At the beginning of 2020, I was just recovering from bad form and a bad run at Mumbai full Marathon 2020. I had the 10th board exams of Kaveri ahead and carried on with the agony of a bad full marathon. I told myself, “let this get over, lets train well and run a good marathon.”
With exams and things going on smooth, with women’s day programs/ rides keeping me busy, we reached 18 th March 2020. The exam was over. But it was over amid a new fear – Coronavirus.
Initially, I was reading and absorbing, cycling rides got less, the social distancing phrase and actual (Smiles) was more.
My husband told me to give some more attention to the kitchen and I felt something big is coming in my way like a known Ghat section or long uphill. Girls were excited as we were planning a family hike and I had planned very well offseason athletic training for them.
What we all could see was more news, more masks, more sanitizers, less outdoors, fewer rides, and restriction from highway or stadium to campus ground, from the ground to our flat. The Microbiologist me and my husband started taking more care, we created some zones in our house where we do not take things in and let that sit for 20 hours near the door, wash milk bags in soap water, etc.
Grocery:
Normally I go in the city and buy best vegetables from Lalbaug and organic Madhya HSR, I am really not used to the fresh mart and even going there inside PSN campus (I don’t like same plastic packed products), so going there, going with bags, filling own bags and be disciplined about going early when fresh vegetables come, etc. was far beyond my comfort zone. But I made a good effort to do that as I am particular about raw material I need for cooking. But I think it was good service by them in these difficult times as told by PSN folks. I generally go 20-25 km outskirts to even have Sunday breakfast on cycle so imagine my situation in this concrete place.
House Help:
As a family, we decided for our cook to not come inside the house and me and Harshad both made unwritten agreement, he wakes up early and does morning utensils and breakfast, I only wake up at 12 noon since I am sleeping late and trying to reduce my food intake. Sleep more. I take charge of the kitchen only after 12 and normally until 9 at night. I enjoyed my time with kids they did learn sandwich, mixer/ food processor operations, making few Indian dishes, girls helped me very much with arranging utensils, arranging cooked food, small chores like drying clothes, folding them, this reduced their screen time.
Harshad was always busy drawing and he could do some sketching. I finally did set up my indoor cycling trainer and mounted my Mountain bike, I had no idea one day I will have to see Nandi hills from my tower rather than climbing it. All these days I did at least 40-50 mins workout every day. Result of which is my weight even reduced by a fraction at the end of 21day part one lockdown. Girls did small drawings and some cake baking at night with me.
Teamwork:
Our family who generally are very independent people battling their own wars, but we showed great teamwork in cooking to cleaning to maintaining personal space for everyone in day to day life. Initially, me and girls started watching sports movies, then workouts, cleaning, small cooks in the kitchen made it all fun.
Lockdown 2020 and Training:
A major part of the training was stairs and climbing them, other bodyweight workouts, ankle weights, kettlebells, and indoor cycling trainer was precious during these times. I started staying very positive and started visualizing events during 2020 and finer planning them.
Did a lot of variations like planks, squats, HIITS, sometimes volume, and sometimes intensity.
As an endurance athlete, I see I perform better when difficult situations are in front so this lockdown made me very calm, sports teaches you and trains you for such things when you know you have to run 21 or 42 km or have to do all-out effort in cycling on a climb you just put your head down and try executing that nicely. I personally feel my kids are mentally more strong due to this training of the past 3-4 years, it was always a very cheerful atmosphere and we often spoke about travel memories especially last year’s Kashmir trip.
Volunteering and Social Interactions:
My volunteering story is a little funny, I got myself added to one group called Water Warriors who water campus but either it rained and could not find anyone who could tell, where, and what I am supposed to do. I had other options like cleaning lifts and delivering groceries on cycle but kept quite looking at the risk involved for my family due to my volunteering and could manage to just dry sweep some open sunny area in PSN. I had talks with my cousins and other friends to know if they are fine, I remembered few events that I did in these years and messaged many fellow cyclists during these times to know how is life.
I know all this shall pass and I will be free again on some roadside tea stall and chatting with some villager in no time until then eat less -sleep more -burn more, stay amalgamated and enjoy PSN and yes if you sometimes see some lady slowly walking outer circle during 3:40 morning remember she is a highway bound cyclist in lockdown 2020.
