As I completed my fourth 200 Km brevet on Nov 5th, the thought of trying out a 300 Km one crossed my mind. I never attempted more than 200 Km as it required riding the entire night and I did not want to put my body through an all night suffering. But the suffering I endured under the sun during the all day Bhongir Fort ride made me feel that I might actually enjoy an all night ride. All I needed was to log additional sleep hours before and after the ride to compensate. So, I decided to try out the 300 Km brevet on Nov 19th – Tour of Neelagiri.

As a practice ride, I went for The Bike Affair’s Anniversary ride for their Jubliee Hills branch. It ended up being an enjoyable 100 Km ride along the countryside. As always, TBA hospitality made it a pleasure!

A long ride is a good opportunity to hog all the food I enjoy for several days before the event. My first 300 Km brevet provided many of them during the preceding week. I treated myself with a good portion of tandoori chicken and chicken biriyani for lunch before I started to the venue. After all the paperwork, the brevet was flagged off around 4 PM with over 40 riders and off we went on a pleasant November evening. I had 20 hours to complete 300 Km and I should be back at the venue by noon Sunday.

The route had 3 segments:

1. About 90 Km largely on Hyderabad – Vijayawada highway till Narketpally through Choutuppal and Chityal and largely downhill
2. About 60 Km from Narketpally till Miryalguda through Nalgonda – largely flat with a bit of rolling hills
3. 150 Km from Miyalguda to Hyderabad along Sagar Road through Peddavoora and Mall – constant climb for 120 Km followed by rolling hills on the final stretch.

The first segment went off like a breeze. Fresh legs, downhill and pleasant evening aided in maintaining average speed of over 22 Km/hr. I arrived at the first checkpoint at 8PM to the sight of a dozen riders having dinner. After completing the paperwork, I had tasty curd rice with pickle that was arranged by the organizers. I wrapped up the break with a banana and refilled my water bottle.

I had a minor scare after I restarted when I thought my rear brakes had jammed on the wheel. After meddling with them for a while, it looked like the problem was due to the 2 pouches I had attached to the top tube of the frame. I adjusted them a little bit and things appeared fine. Keeping my fingers crossed, I started riding again. Luckily, I did not notice any further problems and I continued to maintain good pace. I arrived at the second checkpoint (152 Km) at Miryalguda at 11:21 PM. That was less than 7.5 hours for 150 Km at over 20 Km/hr. I was happy at being able to maintain good pace and was surprised that I was only the 6th rider to arrive. But I knew the ordeal would actually start from here and felt if I could maintain the 6th place till finish, it would be an achievement!

After the standard formalities at the checkpoint, I started riding again with the objective of maintaining my relative position among 40+ riders. Till Miryalguda, we were on a 4 lane highway with excellent surface but now it was a single lane road with numerous potholes and even stretches with only gravel left on the road. That made riding difficult but it also made me feel closer to the countryside. Without any traffic, the silence was blissful and after a while I started enjoying the environment! The next checkpoint was a place called Peddavoora at 195 Km and I reached there at 1:55 AM. It was amazing that I covered almost 200 Km in about 10 hours. I was still among the top 6 riders. The checkpoint was at a all-night tea stall that was serving omelettes and rotis. I wanted to gain some time. So, I quickly ate an omelette, gulped down a glass of tea and quickly started before a couple of others. There were three riders ahead of me at that time.

The next checkpoint was at a place called Mall, another 70 Km away. This stretch was the most difficult. The road was bad and uphill. Riding between 3 AM and 5 AM was not easy. But after about 4 AM, I got into a rhythm and started chipping it away. It was an absolutely barren road but there were houses along the road every few hundred metres and they had the lights turned on their corridors, which lit the road well. I stopped a couple of times to refresh with sports bars and dry fruit chikki. It was awesome to see the dawn riding along the countryside. The next checkpoint at Mall was no where in sight. I thought I will reach it by 6:30 AM but it was 7:23 AM by the time I reached the 263 Km point. But to my surprise, I was only the second rider to arrive and the two people who started before me from the previous checkpoint arrived about 10 minutes later. The thought of finishing second was cool and excited me! I had a cup of tea and a couple of bananas before starting to ride again.

I was now on the last 40 Km stretch, with the sun shining bright but the heat had not yet picked up. My target was to finish the ride before the sun came out strong and try to avoid any one crossing me. The constant uphill became rolling hills and I was able to increase my pace back to about 18 Km/hr. I did not see any one closing in till I reached the finish point at 9:48 AM. I finished strong and was surprised at it! It was one of my best rides and gave me the confidence for more!!!

While I touched 900 km mark on running front by mid October, I was off mark on cycling during 2016. Strava showed reduced cycling activity from April till September, due to summer vacation and not participating in monsoon brevet during July. Usually a 200 km brevet results in covering 400 km with 200 on the event day and another 200 during the preceding 2 weekends as part of preparation. So, I decided to register for Bhongir Fort brevet on November 5th and that also excited me as my previous three brevets were all along the same route.

I planned to cover all the lakes of Hyderabad as part of my preparation and I expected them to be beautiful after recent plentiful rains. I covered 3 lakes – Himayat Sagar, Gandipet and Ameenpur lake during the first long ride. It was a delight to see all the lakes with copious water – particularly Ameenpur lake that was filled to the brim.

I decided to go to Shamirpet lake for the second practice ride. It was a wonderful sight –  I had never before seen it with so much water! It was a pleasant cloudy morning that helped me easily cover 100 km without  getting tired!

  

For 3 weeks after the Hyderabad marathon, my fitness activities slowed down while I was recovering from the marathon and a viral fever. As I was scheduled to travel on work, I planned to compensate for lost action.

I started with a target to run about 100 km during these 3 weeks. But with beautiful weather and running trails at New York, Charlotte and San Francisco, I made it over 120 km. Manhattan Central Park, Charlotte Little Sugar Creek and SFO Bay area parks are beautiful places to run! And my buddy at Charlotte helped me go biking on a couple of days during one of the weekends covering 94 km across the Carolinas. I got a feel of the US countryside for the first time! Overall, one of those rare instances where I was able to exceed my target.