Life as a Pune Randonneur

After about five months of some serious frustration working at a remote location called Ranjangaon about 70 kms away from the city, the shift in November to a brand new facility much closer to where I stay in Pune was exactly what I had been looking for. From wasting around 5-6 hours on travel every day, I was suddenly spending less than an hour on travel! This gave me enough time and energy to pick up a whole bunch of hobbies that had been packed and stored away in the cupboard – Quizzing, cycling, learning Spanish, reading and so on. 

The cycling, especially Randonneuring scene in Pune is one of the best in the country with naturally hilly terrain and passionate folks.   Randonneuring is the sport of long-distance cycling where a person competes not against fellow competitors but against a fixed time limit. There will be checkpoints all along the pre-specified routes where one has to get their rider cards stamped and signed within the stipulated time when that control point remains open. The start and end points are also control points and failure to reach any of the check points within the time limits will lead to a DNF(Did not Finish) result for the ride. The sport is governed by the Audax Club Parisien (ACP) of France, whose representative clubs conduct the rides (often called brevets or BRMs) across several cities in the world. All completed brevet cards will be sent to Paris for homologation following which the medal of completion will be sent to the club that organized the brevet. The set timings to finish the rides are as follows:

Distance (km)	Max. Allowed Time (hr)
200	13.5
300	20
400	27
600	40
1000	75
1200	90

In addition, there is a special recognition award called ‘Super Randonneur’(SR) given to anybody who finishes 200, 300, 400 and 600 km brevets in the same season (Nov-Oct). The sport tests any individual’s fitness and resolve to the limits, the latter more often is put under a serious test when ride times cross 24+ hours and severe sleep deprivation kicks in. The elements also prove to be a big challenge sometimes with the sun blazing away in all its glory or bone chilling cold during the nights or even heavy rains or severe headwinds during none of which the ride clock stops and hence the rider also usually doesn’t.

The initial apprehension before my first brevet ride –‘The Mandhardevi 200km Climber’ was huge. Not having done serious cycling for over 6 months, I was hardly confident I would cross even a 100 kms. To top it, the ride was touted to be the toughest 200km BRM in India with over 3000m of climbs. I kept looking back at my Wall climbs in the Nilgiris with my hometown cycling club ‘Coimbatore Cycling’ (I still ride under their banner in all brevets :) ) for inspiration. The ride was a tough one as expected but I managed to drag myself across the finish with only 20 minutes to spare. You can read about that ride here in this previous post:

http://arjunmurali.blogspot.in/2014/12/mandhardevi-climber-200k-brm-experience.html

It was clear that the frustration and inactivity had done me no good. All the stamina and strength that had allowed me to scale the 30km Kotagiri climb in under 3 hours were now gone. I was struggling to keep going at 6-7 kmph up the Mandhardevi slopes. However, the mere fact that I managed to finish the brevet gave me a huge confidence boost. I started riding more and more and could feel the improvement.

Two weeks after the BRM200 was the 300 km brevet on the Pune-Bangalore highway to a place called Umbraj and back. It was more of a straight out and back kind of route without any seriously challenging ghat sections. I don’t remember much from the ride apart from facing sleep management issues for the first time, which had slowed me down dramatically. I still managed to amble along and finish that ride with only 20 minutes to spare. I remember Divya Tate, the India ACP representative, urging and encouraging us to keep going and getting us some delicious cake upon finishing at around 1:30 in the night. Here’s the photo from the finish line of that particular brevet:

(From left: Raj Khedekar, Me(in front), Gagan, Aniket, Kiran and Vaibhav)

What followed were a couple of brevet attempts that taught me a lot of lessons in terms of nutrition, sleep management and pacing myself during the 24+ hour rides. First was the Sahyadri Special – the 600 km brevet through the strawberry fields of Panchgani and Mahabaleshwar. This brevet involved 3 hard climbs in the first 150 kms following which it would only be rolling terrain. In a change from the previous two brevets, I was with a group of strong riders like Kedar Joshi, Mihir Sambhus, Rakesh Kale and Arun Thipsey. Despite a puncture on the Pasarni Ghat section, I finished all the climbs in pretty good time, accelerated during the descent towards Satara and caught up with the group. From then on, it was slow progress with the group. We reached the turn-around point with only about 40 mins left which meant we could sleep for only 40 mins. The ride after was very painful for me when acidity and other stomach problems combined with severe sleep deprivation, caused me to get dropped from the group and once I was alone I quickly lost hope and decided to quit and get my first DNF :(

 

The others rode through the day with only the 40 min sleep behind them and finished at 7:30 pm! Some amazing resolve! It was a very special day for both Mihir and Rakesh as they had completed the SR series. Here’s Mihir’s post on that memorable achievement:

http://mihirsam.blogspot.in/2015/01/the-ultimate-quest-super-randonneur.html

Next was the 400km brevet in Nashik the very following week. I had attributed all the problems from the previous brevet to eating bad highway food and this time decided to keep going only on bananas and water. GRAVE MISTAKE! After only about 250kms (which I had completed in record time), I was completely dehydrated and alone and my resolve was easily broken this time around. Another DNF in a span of 2 weeks :(

Having learnt a lot of lessons from the previous rides and also from the more experienced riders with whom I could get in touch through the Whatsapp group created for Pune Randonneurs, I decided to attempt the 400km brevet in what was part of a group of rides called ‘Last chance Brevets’ – essentially the last chance to complete the Super Randonneur series before the hot summer started. Kedar Joshi was also doing the 400, completing which would earn him the SR title. We knew we would be riding at more or less the same pace and decided to stick together right from the start. It was the simple out and back along the Pune-Bangalore highway – a familiar route by now. We paced ourselves beautifully, stopping for some sumptuous meals at good restaurants we had previously identified along the route. Apart from a front light failure during the night (thankfully I had a spare headlight), the ride was essentially problem-free and we finished in just 21.5 hours with a whopping 5.5 hours still left on the clock – a huge confidence boost!

Next was a team BRM – the Aurangabad Fleche (pronounced fle-sh), to the scenic Ellora Caves. It was a great team ride with me learning aplenty from the to-be Maestro Randonneurs (5000km of homologated brevets completed in a single season) Sathish and Yuva. The ride was covered by the ‘Crank with ProCycle magazine’ and had a superb write-up by Divya Tate. You can find the article here

   

Team TNP (Tamil Nadu-Pune-Punjab) CycloExpress at Ellora caves :)

(From Left: Sathish, Me, Abhishek and Yuva)

 

Then there was the ‘Knight Riders 200BRM’, a night brevet that started on a Saturday evening and ended with a nice breakfast on Sunday morning. It was a refreshing ride that kept me in good touch for the upcoming 600BRM in Mumbai. Just a week before the 600, I went on a ride with a group called ‘Ride On Pune’ till Lion’s point in Lonavala and then on a trek up Fort Tung with another group called ‘Pune Trekking Partners’ . It was kind of my personal tour of the Sahyadris. You can read about it here in this previous post:

http://arjunmurali.blogspot.in/2015/04/my-personal-tour-of-sahyadris.html 

Geography in Action: 

Mumbai-Dhule-Mumbai : I had sorted out my nutrition issues and had also become quite good at sleep management and was hence very confident going into the Mumbai 600BRM completing which I would earn the coveted SR title. After about 60 kms, I joined up with the super strong Pranaya Mohanthy, pedaling away on his solid mountain bike. 

We’ve all learnt about the low lying coastal plains and the plateaus with steep sides and flat tops in High school geography. It seemed such a simple concept, but you don’t actually realize the magnitude of that steep side and altitude difference between the coastal plain and the plateau until you climb onto one in a bicycle. That was exactly what we were doing from Mumbai to Nashik. Climb after climb in the blazing hot sun with temperatures hitting 43 degrees centigrade – causing the organizer to christen the ride as the ‘Blaze Brevet 600’.

At Nashik, we caught up with Rakesh Patel – one of the 4 finishers of the 1200km brevet on the same route in last November. From then on, the three of us stuck together and kept riding a steady pace, with short breaks to chomp on some snacks and get the energy levels up to keep us going. At Dhule, we had a great meal in the middle of the night and decided to turn back without much sleep there. The logic was to cover as much distance as possible in the cold of the night. We lumbered on, chipping away at the remaining miles in a slow pace. Sleep finally got the better of us and we stopped for a quick 45 minute nap outside a shop some 60kms after Dhule towards Nashik. It was a super-refreshing sleep and the three of us were back to our usual fast paced ride. There was just the small hurdle of the Chandwad Ghat section following which we would be experiencing Geography to our benefit :)

At a tea shop in Nashik on the way back from Dhule
(From Left: Nilesh, Anil, Pranay, Rakesh, Kiran and me)

The rest of the ride till we were around 50 kms outside of Mumbai was more about taking care of our burning bodies with regular water intake, cooling foods like Watermelon, etc. Then, anticipating that we might get delayed a lot in the Mumbai traffic that was to come, Pranay took the initiative to push like crazy at speeds of over 30 kmph. It was a superb effort on his part to keep us going at that pace after 550kms of cycling. We carried that burst of pace right into Mumbai, through all the traffic and onto the finish line. It was a whole different ball game cutting across and riding through the peak Mumbai traffic and we thankfully finished safely with around 50 minutes to spare. The awesome Anil Uchil and the others from Mumbai Randonneurs were there to greet us at the finish. Anil got us some delicious cheesey sandwich and ice cream that we devoured without any guilt :)

There wasn’t a lot of time to relish in the moment of having become a Super Randonneur though, as I had to catch a flight to Bangalore for a training session there the next morning. Pranay continued on for another 100kms and managed to get the top spot in Strava for the most distance covered in a single ride by anyone in the world. Amazing achievement!!

 
The organisers even took a video of me during the brevet and I got to see myself riding for the first time :D

Arjun --> Randonneur  -->  Super Randonneur 

Loved every moment of it! It wouldn’t have been possible without the support of the awesome folks at Pune Randonneurs and the encouragement of my friends and family and of course my mentors from Coimbatore Cycling. 

At some point in any ride I decide never to do such a ride again, but we’re all big liars and back we are on the saddle for the next ride. Let’s just say, I decided never to ride anything more than 600kms in the coming months ;)