Medals, run-time SMSes made 11th edition better than before

Despite grey skies looming ominously over the weekend, the spirit of the run runners remai-ned bright and sunny as large crowds gathered at Necklace Road early Sunday morning for the much-awaited Hyderabad DC 10K run.

There were thousands of anxious faces, young and old, determined to make it to the finish line. The serious athletes concentrated on making it count in the medal tally, but the majority were just happy testing their strength and endurance, setting and breaking their own personal records.

“I can't believe I did it. I trained for less than a month, so I didn't expect to even finish, but this feels unbelievable,“ said Anand Bharat, a first-time runner, who completed the race in 68 minutes. Despite their obvious exhaustion, runners dotted People’s Plaza, bonding with their friends and colleagues, comparing their experiences and run times.

“It was a fantastic run.

More so, this time, because they gave us medals for completing the race, which was not only a token to keep but also great for morale. I think the reason I come to the 10K run each year is because I always run into people that I haven’t seen in years and we end up having a great time,” said Sandeep Y., a software engineer at Capgemini who has been running the 10K run for the past five years.

Runners with experience of previous marathons seemed particularly happy with the 11th edition of the 10K run because it was well organised and tech-savvy.

Many vowed that they preferred the Hyderabad run to mara-thons in other cities.

“There were not too many sponsors or celebrities hijacking the event, the crowd was good, and the weather was perfect. This was definitely a better racing environment. I was especially impressed with the racing bibs. The minute I finished the race, I got an SMS with my running time,” said Pradeep Kumar, a manager at Novartis.

The significant increase in the number of women participating was another reason this run was excellent, says Divi Alagappan, an IT professional and regular on the track.

“There used to be very few women in these events. But this time, there were almost twice as many as last year. It is so great to have so many women put on their running gear and participating,” she said.

Post-run merriments continued the rest of the morning and people returning to their homes already talking about training for next year.

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