Electric is the right word to describe the ambience around the MMRDA grounds in the Bandra-Kurla complex here on Sunday morning.
The summer has set in but the chill has not gone out of the air. The pleasant morning was made more enjoyable by the occasional bursts of cold breeze. One wondered if the mornings are the best part of a day.
It was not even dawn and the place was already buzzing, bursting and bustling with activity. Electric is the right word to describe the ambience around the MMRDA grounds in the Bandra-Kurla complex here on Sunday morning.
There was a sense of collective buoyancy in the air, positive expectancy in the atmosphere and an impish exuberance in the surroundings. Everyone was saying: I CAN.
Over 2,500 women participated in different categories of the DNA I Can half-marathon. Two thousand five hundred more had come there to just cheer them. It was a congregation with a can-do spirit. Some surely were content participating in the event, first of its kind in the country, but most runners wanted to win it. They were going, rather running, for the kill.
The flag-off was eagerly awaited. Once they said go, the runners started pushing themselves hard. They did not seem to know what the word restraint means. They were trying to reach new personal frontiers. It was a mocking defiance of the so called limitations in one self. They were stretching and stretching themselves hard, displaying irrepressible spirit and unbreakable will.
Even as the chilly morning made way to a hot day, there was no sign of any dip in enthusiasm. “I’m here to complete the race, come what may,” said a participant of the 10 km run, while a disabled runner continued her march to the finish point, weathering the scorching sun.
Among the thousands who turned up for the marathon was Aparna Popat, an Olympian. “I knew this would be such a smashing event. An exclusive women’s marathon is unprecedented. It had to be successful,” the former national badminton champion observed.
Aparna flagged off the 10 km race and watched the runners in delight as they passed by her. “‘Such events bring the women out of the confines of the four walls. Indian women are no less able than their counterparts in other parts. They just need encouragement.
There is no sporting culture for women here. We need to create it,” she remarked.
Is not DNA I Can half marathon a step in that direction? “Yes,” Aparna endorsed.
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