. Struggled a little bit. Not able to do the usual 25 minutes. Tommorrow will try the usual 25 minutes jog. 72 hrs without a cigarrete.

68 hrs without smoke

48 hrs without smoke. Take one day at a time. Go to sleep without a smoke.

43 hrs without smoke

Just 11 minutes today as rain played spoil sport.
25 hrs since I smoked.
From now on I will keep blogging not only the Jogging minutes but also the non-smoking hours.

Same 25 minutes again.

What a final!

Hi folks,
I decided to write something else in my blog other than my boring stats about my running. What a final that we had on Sunday. Nadal vs Federer. I thought the last year final was the best that I watched. But this year's one eclipsed that one. I like Nadal for his determination to return every single ball to the other side of the net. Stats will say that Federer made more unforced errors. But the truth is that Nadal forced Federer to go for the lines and hence he made more errors.
Federer made a great comeback after he lost the second set. The shots that he played to save some match points were truly sublime. My favourite moment is in the fourth set tiebreak. At 7-7, with Federer serving and with Federer all over that point, Nadal hit an impossible forehand passing shot as Federer was approching the net. Then the next point Fed hit an even better passing shot with his backhand down the line to save the match point. It was great tennis. How they must have felt ? We can't even think of such an experience. See the following video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKBRKok4Ltg
In the end Nadal's determintation and single mindedness won the day for him. Ofcourse, he played some amazing shots to beat Federer. I like Federer for his unbelievable shot making skills. I am in fact a Federer fan. I want Fed to win the French open which now seems increasingly difficult. But now after this final, I simply admire Nadal for his fighting spirit. He has become one of my sporting heroes.
I always preferred sportsmen with never say die attitude than the ones with more skill. Steve Waugh to Tendulkar for example. In sports, whatever one says , one always plays to win. In batting, the sole purpose is not to give your wicket. It doesn't matter if you take a short ball on your ribs than hooking and getting caught.( Stolen from Stevewaugh's autobiography). Same in tennis, put the ball across the net with a single handed backhand or a double handed one.
Vamos Nadal ! I am desperate to get back at IMSc and play some tennis. It doesn't matter if I play with the guy who considers him an artist or the guy who is really an artist but also a master at breaking racquets or with the one who can read about deformation quantization all day but can't run for 12 fucking minutes in the treadmill.

ssundar

Time: 7.00 AM
Rounds: 14
Duration: 25 minutes

On Sunday, I did 25 minutes of jogging nonstop. It is the maximum that I had run. I did 14 rounds. Today I did not run as I took it as a rest day. Tomorrow morning I will try to do 25 minutes again and push for the 15th round. My veins are showing up in my arm. I am so happy. I am studying well too.

I did 23 minutes today. I finished 13 rounds. Next target is to push for 30 minutes. I will try to improve by a minute everyday.

Today I went for a jog in the morning. I woke up at 6.30. In Delhi, Sun comes out only late. Even 7.30 won't be hot unlike in Chennai. I did 12 rounds today. It took me 20 minutes. Today I found that I can do 8,9 rounds with ease and the struggle starts only around round 10. A week earlier I was struggling at round 5,6 itself. So every time I run I will push the limit by a little. So now the minimum 20 minutes is established, I am going to jog for x minutes where x \geq 20.

Again 18 minutes of 10 rounds for the last two days. Today, I will try 11 rounds. Tomorrow is rest day and by Sunday I plan to hit 20 minutes.

Yesterday, I did 10 rounds in 18 minutes. This is the maximum that I did since I started running in Delhi. My next target is to hit 20 minutes. I am going to take it easy today as I am trying to do jogging in the morning. So I should wake up early in the morning tomorrow.

Yesterday I forgot to take my watch to the ground. I ran 9 rounds in the track in "Chota park".
One round is approximately 150-170 ms. I don't know. I think I had run for 15 minutes. Today, I am going to try for 10 rounds.

ssundar

Hi, today I ran for 14 minutes. There is a beautiful park near ISI Delhi called "Chota park". For the last three days I have been jogging at a reasonable speed for 15 minutes. My short term aim is to run 5K when I return back to chennai. I should do the following. 1) Hit the 20 minute mark by July 1 2) Hit 30 minutes by August 1. 3) Wake up early in the morning 4) Don't sleep in the afternoon unlike so that I can sleep around 12 in the night. 5) Work well during the day.