Running and Helping

I always wanted to do different things and things that are different. I believed that I'll gain experiences that are unique which nobody else have gone through. To my surprise I always find people who are doing things I thought would be different and unique. Well I have realized that "Its not the things that are different but I'm getting to meet different people who are willing to do different things". Does any of that makes sense ? If not don't worry about it.

Why Marathon ?

Last year on of my friend asked if I'm interested in running a marathon and my instant answer was NO. My dad always say "If you are not doing something now you will doing it when you are a year older" he did not mean the marathon though :-) . Things have changed in the past few months since I have started practicing. Now I do have a reason. I'm running this marathon to bring smile to some of the under privileged children in India. I'm running with the charity organization called Association for India's development or AID. Click here to know more about AID and Click on 'Projects' to view the list of projects supported by AID - Maryland chapter

About AID

Is it Fun ?

Well running 26.1 miles is not that fun but there are few things during the course of the training which are really fun. Like

1. Going to brunch with friends after the run and loading up on all the carbs without any guilt.
2. Gossiping during the run.
3. The image of water melon and bagel in front of eyes . I never used to like bagel before.
4. Yelling "Looking Good" to your friends who are trailing behind when they are really looking not so good. I'm telling thats lot of fun
5. After the run you get to hear all the excuses why someone couldn't run as good as they should have

I need all your help

Feel free to donate any amount be it even a single dollar

A few suggestions-

$25 (Approx. one dollars for every mile I run)
$50 (Approx. two dollars for every mile I run)
$100(Approx. four dollars for every mile I run)
$200(Approx. eight dollars for every mile I run)
OR (Total Practice run in Miles : 286 * 10/15/20/25 cents)

AID, Inc is a 501(c)(3) organization. Donations to AID are 100% tax-deductible. Click the "Donate Online" button on the right to make a donation


You can donate online OR Mail me a check payable to 'AID' with marathon:ramesh_n' written in the memo at

Ramesh Nair
2101 Raven Tower Ct, #103
Herndon, VA, USA.
Cell – 571 241 0222

Note: Please check if your company matches your contribution towards the charity organization.

It’s absolutely fine, If you are unable to give me your helping hand in fund raising efforts, I am sure, your best wishes will be always there to help me complete the Marathon run.

Looking Good,
Ramesh

Rileys Rumble

The night before the marathon, I had all my excuses not to run this race but the next day morning it was a different scene. After reaching 20 minutes late and going through not that messy registration process, searching for the bib and managing it to pin. I said good luck to my friends Shushma and Malini. The starting line was deserted and did not give any indication of the difficulty of the trail that we were about to face. Rumble in the Rileys is considered one of difficult half marathon around the DC metro area with lot of up and down hills. All the runners who are seriously considering running a full marathon use rileys as a test to their endurance and will power. This is my first half marathon. Though I have ran upto 14 miles during the practice runs this trail was nothing like any trail we ran before. The up hills were killing while the down hills were horrifying. Thanks to some good piece of advice from previous year runners to take it easy on the down hills and not to give it to gravity. To your left is the elevation chart of the course. If you could figure out what that means let me know. I'm still trying :-) . I have to talk about the good things of the trail as well. There were lot of friendly people all along t who were up that early and made it to the trail to cheer us. All the volunteers did a very good job to keep us hydrated and more importantly motivated. its funny to hear when they yell and cheer "LOOKING GOOD" when you are actually ..... you know doing "NOT SO GOOD". Some where around the 6th mile turn around I saw some familiar faces like Dilant, Ravi and few others from Marathon charity partners. They were all "LOOKING GOOD" :-). What matters the most is to finish the run and feeling that comes with that is something different. I managed to finish the 13.1 miles in 2 hours 16 minutes and 40 seconds and taking into account of the face that I started 15 to 20 minutes after gun time let say Its not that bad.