‘Never say Quit’…Enduro all the way

5th February, 2011… 1.30 am

I am completely pooped and want to rest my legs desperately. It’s pitch dark at 20:30hrs at Ghisar village- our time check (TC-5) halt. From here we have another 40 odd kms to trek with our cycles to reach Thangaon for our night halt. We grab a small bite and start on our trek.

It’s chilly and we are struggling to find our path. I am wheezing terribly but still not keen on stopping because if I stop I will feel sleepy. So I quietly follow my team mates Ashu da and Kirti. We are in the middle of some huge mountain trying to find our way to Dangi Notch khind..our land mark to find this place is a red light that we can see close by. We are following a corporate group who are also looking to reach the same spot. The idea is to get to this spot get our passage check (PC) stamped and then proceed as fast as we can to Thangaon—that’s where we are supposed to be having our mandatory halt for the night.

As per race rules every team had to pass through all the TC and PC in the prescribed sequence and failing to do so would lead to disqualification.
It’s already very late- 12.30 am. Finally, after much struggle and to and fro trying to find the path we reach the red light. We are told by the marshalls here that Thangaon is probably another two and half hours or more depending on our speed. Damn! I think I rather get some sleep instead of moving ahead. But I find myself alone in this decision so follow the gang quietly.

As we all move forward lugging our cycles along the narrow path we reach a point where we are forced to halt. We are told the entire path is blocked as the teams ahead of us have stopped to rest. So we too decide to park ourselves along the path way. I got into my sleeping liner and covered myself from top to toe, stretched myself completely and slept on the rocks. Kirti got into my sleeping and curled himself like a baby and slept. Ashu Da too caught up with some sleep. I thought it was required as the next day was going to be no mean task.

In the sleep I thought to myself endurance is good and need to be tested at some point in time in life—but did I have to do this to test my endurance? I wasn’t here to prove to anyone how high a bar I could jump, I was here to enjoy myself. Just as I thought I was getting some sleep I was woken up by a team of cyclist who were all headed to Thangaon. It was 05:15 am.. we all had to wake up and follow suit.

I was excited just with the thought of participating in Enduro 3 for the first time ever. I knew of it as an adventure race which includes cycling, trekking and other activities like rifle shooting, river crossing, rappelling etc… I was under the assumption its all fun until the race started and I realized what I had got myself into. Enduro 3 as the name suggests is the ultimate adventure race of India. It's a race which will test your skills in endurance, physical fitness, team spirit, leadership skills, crisis management and the power to make the right decisions.

The pre-race registration began at SP College around 6.30 am. We were staying about 15 minutes away from the college so rode our way on our B Twin Rockrider 5.0 and Raleigh cycles to the college around 8 am. As we reach the grounds, we get to hear music and the signature song of Enduro 3 playing. We were part of the Ameature Mix team. As we reach the registration counter we are asked to wait as the Enduro vests haven’t arrived.

After about 15 minutes the team leaders are requested to report their teams and collect the vests, direction map, route plan book, energy drinks and caps. As we adorn the vests and read through the route map and glance through the Google satellite map, there are still teams cruising into the ground with their Hercules, Atlas, Firefox, Rockriders and Trek’s. There were even many with simple cycles without gears as well. We are now asked to move to the college ground and assemble as per our respective categories. We are told that we are waiting for a political dignitary-Raj Thackeray to flag off the race.

At about 09:45 hrs. Enduro3-11 is given a flag off. It’s a tremendous feeling to witness the swarm of bikes flushing out of the red carpet. Man, You really need to be there to experience it!

We are all headed to Khadakwasla which is about 35 odd kms from SP College. In minutes, Pune roads are taken over by the red brigade (our vests were Red in colour). There is heavy vehicular movement and nobody is stopping for us to move. We just need to follow the traffic movement and rules and pedal away. I was under the impression that our race had already started..but no it hadn’t we reach Khadakwasla at around 11 am and here we are told that the race starts and our time starts now. Here is where our first ‘Time Check’ (TC) begins. So all the 1.5 hours of cycling we did was a warm up ride before the actual race. Our time started at 11.35 am

Prior to the start of this 140 kms race, I thought that 80 percent of the roads that we were supposed to ride on, would be proper tar roads and that ‘dirt tracks’ was only for a short patch. Little did I know, it’s going to be just the opposite. The first few minutes are wonderful ride until the ghat started. We were heading to Khondanpur.

The mercury is rising and along side you are rising equivalently on the saddle. The trail goes on for about two hours and finally we reach a spot from where its downhill. There’s smile on everyone’s face. The very thought of downhill is such a relief but like all good things in life are short lived this is also a short lived happiness. There is a huge uphill…impossible for me to cycle all the way …but I was not alone I was glad to see many of these well built guys doing the same so felt good.

Unlike the last Enduro 3, this time around the entire race was largely cycling. There was equal amount of uphills and downhills and complete dirt track mountain biking. I never expected I could do dirt track cycling but was glad that I had good control over my cycle and thankfully had no mishap with my cycle although I did fall couple of times and bruised myself. My team was lucky as none of us had any cycle issues. The long stretch of dirt track downhill cycling was by far one my best ever. Had never done anything like this before or even imagined to do something like this before. Thoroughly enjoyed the cycling.

As we ride along the tar road we reach TC 4 at around 17:30 hrs and here we are told that its special stage and the task from here is to reach TC-5 in the next half hour. We immediately started off and midway through I think to myself whoever on earth thought we could do this stretch in half hour? It was a real bad stretch with red mud, huge stones and it was sundown and dark.
Amidst all this thinking Ashu Da and I realize that Kirti has way ahead of us. We could find him through the trail. At one point it was only Ashu da, myself, the surrounding eerie silence and our headlamps. Not a single soul or vehicle in sight. We were not even sure we were on the right path but kept going until at one point we see some marshalls. I had a sigh of relief and we now told we have 5 kms more to go. The time was around 19:30hrs.. Now all thorough this route we tried to ride our cycles but it was very difficult as the red mud was blurring the vision and our headlamps had white light which was not helpful either so we walked the entire distance and that took a neat three hours to reach TC5 at a village called Ghisar.

From here we are told we have to head to Thangaon by mid night so that we could get good nights sleep and start the day early tomorrow morning. We started at around 21:30 hrs for Thangaon. It was supposed to be a short trek along with our cycles. We lost our way and had to stay put midway till early morning. We once again set out at around 5.45 am and reached Thangaon around 8.30. At this point I really thought that we would be depositing our cycles here and then start our day two trek. No that’s not what it was we had to once again ride all the way through.

At Thangaon we meet our friends from team Panthara (Kapil, Anita and Sandesh) after having done brilliantly all of the previous day and reaching Thangaon by 22.30hrs they were in for a rude shock in the morning when Sandesh cycle gave away. His tyres were road tyres not at all meant for dirt track biking. While they were busy repairing the puncture we went ahead and completed our two other activities namely river crossing and Kayaking. River crossing only the team leader Ashu da did and kayaking all three were a part. While my fear for water remained I still enjoyed Kayaking. It was a short distance in Panshet lake. After we finished these activities we once again checked our cycles for air and brakes and immediately set out.

At this point there was a slight bit of anxiety amongst us as we were trying to find out where our second team was Odati 2 (KK, Aruna and Dhiraj). We tried to find out from the organisers at Thangaon if they could page and find out where they were. BUt immediately we got no response although we were told that they would try and find out. At Thangaon we also hear that many teams gave up in the night itself. I particularly did not want to believe that they would have given up unless ofcourse something drastically went wrong. We were optimistic and decided that at every TC and PC from here on we would try to find out Odati 2's whereabouts.. There were many teams still reporting at Thangaon. From here we have another 40 to 50 kms more before we end the race.

My only aim now was to finish the race. Kirti’s excitement was reduced on hearing there was more cycling. But we had no trouble motivating him and Yo! We made it …the last four Kms was the best ride ever… complete downhill and that was awesome…..and bang on at 6.15 we completed the race. It took us 32 hours to complete the overall race…Phew!!

All in all, it was a fantastic experience. All's well that ends well. We meet Sandesh at the canteen who tells us that he had to give up teh race mid way and head to Panshet Water Resort as his cycle completely gave away. Kapil though was demoralised with Sandesh's exit and had almost decided to quit, moved on..on seeing Anita's motivation to complete the race. She aimed to completed within the first 10 teams. Infact they did brilliantly. Kapil and Anita completed the race within 23 hours i am told. Unlike us who were freed of the last trek they did the last trek to Koshimbir top as well.

After having completed the race, our foremost agenda was now to locate Odati 2.After having left a word with the organisers we leave the premises to head to Pune with our cycles. Mid way into our journey we get a call from KK saying the team has reached Panshet Water Resort...a sigh of relief in all our faces. As they say 'All's well that Ends well'

My closing remarks: The one thing that Enduro3 has taught me is ‘Never say Quit’! Next year I aim to compete better!!

Route Snashot!
Overall 140 kms race that included dirt track biking , trekking with your cycle, river crossing and Kayaking

Route: SP College-Sinhagad Rd-Khadakwasla-Sinhagad Toll Botth (here is where the competitive race started-Sinhagad toll booth-Kondhanpur-Karanjwane- Khariv-Dhanep Phata-Vihir-Ghisar-(trekking along with our cycles started here )- Thangaon-(here there was river crossing and kayaking)-Tekpole- Koshimbir base- Abhiruchi base- finish at Panshet Water Resorts