Wisdom From A Dentist's Chair

“Trust thyself; every heart vibrates to that iron string...Insist on yourself; never imitate...Where is the master who could have taught Shakespeare? Where is the master who could have instructed Franklin, or Washington, or Bacon, or Newton? Every great man is unique...Shakespeare will never be made by the study of Shakespeare.” 

-Ralph Waldo Emerson on Self-Reliance

I had been searching for ‘The Answer’ since the last 7 years. My search as a runner has been for ‘The Perfect training program’. The best program, which would help me ‘Arrive’.

For 7 years, I have been searching for the best training program which I can follow like one follows religious scripture.  Which is the boat that will take me across to the Promised Land?  

My moment of clarity arrived at the unlikeliest of places.  My search ended at my dentist’s office. 

Let me explain.  My dentist, Dr. Nipa Diwanji, is also a runner.  She is absolutely the best dentist in India.  Unfortunately, I cannot say that about her running ability.  But, Dr. Nipa is a perfectionist at work and this personality trait also compels her to continuously try to improve her running ability. 

Just like me, the good Doctor, is also continuously looking for the best and greatest training program to help her run faster and further.  But it’s still just a work-in-progress. 

As I entered her office last week, to have her look at my nagging toothache, I noticed a book on her desk: “Run Less Run Faster” by Bill Pierce, Scott Murr and Ray Moss.  The book claimed to help runners train to qualify for the Boston Marathon. 

I was delighted.  This was the Holy Grail I had been searching for. A panacea for all my problems! This is the boat which will carry me to the Promised Land. I want to run a 4:15 at the Tokyo Marathon in February and this training program would surely help me get there!

The Dentist’s chair always reminds me of a medieval torture device. And as I settled in for an extended torture session on ‘The Rack’, I tried to distract my mind by thinking of my 7 year search for the greatest marathon training program.    

The search has been unending.  I have tried all the programs that are out there. I have tried out programs by Tim Noakes, Jeff Galloway, Joe Henderson, Art Liberman, Bob Williams, Pete Pfitzinger, Jack Daniels, Alberto Salzar and perhaps a dozen others suggested by every possible Running magazine. 

So now, is my search at an end?

But as Dr. Nipa prodded and poked around my mouth with all kinds of sharp knives, I wondered whether the best program for me is out there somewhere or is it already inside me.  To attain my goal of running faster and further, must I search outside or inside of myself?

With the help of an X-ray, the good Doctor soon diagnosed the source of my toothache. She opined that the 3^rd Molar needed to be extracted. Oh! How I hate my Dentist.

As she started preparing an anaesthesia injection (which in my opinion was big enough to put an elephant to sleep), I kept thinking about my search for a perfect marathon training program.

As she started her torture session, I remembered a story once told by Osho: 

“There was once a King who was searching for the greatest religion in the world.  He had been searching for it since he had been a young man and had not still found it.  And since he had not found a perfect true religion, the question of living a religious life in accordance with it did not arise for him. 

He called on scholars, saints and philosophers to help him find the greatest religion.  They came and they argued amongst themselves and found fault in every religion out there. Each claimed that his religion was the best and greatest. So the King never found the greatest religion.  But he never gave up his research; it had become his play.  However, as death came closer, he became restless.  Now he became desperate to find the greatest religion, which could lead him to God. 

One day a beggar came to the palace to beg and finding the King worried and depressed, asked the reason.  The King replied, “How can you help me even if I explained? The greatest scholars, saints and philosophers have not been able to help me.”           

The beggar then said, “It is possible that their greatness was in-itself a barrier for them?”

The king looked at the beggar attentively.  The beggar continued to speak, “I can do nothing. In fact, I do not exist. But the one who exists can do a lot.”  

The King spoke up, “I wanted to seek out the highest religion and make my life religious but this has not been possible.  Which is the highest religion?”

The beggar laughed and said, “Oh King! What madness prompted you to seek out the highest religion?  Life does not become religious after you have found religion; religion is found only when life itself becomes religious.  Please come to the other side of the river outside your kingdom.  There, I can point my finger towards religion and God.”

They went together to the riverbank.  The best available boats were brought to them but the beggar would point out one fault after another in each of them. Lots of boats were brought and each one was rejected by the beggar, some as too big, some as too small, some as too plain, and some as too ostentatious.  

Eventually, the king became frustrated.  He said to the beggar, “Oh, great soul! We have only to cross this small river, we can even swim across. Let us forget about these boats. Let us get there by swimming across.  Why waste our time?”

As if the beggar had been waiting for this, he said to the king, “Oh King! I also wanted to say the same thing.  Why are you so concerned with the boats that signify different religious sects? Isn’t it best for us to swim across to God? In fact, there is no religious boat.  The only way is for us to swim.  Truth can be found only through our own efforts.  Nobody else can give it to us.  One has to swim in the sea of truth by oneself. There is no other support.  Those who look for support will drown close to the shore, but those who take courage and swim by themselves will manage to cross, even if they have a little taste of drowning at the beginning.”

As the good Doctor, drilled away inside my mouth, I reflected that over the last 7 years of running, I had collected fabulous amounts of information about running and running programs. I have lots of knowledge.  But knowledge is not wisdom, knowledge is just information.  Wisdom leads to a transformation.  I have collected knowledge on training programs, on shoes, on hydration, on hill running, on speed training and more.  I had filled my mind with lots of information.  Perhaps the time had now come to drop all this information. The time had come to transform myself.  

I felt that it was now time to put faith in my own experiences. 

7 years of running, thousands of kilometres, all over the world, has given me a treasure trove of experiences. It is time to create my own path, I need to be a pilgrim again and seek my own path to salvation.  I don’t need to borrow someone else’s boat; I need to swim for myself.  

I need to drop all the knowledge clogging my mind.  I need to be emptied of all this borrowed knowledge; for when I drop this knowledge, perhaps wisdom may arise.

I shall find my own Wisdom!

I was pulled out of my reverie, by the sound of Dr. Nipa’s voice. “Ok Amit, it’s done!” she said.

“What have you done Doc?” I asked, barely able to speak through my totally anaesthetised mouth. 

“I have extracted the third molar, it was impacted and I had to drill it out” she said.

“Speak to me in English Doc, which tooth is the 3^rd molar?” I asked.

“That’s your Wisdom tooth” she answered, “I just extracted the last of your remaining Wisdom teeth”

“OUCH!” is all I could say!

“The Way of the White Clouds”

“The Way of the White Clouds”

In 1785 Scottish poet Robert Burns in his poem “To a Mouse, on Turning Up in Her Nest with the Plough” wrote the lines:

“The best-laid schemes o’mice an’men

Gang aft agley

An’ lea’e us nothing but grief an’pain

For Promis’d joy!” 

For those of us who use the contemporary form of the English language, these lines can simply be translated as follows: “Shit Happens”

I had made some plans.  I had planned that I would run a 4:19 Marathon in Amsterdam on the 21^st of October.  The training plans had been made and put into action. The arrow had left the bow. The game was afoot. 

And Then...shit happened!

On the 16^th of August, I went for a haircut.  Half way into the haircut, my barber standing behind me asked, “Amit Sir, which is the strongest antibiotic according to you?”

I cringed. I shrunk into the chair.  I looked at his reflection in the mirror and in a voice filled with panic I asked him, “Why do you ask?”

“Oh Nothing”, he said, “I have contacted this really bad virus which does not seem to leave me.”

I looked at my reflection in the mirror.  Can I jump out of the chair and leave? He had already cut the hair on the right side of my head.  If I left then, I would have looked like half a Mohawk. 

I told him that it was a bad idea to call in clients when he was unwell.  I tried not to breathe for the next 15 minutes as he finished my haircut.

48 hours later, I lay in bed with 103 degree fever.  I cursed my barber. 

Why? Why? Why was this happening? 

As I lay in bed, my friend Raymond in Australia sent me an e-mail that he was injured and it seemed that his planned run at the Delhi Half Marathon seemed to be in jeopardy.  He lamented, “Why did I get injured just when I had started enjoying my runs?”

On the 18^th of August, as I lay sick in bed, wallowing in self-pity, I had my ipad next to me and I was fixated on following one of the greatest athletic endeavours about to be undertaken. 

Diana Nyad, a 62 year old athlete was about to swim from Cuba to Florida, a distance equalling 5 English Channels. A 164 km swim in shark and jellyfish infested open waters. She was to swim it without a shark cage.  She had been preparing for this attempt for a lifetime.  This was her 4^th attempt. 

What made this attempt incredible was not just that she was 62 years old or that the distance was too long.  What she had to face was also the unforgiving weather, the dangers of hypothermia, and the possibility of being bitten by sharks and venomous jellyfish. 

Diana had tried this swim before.  In 1978, at the age of 28, she had fought against raging sea currents which had pushed her off course, out of reach from land. 

30 years later, in 2011, she made two more attempts, the first attempt failed due to an asthma attack and the second due to jellyfish bites.  But in 2012 she had again collected over $3,00,000/- to put together a team of over 50 people to help her make one more attempt at the crossing.

As I lay in bed, burning with fever and filled with self pity, Diana jumped into the water. Every few hours I opened my eyes to log onto her website where her crew was posting updates. 

An escort boat “Voyager” was next to her. Her team of kayakers was protecting her from sharks.  There were shark experts and jellyfish experts, all working together to get her to the other shore. Diana had trained for thousands of hours to accomplish her goal.  She had undertaken countless swims for countless hours, training for this very day.  The rules were such that she could not touch the boat. She had to be even fed through a tube. 

On and on she swam. 

I prayed and cheered for her as I lay in bed and so did thousands of people around the world. We kept posting comments of encouragement on her Facebook page.  Diana was swimming for every middle-aged person like me.  She was telling me that I can have still have lots of dreams and desires, that I was not too old to push my limits.  She was swimming for all of us. 

Then the first jellyfish struck. A bite on her neck. Then the 2^nd, on her lips. A third on her hand, then a 4^th on her forehead. And on and on, jellyfish came in by the hundreds and the thousands. It became a minefield. They had to pull jellyfish tentacles out of her fingers.   The bites were debilitating and caused her excruciating pain, chills and asthma. She kept swimming.  

And then the first storm came in and blew her off course.  She swam on.  

After 40 hours of swimming she fought hypothermia and dealt with swollen lips and a swollen tongue. 

And then a second storm came in and simply settled in on her.  She kept swimming.

On August 21^st the update on her website simply said:

“7:42am EDT Diana has been pulled from the water.  We’ll have more information when it becomes available.”

Hot with fever, still in my bed, I cried.  I could not believe this.  Why? Why? Why?

After swimming for 52 hours and 5 minutes, on the eve of her 63rd birthday, almost 112km into the swim, Diana had been pulled out of the water because the storm had simply become too dangerous not only for her but also for the crew supporting her.  She had not wanted to stop.  She felt that the dream was within reach. She had the strength. But it was just too dangerous to carry on.  

Why didn’t Diana make it to Florida? Why did Existence conspire against her?

A few days later Diana wrote: "It's not in my nature to admit that no matter how much will you summon, no matter how much courage you express, no matter how much intelligent and complex planning you do, no matter the excruciating long hours of training, no matter the dedicated and expert individuals you choose to help you, sometimes you just don't arrive at your destination,"

Sometimes you just don’t arrive at your destination! The best laid plans of mice and men, Go often awry!

20 days later, my plans to run a 4:19 Amsterdam Marathon lay in ruins.  The virus left a cough in my chest which would just not go (exactly as my barber had complained).  A plethora of drugs had drained all the strength from my body.  To run a marathon as early as October seemed hard, to run a personal best time was out of the question.  I cancelled my race entry. 

Why? Why? Why do such things happen?

Osho says that asking such questions is foundationally absurd.  Why’s, he says, are always unanswerable. 

“The trees are – you cannot ask why

The sky is – you cannot ask why.

Existence exists, rivers flow, clouds float – you cannot ask why.”

Osho suggests that his way of life is that of the White Cloud.  He says that, “A white cloud has nowhere to reach, no destination, no destiny to be fulfilled, no end.  You cannot frustrate a white cloud because wherever it reaches, is its goal. It has no will. 

White clouds are not directed by the wind.  The phenomenon of direction exists only when there is resistance. 

If the white cloud wants to go east and the wind blows to the west, then there is direction – because resistance is there.  But the cloud is not going anywhere, east and west mean the same, there is no resistance. 

If there is no will on the part of the cloud, then the wind cannot direct it.  If the wind says east the cloud is ready, it is already on the move toward the east.  There has not been a single thought of no; there has not been a single denial.   The wind is not directing, direction is needed only when someone is against. 

But people have their wills and projections and desires and ideas.  They fight with the wind.  The more they fight, the more anguish is created.

One who understands existence stops fighting. He is not even trying to swim, he simply goes with the flood. He uses the current as a vehicle; he becomes one with it and moves with it.”

Osho calls this ‘surrender’.  

This acceptance of Existence without questioning is quite hard.  To simply accept what happens without asking ‘Why’ seems difficult. 

Dan Miller once said, “The only problem in your life is your minds resistance to life as it unfolds.”  The key then, to a happy life, is perhaps to simply accept that sometimes, “Shit Happens”

So now, I will try to live the way of the White Cloud. 

I am now a White Cloud. 

I am drifting...drifting towards...Japan...towards Tokyo...I should reach there...24 February 2013...just in time for the Tokyo Marathon.   

Idiots and the Tyranny of Goals, Log-books and The Comrades Ultra Marathon.

“So let it be written, so let it be done!” 

: From the Film “The Ten Commandments”

I am tired of finishing Comrades with just a few seconds to spare.  Earlier this year, I finished the 12 hour race (43,200 seconds) with just 140 seconds to spare.  Not only does that become a stressful day but in addition, I have also to listen to the constant scolding from Neepa who wants me to run faster and keep up with her.  This is indeed, too much stress. 

I start Comrades in the H seeding (5 hour qualifiers).  On an average we lose 8 minutes to reach the start line which in-itself is a major handicap.  To the best of my knowledge, statistics show that 30% of the runners who start in the H seeding won’t make the final cut-off.

The way forward for me is obvious.  One does not need to be a brain surgeon to figure out that the best way to finish Comrades is to run fast...or faster!  I have known this fact for the last 4 years but each year, instead of focusing on speed and endurance training for Comrades, I get seduced into pursuing all sorts of other races around the world whose distance and timing aren’t the best stepping stones for a good Comrades day run.  Consequently I end up messing up my Comrades training. 

No more!!

This year, I have decided that I shall be seduced by only such races that help further my love affair with Comrades. 

The first step is to bring down my Marathon time and consequently improve my start seeding at Comrades.  I have decided to run a sub 4:20 marathon which would put me into the F seeding and drastically improve my chances of finishing the race (provided I do all the other requisite training).

So I have put a plan into motion!

I have decided to run the Amsterdam Marathon on the 21^st of October 2012 and run a personal best time of 4:19 (My PB is 4:39). 

As any good businessman or for that matter sportsman knows...the best way to start achieving your goal is to write it down and then monitor one’s progress towards it.  For runners, it means choosing a marathon training program and keeping a log book. So on Sunday evening (22^nd July) after having run 20k in the morning and with 13 weeks to go for Amsterdam, I sat and made my program and entered it into my log book.  The program covered all the days from the 23^rd of July to the 21^st of October 2012.

The first week starting Monday 23rd looked like so:

Date	Planned	Actual	Remarks
Monday 22	8k easy + Gym (legs)
Tuesday 23	Rest
Wednesday 24	125x8hill sprints
Thursday 25	12k easy + Gym
Friday 26	400x10 speed
Saturday 27	Rest
Sunday 28	22k easy

On Monday and Wednesday I managed to run as planned. (The Rest days have never been a problem). But when the alarm rang at 5:00am Thursday morning, I felt tired and fatigued.  I always listen to my body and so I switched off the alarm and slept until 8am. The 3 additional hours of sleep cured me and I woke up refreshed but with terrible guilt for having missed the 12k.  The log-book is a terrible tyrant!

My first work meeting was at 10:00 am and the second was scheduled for 12:00 pm.  As I drove towards the 2^nd meeting, I happened to pass the Borivali National Park (a wild life sanctuary in the heart of Mumbai) where I occasionally run on the weekends. 

I could not resist!  I called up my client and requested him to delay my meeting by 3 hours in the light of some urgent personal work which had come up.  He agreed.  I asked Khwaja to drive into the park.  I asked him to stand guard as I changed into my Gym clothes (I have learnt to keep my shoes and a pair of running clothes in my car at all times). 

And I was off...running...in the middle of a work day...in the middle of the week.  I cannot recollect a happier moment in the near past. 

I quickly said a ‘thank-you’ to the Universe which gave me such a wonderful opportunity to Run!

The forest was incredibly beautiful now that the monsoons had arrived. Everything was lush green and there were small ponds everywhere.  It seemed quite different from how it seems to me in the early mornings.  There were fewer people and it seemed quieter.  Quieter, because I had stepped into the forest straight from the madness of mid-day Mumbai traffic. 

There were a few young lovers, sitting around on the benches, hugging and kissing and soon to be joining the ranks of Mumbai’s malaria infected.  I hoped that my constant motion would keep the mosquitoes away. 

As I ran, I realized that it was not my slavish devotion to the log-book plan that made me run in the middle of the work day.  This was more like a “call of the wild” thing.  Having recovered from fatigue with the 3 extra hours of sleep, I simply wanted to have my daily fix! My Time, alone with myself!

I thought about my obsession with my Goal of a 4:19 Marathon! I thought of my obsession with the Comrades Marathon. Is there any other way in life to set one’s target?  And what if I miss? Is the target realistic? Is the target achievable?

Different people have been known to set their targets in different ways.

I love a story once told by Osho about a King who loved archery.  

“Once, a King was passing through a small village.  The King loved archery; and was himself was a master archer.  All around the village he saw that on all the trees someone had drawn a bull’s-eye and had then shot an arrow exactly in the centre.  This archer had shot the bullseye every single time.   The King could not believe that in that small village there lived someone who was certainly a greater archer than himself.  The King himself was pretty good but even he was not always one hundred percent accurate. Once in a while he missed the target.  But here in this small village on the trees he saw circles and exactly in the middle an arrow.  Hundreds of circles on hundreds of trees and every single shot a bullseye.

The King said, “This is fantastic... even the best archer cannot manage this.  It seems so perfect.  I want to meet the man.” So he called the people and asked, “Who is the archer?”

They all laughed. They said, “Forget about him. He is the village idiot.”

The King said, “You don’t understand, You bring this man to me. His archery is perfect.  I have never seen so many arrows shot perfectly in the centre of the target”

The villagers said, “Your Highness, this man is the village idiot.  You don’t understand his archery. First he shoots the arrow and then he makes a circle around it. Naturally, he is perfect, always perfect.  And we have often tried to explain to him, ‘This is not the right way. First you should make the circle on the tree and then shoot.  In that way, one can miss.  This is the simple way, you never miss.”

As I ran through the forest, I thought about my ambitious target of a 4:19 marathon. Was this the best way to chase my target?

When I finished my run, I realized that I had run 14.5k instead of 12k.

And as far as my target was concerned, I knew that my arrow was already shot. 4:19 was a done deal! All I had to do now was to draw the circle around the target. All I had to do was train hard and show-up on the start line.

And I am no Village idiot...perhaps just an International one! 

Amit Sheth

International Ambassador: Comrades Ultra Marathon: The Ultimate Human Race.

     

My Iron Lady, The Comrades Ultra Marathon & Supraventricular tachycardia (SVT)

My Iron Lady, The Comrades Ultra Marathon & Supraventricular tachycardia (SVT)

I was recently reading a dissertation titled: Shakespeare’s Women: The Weaker Vessel or Stronger Sex? In this dissertation I came upon an interesting homily.  A homily is a commentary that follows a reading of scripture. In many Churches, a homily is usually given during Mass. Many people consider it synonymous with a sermon.

I read the following : “St Peter gives his precept saying: you husbands deal with your wives according to knowledge, giving honor to the wife as unto the weaker vessel, and as unto them that are heirs also of the grace of life, that your prayers be not hindered (1 Peter 3). … For the woman is a weak creature, not endued with like strength and constancy of mind, therefore they be the sooner disquieted, and they be the more prone to all weak affections and dispositions of the mind, more than men be, and lighter they be, and more vain in their fancies and opinions.”             

(An Homily of the State of Matrimony, 1562, from Aughterson, 1995, 23.) http://www.ukdissertations.com/dissertations/english-literature/shakespeares-women.php

I have also read some abstracts from the Indian scriptures of Manu, which dominated the Hindu mind for thousands of years.  They were filled with similar garbage.  He too was convinced that women were inferior to men and needed to be dependent, first on their parents, then on their husbands and later on in life on their husbands and their children. 

It seems obvious that these guys were suffering from massive emotional and mental problems; besides they didn’t get to meet some of the women I know.

Road to Comrades 2012: A story of Heartbreaks, Plantar Fasciitis and Backaches.

The road to Comrades starts, in all earnest, for Neepa and me with the Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon.  We ran that race in January 2012 as sub 5 pacers and then planned a second marathon in February. 

On the 6^th of February 2012, Neepa and I had planned a 12k run in the Borivalli National Park.  It is an out and back run. We first run a rolling 5k and then climb a 1k hill and then return to the start.   

We started running together around 5:30 am. At 5k, we reached the bottom of the hill and as I started running up, Neepa just fell back and started walking.  I continued running up and reached the top of the hill and then waited for her.  Almost 4 minutes elapsed before I saw her walking up.  When asked what had happened, she used our mutual running jargon and replied, “I just lost it”.  It meant that she had suddenly tired out.  She explained that she just lost her breath.  But then, she turned around and started running back down.  I passed her quickly and reached the bottom of the hill and again had to wait for her.  When she reached down she said that she was unwell, that something was not right, that breathing had become a problem and that her heart for racing. 

The National Park at this early hour in the morning is a car free zone.  Our car was parked about 5k away, outside the main entrance gate.  Neepa said that she will run/walk towards the gate and asked me to run ahead and complete my training run.  I told her that I was going nowhere leaving her alone.  As we walked slowly, we discussed that it was now time to do another ‘physical’ with our cardiologist.  It had been a little over a year since we had done a stress test.  After a few minutes of walking she started running again and I followed.  She kept telling me to run ahead but I refused.  With about 4 k to go, she said she was again feeling very uneasy.  I told her that she should just sit on a bench and that I will go and get the car in.  I sprinted towards the park gate.  I ran up to my car parked outside the gates and by this time the park was opened to cars. I paid the entry tax and drove towards Neepa.  By the time I got to her, she had walked another km.  She got into the car and said, “Let me drive behind you while you finish your run”.  I told her, “Let’s just go and get a cardiogram done right now”. 

Within a few minutes, Neepa started hyperventilating.  She shouted that we must get out of there and to a hospital. She started gasping for air. The noise coming out of her throat made me think that no air was going in.    

I raced the car towards the entrance and then onto the highway.  The closest hospital was about 20 minutes away (Nanavati or Ambani).  Neepa was sitting slumped against the window and gasping more and more loudly for each breath.  It seemed that no air was going in.  I drove as fast as I could on a Mumbai road.  I called one of my brothers-in-law, Dr. Amrish, who is a pathologist and told him what was happening.  Neepa’s side of the family (paternal and maternal) has a history of heart attacks and I was sure she was having a cardiac attack. I noticed that even as she gasped for air, she kept talking and thinking coherently. She said she wanted to go only to the Hinduja hospital which was a bit further away. Her decision probably had to do with the fact that  my nephew, Purujeet, a young doctor is currently working in the Casualty department of the Hinduja Hospital and that my other brother-in-law, Dr. Jnanesh, is a heart and lung transplant surgeon also attached to Hinduja hospital. 

I drove as fast as I could.  The family converged towards the hospital in their own cars.  All the time, Neepa gasped desperately for air and told me that her heart was pounding and racing and that she was feeling dizzy and near fainting.   I thought I was going to lose her.  I couldn’t believe that this was happening.

We zoomed into the entrance of the hospital, towards the casualty dept. My brother-in-law had phoned in and they were expecting us.  Neepa was put into a stretcher and they rushed her in. 

She moaned and gasped and I stood looking helplessly. They tore off her running vest and wired her up.  The monitor showed 200 heart beats a minute.  I walked outside and dialled my father-in-law who was at that time 4 hours drive away from Mumbai.  I told him that Neepa was having a cardiac event and that he should start towards the hospital.

A few minutes later they gave Neepa a shot of Adenosine. And then within a few seconds her heart beats returned to normal. She suffered excruciating pain in those few seconds when her heart “rebooted”. The family arrived and although nobody said a word, I knew that they were blaming running as a cause for all this. 

As I stood near Neepa’s bed, she smiled and said, “I am totally ok now.  I can run back home.  Let us get out of here.”

Of course, the doctors of my family were not going to let her move out of there until they did every possible test on her. 

4 hours later as we sat in the car we reflected on what we had been told at the hospital. Neepa had suffered from an attack of SVT.  It was an attack caused when her heart’s electrical system did not work right, causing it to beat very fast. 

Neepa and I had been scared out of our wits.  We had both thought that she was suffering from a heart attack.  The cardiologist on duty at the emergency had told us that her running days were over and that from now she had to be on some pills for the rest of her life. 

Although we drove home in silence, I knew that those words weighed heavily on her mind as they did on mine.  We were losing a part of our daily life which brings us so much joy.

We reached home and went to sleep.  We were physically and mentally wiped out.

We woke up in the evening, had dinner and went back to sleep.  The next morning when I woke up at 5:00 am, Neepa was already on the internet and Googling: “SVT and Running”, “SVT and Sports”.

 

By 7am she had concluded that she intended to continue running.

Over the next week we met with several cardiologists who specialize in treating SVT.  The best cardiologists in Mumbai informed us that the SVT attack was not caused by running or because we were running a difficult race like Comrades.  We were told that a SVT attack may or may not occur at anytime, to any person. It could occur while one was running or it could occur while one was at home lying in bed and watching TV. 

We were informed that SVT can be treated by either a cardiac ablation procedure or by drugs or as by some people who just learn to live with it and do nothing.  There were certain simple procedures like coughing, gagging, or putting ice-cold water on ones face or rubbing one’s eyes (called vagal procedures) or taking calaptin tablets SOS which can be used to deal with the attack in its early stages.  We also learnt that an SVT attack is not life threatening.        

Neepa refused to undertake a surgical procedure based on one SVT attack or go on life-long medication based on one SVT attack.  She concluded that she will continue running and just watch what happens.  She felt that she now knew what to expect and how to react in case she got another attack while she ran.  

Of the many possible causes of SVT, one of the major possible cause is caffeine or energy drinks/supplements (like caffeine strips) with a high caffeine content and Neepa usually drank 4-5 cups of strong black coffee each day.  She decided to give up coffee. She concluded that she will run with the calaptin tablets in her pocket and that she intended to run Comrades in 2012.

Three days later we stepped out again for a 5k, ten days later she ran a 42k.  I was away running the 3 Cranes Challenge in Africa and so she ran the 42 k without me.  We had decided that she would run a route in the vicinity of the Hinduja Hospital (with Neepa’s brother-in-law Sanjay Dalal and sister Mona running alongside her and my faithful friend Khwaja driving the car as her support team).

Over the next 3 months we kept running, always making sure that we carried the SOS tablets in our pouches.  There was not a single day when I ran with her without being worried about SVT.  We never spoke about it but the thought and fear was always there with us. Sometimes I would want to remind her to carry her tablets but would hesitate bring up the dreaded topic. 

She kept training for Comrades and then we went off to the United States in May for a month long vacation.  During that time, we ran a brutally hard 50k Ultra in the Nevada desert in 100 F heat.  She breezed through it.  We then ran a really hard Marathon in Pittsburg.  The SVT problem did not leave my mind for a minute during those races.

For 27 days in the United States we, like all tourists, walked and walked as we should to show that wonderful country to our children.  We walked for perhaps an average of 6 to 7 hours a day.  And for the first time in her life, Neepa picked up an injury from walking too much: Planter Fasciitis !!

With less than a month to go for Comrades, she started aggressively undergoing physiotherapy and kept icing her foot.  

Normally she never does such stuff for herself and to watch her religiously go to the physio and ice her foot meant that it was really bad.  I kept getting more and more worried.

The day before we left for Africa, we did our last Yoga session. Neepa strained her back during the session.  I could feel a cloud of gloom descend on us. All the pre-race signals were ominous.  

3^rd June 2012  : 89 km, Comrades Ultra Marathon

As we left India, my dad called Neepa inside his room and told her, “Look after Amit, bring him into the finish.”

The start line of Comrades touches the deepest part of a runner’s heart! It sends a chill down a runner’s spine and inspires him/her to greatness, no matter how many times he/she has already been there. 

This was Neepa’s 3^rd start and my 4^th.  She will always enjoy the honour and distinction of being the first woman of Indian Nationality to have run Comrades.  She had run her first “down run” in 11 hours 50 minutes and her first “up run” in 11 hours and 56 minutes.   

Starting in the H pen we reached the start line after 8 minutes and 20 seconds.  Our watches showed that we had run/walked 800 meters to reach the start line.  Less than 1 km from the start we hit a small hill and a few seconds later, Neepa fell back! I felt sick in my stomach when I realized that she was not next to me.  After a few minutes I stopped running and waited for her.  She caught up and I asked her what had happened?  She explained that she had walked the hill.  And so, on and on we went, very often she would fall a bit behind and I would wait for her to catch up. 

Every time I asked her how she was feeling, she replied, “Fine”.  Now from long experience, I know that Neepa believes that when she says ‘Fine’, she soon starts feeling ‘Fine’ even if she is feeling terrible at that time.  So I kept wondering if her ‘fine’ was a real ‘fine’ or a self-hypnosis ‘fine’.

But by 40 k, the bottom of Inchanga (a massive hill), she started getting faster.  She wanted to run up Inchanga and I had to hold her back. Then she wanted to run down Inchanga and I followed her down.  She then wanted to run up from Drummond (half way) up to the top of Botha’s hill (the hardest part of the route).  I told her she was crazy and that I would be finished if I ran up Botha’s (45k to 52k, I normally have to walk up 70% of Botha’s).  She said that she wanted to finish in 11 hours 45 minutes and was easily possible.  I told her that my legs were very sore.  She told me that her planter was killing her since 15k and she felt so much pain that she wondered if the foot would fall off and that she was trying hard not to cry but she said that she had decided in her mind to run and that her body would follow her.

My mind, on the other hand, was following my body which was slowly getting more and more tired.

With 18km to go, I was incredibly fatigued.  We had 2 hours 34 minutes to run the 18k but my quads were killing me.  I could not run.  Neepa asked me if I was cramping and I said, “No”.  “Ok then”, she said, “It’s just pain.  Just run through it.  I am running through this planter pain. I feel like my foot is about to fall off. But I can run and so can you. Just Run!”

The truth is that I have never run through pain. I always stay in a certain comfort zone and what she was asking me was to run beyond that zone.  It was new territory. I had never travelled through it.

With 13k to go it was fast becoming crunch time.  Enough time to finish if I ran, but not if I was walking.  And I was walking. 

Neepa screamed, “If you Love me, Run”.  I ran..for the next 6k.. and then my love ran out...I started walking again...

With 7k to go we had only 57 minutes and 21 seconds left.  It was now or never. I realized that unless I win the battle with my mind at this point, I might as well stop giving motivational talks to people.

Our friend Peter, who was seconding us, came and gave me a drink.

She pleaded with me again. “Run for the kids”...I ran...but with 5k to go, I hit the cat-eye in the middle of the road and fell flat on my face, landing on my chin.  Both my palms started bleeding, so did both my knees and both my elbows.  But the pain I felt in my right calf made all the other pain seem irrelevant.  It felt as though the ligaments in my calf had just been ripped apart.  I knew it was all over.  I was close to tears.  Neepa who was a 100 meters ahead of me, sprinted back.  The spectators reached me first and lifted me up.  I wondered if I could possibly take another step.  I tried, I could.  A dozen spectators broke into applause.  I stated to walk. 

Neepa poured water on my hands to wash off the blood.  She reminded me that she had also fallen in 2010.

She asked, “Are you ok?” “Yes,” I answered, “Let’s go then”, she said, “let’s get this done and over with.”

“Neepa, I can’t run anymore,” I said, “You go ahead and finish. I will keep walking.”

“I am not finishing without you. We both need to finish”.

“I don’t want to finish,” I said, “My legs are tired”.

“It’s not about your body, it’s about your mind.” she said.  

At this she stopped walking and stood behind me.  “You run and we both finish or we both don’t finish.”

I searched my mind for a few choice bad words, but what came to mind was the story of Roma.  Plutarch writes that after Troy fell, some of its people escaped, found sailing vessels, were driven by storms upon the coast of Tuscany, and came to anchor in the river Tiber.  The men and women went ashore and wondered if they should explore the land.  The greatest and most intelligent of the Trojan women was Roma. She figured that the men would never settle down and will keep roaming and wandering over the seas unless they were forced to stay on the land. So she proposed to the other women that they should burn the ships and consequently they would be forced to settle down. And that is what they did.  Having no way left to return to the sea, the men were forced to settle down in the country. They prospered and then they named the city in her honor: “Rome”!

By standing behind me and refusing to run, Neepa had burned my Ship.  

I had no option left.  I would have been happy for her to finish and go home with her medal but now there was no option but to run.

And run we did!  I ran the last kms under 6:30/km.  I realized that the pain in my quads did not stop me from running fast. The bleeding palms, knees and elbows were just a mild irritant. I realized that I had pushed back my pain threshold. I had achieved a new personal break-through inside my mind.  

We ran into the stadium and Neepa took the Indian Tri-Colour from our brother and host Dr Sid Reddy. And so once again, just as in 2010, we ran into the finish, holding the Tri-colour....

The men of Troy were really upset when they found out that their wives had burnt their ships.  They felt that they were now forced to settle in an unknown land.  As they walked towards their women filled with wrath, the women decided to salute their kinsmen and husbands with kisses as a way of supplicating them and to appease their wrath.  From that day on, it became customary for the women to salute their men with a kiss.

Consequently, I feel that Neepa too, owes me a kiss just like the men of Troy did from their wives who had burnt their ships. (Although I got a finishers medal due to Neepa just as they got a whole new country due to their wives).

So Tonight is the Night!!

I shall request my wife, to appease me with a kiss and then...we shall go a step further...we shall do much more...we shall sit with our log books and plot our way to the start line of Comrades 2013...........

 Some Explanatory Notes:

(A) In ‘The History of the Peloponnesian Wars’, Thucydides declares that, the best woman is she about whom there is the least talk among persons outside regarding either censure or commendation, feeling that the name of good women, like her person, ought to shut up indoors and never go out.

I disagree totally. The best women lead men with their examples and those examples should be made public.

Neepa agreed to make public a personal health issue as she felt that, just as she had googled ‘svt and sports’ and taken inspiration from athletes with SVT who participated in the Tour de France, triathlons and ultra-marathons, perhaps, some runner someday will take heart from the fact that she could keep up with her running after her episode.

(B) Neepa was given a go-ahead to run Comrades by two of the best Cardiologists in the city.

(C) Since that episode in Feb 2012, Neepa has not suffered any more events.

(D) She now drinks just one cup of coffee with her breakfast.

(E) Shakespeare’s Women: The Weaker Vessel or Stronger Sex? In real life, let there be no doubt about who is the stronger sex!