Jai Jagannath; Jai Mata Di – thank you for giving me the strength and stamina to finish my life adventure goals of finishing 7 summits and 7 Ironmans.
Unfortunate Ironman California 2024 Signup :
I signed up for the race on September 2nd 2024, keeping a few things on my mind. 1st be with my daughter Aditi on her birthday on 2nd Nov, before I move back to India on the 3rd. 2nd I was mentally and physically at the lowest level in my life, after running for the MLA elections in Odisha. It felt like people betrayed me, my family betrayed me, there is no place for truth in Indian politics. My financials were a disaster, my silicon valley career is a disaster now, and with this big loss I was a disaster. I needed something challenging to fix myself.
I felt so lonely at home in California, even with my wife and daughters around. I wanted to run away from the normal world. I wanted to just get lost in the mountains till I regained my senses. I was feeling sorry, I am not giving quality time to my teenage daughters. I have been away from family for the longest ever 2 years, and back with them I am not finding my connections.
Luckily there were some spots open in Ironman Sacramento, in my backyard to say as I live here. Now there is some fire coming up in all the smoke I was in. I fixed my tri-bike and went for a ride. I ran around our neighborhood, Lake Natoma. My mood started changing, I started fixing things around my home. Fixed the freeze, the dish-washer, my Royal Enfield motorcycle, the cars, the outer walls, and I fixed my garden. Along with it I started training for the Ironman race, which seems to have reversed my path towards destruction.
When you are low, you find ways to go further low. Unfortunately, while fixing my Subaru, I had to go under it. The nut was too tight and while trying to release it, I put a lot of power and the jack slipped off. I was crushed under my own car. The entire weight of the car fell on my left shoulder, and I heard the sounds of breaking bones. My bad I did not put extra fixed jacks, and my sixth sense of safety did not work. I think when you are low, your hard earned experience gift of sixth-sense do not work. It was a disaster on a pile of disasters. This happened on 11th September, and the race is in 6 weeks. I was not living in the USA, I had canceled my health insurance, and I had no money to go to an expensive private hospital. The only way out was to put ice 12 hours a day, and use the hard straps from previous accidents. Could not move for 10 days, just sit and watch TV and read books. Well maybe that was part of the plan God had for me. The idea of canceling the race and making life more miserable was not attractive. What worst can happen, physically I cannot run a mile, mentally I am a lone pig failure, emotionally I hated myself, financially I am broke, BUT there is no further low I can go. So I decided no matter what I will complete the race. I did not even have an x-ray done to find what was wrong inside my left shoulder, which bones are broken. It is moving but I can not lift even a 1KG weight.
Never Loose Hope
After 10 days of the accident I started training with one hand. Motivated my wife to go to India and attend the golden jubilee celebration of her college and not give it up for me. Also take care of our business, as I cannot go in this condition. In return I will take care of the house and the kids and will have enough time to train for the race. It worked, I fixed a disciplined plan for the next 28 days. Morning 6 wake-up, do the breakfast for the kids and drop them to school. Thereafter I do the gardening and clean the house. Then I go for a 6 mile run. After which I come back to do the strengthening of the legs and the working hand for 2 hours. Then spend 2-4 fours of exercising on my static training cycle depending on when the kids come back from school. Cook dinner, clean dishes, read a book and go to bed early around 9:30 PM. Things started looking good in 2 weeks, from 2 hours I slowly increased the training to 6 hours a day. Last 2 weeks before the race, I will alternate between long bike rides and long runs every other day. I was shit scared about the swim, not even sure I will be able to get into the wet-suit, and how will I move my left hand. I avoided swimming till the last 4 days of the race. It was so painful on the first day of swimming to breathe from the right side which I am used to. Pain is the mother of new ideas to find alternate ways to swim. I quickly learned how to only breath on the left side and swim with minimum use of my left hand. Next 2 days I could swim up-to 3 KM in the pool. That gave me confidence, as the Sacramento Ironman swim is all downstream the American River. I just have to glide myself.
The race day – Ironman California 2024
Thanks to an idea from my fellow racer Ironman Amrik, about the rice ladoos or rice cake. I cooked sticky rice in coconut milk, added jaggery, shredded coconut, pistachios, dates to it and made 12 rice ladoos, 1 for every hour. My kids were the only support for the race. My daughter Aditi and our exchange student from Germany, Jakuk joined me for the race day. We started from home at 4:30 AM. We filled up the bottles, fixed the bike and the run gear and then I was off on the shuttle to the swim start.
The Swim (1 Hour 5 Mins for 4 KM):
It was a cold day, by the time my swim started it was 7:26 AM, and the water temperature was 15’C. With no open water swim practice, I was anxious, but the 3 days of practicing to swim with one hand and breath only on one side, and the downstream flow of the American river helped. I could swim non-stop till the finish line. 1 hour 5 minutes, the best swim time for me for a 4 KM distance. Wow! I do not wear a watch or any electronics to track my performance ever because it distracts me from the fun of the race. I just knew I had a great swim, till later I found out about my timing. My right hand was completely numb as I was extensively using it, so in the transition I had to request fellow races to zip and unzip my swim and bike gear. It took me 18 minutes to fix myself and go to my cycle, way too slow than any racer.
The Cycling (6 Hours 17 Mins for 180 KM):
I started slow and steady, as I cannot put pressure on the left hand. I would put the left hand on the right hand, and adjust most of the power to the right hand. The parallel bar helped and the figure 8 shoulder straps helped a lot by transferring the power from shoulders to armpits. The rice cakes were like a miracle of energy and stomach stability. On other races I would take the commercial supplements and suffer indigestion and gas all throughout the race. But this race was absolutely smooth. The headwinds did bother me while going up, but I stick to the plan of being on low gear, so I am not tempted to go fast, even If I want to. After 80 miles or so, I realized I have saved too much of the energy, there you go I was on fire the last 30 miles with 32 km/hr average speed. It was a great cycling time of 6 hours and 17 minutes for 180 kilometers. With one hand not fully operational, it takes time to change. From bike to run transition I took 11 minutes, again too slow, but not bad. Slow and steady wins the race, proved!
The Run (5 Hours 1 Min for 42 KM):
Again, I have it in mind, I will take it slow and steady. My run started at 3:19 PM, running with an average pace of 11 minutes a mile. Around half way I was very tired, so started walking, thinking no matter what even if I walk the rest I will finish in great time. But then I started chanting Jai Mata Di and Jai Jagannath vigorously and started breathing forcefully. That acted like magic, instead of walking I could finish the race all the way running. And to my surprise I was able to finish the race within 13 hours. Never give up, everything is possible with discipline and hard work.
Special Thanks to Support Team
Aditi and Jakub – My kids, my only support for the race, fed me with rice cakes everytime I crossed them on the race. Hats off to them they had been running around since 4 AM.
The made in Odisha Finish Line
It was a proud and honorable moment to put on a made in Odisha, Sambalpuri Shirt on a world stage at @inronmancalifornia. I wish all Odias to be more active and carry way more pride anywhere in the world they go. #MakeOdiasFit
