Life, Ultra-Racing, and Everything else . . . Part 1
By: Kishan Parasu
Tags: Sports, Determination, Ultracycling, Perseverance, Cycling

(This article was penned and published on November 6, 2017, in the Notes section of my Facebook page)

While I am here in Italy, attending an academic conference in the beautiful and quaint town of Bologna, incredible things have transpired back home. The main architects of those incredible feats are Yagnesh and Kartik. But, this post is mainly about Yagnesh, his journey over the last year, and his exploits.

I mostly love those individuals who I draw inspiration from and Yagnesh (hereon referred to as Yaggi) is surely one of those. Back in 2015, when I first started cycling, I signed up on the website of an Ahmedabad based cycling club — Cyclone — The cycling club, to receive emails regarding their daily group rides. At that time, Yagnesh Ahir was a mere name from whose mail account, the ride details were broadcasted. I chose to go on one of those rides and there I saw the man for the first time in flesh and blood, clad in a green jersey and a grey helmet, saddled on a green Giant SR1 road bike, and performing occasional bunny hops over speed breakers to show-off his acquired adroitness on the bike. Yaggi, along with his lifelong friend and training partner, Anuj, stood out from everyone else, owing to their proclivity for speed and seriousness for proper training. The two, as I remember now, used to hit the extremely inclement Ahmedabad-Gandhinagar roads on the hottest of summer days to remain competitive for the race days. They found some success in their endeavors as theirs turned out to be the names to reckon with in local Ahmedabad races and the duo performed reasonably well in them.

However, Yagnesh’s desire was to do something far greater. His thirst was not to be quenched by remaining merely competitive at the local scene. With his compadre Anuj, he instituted Amdavad Crankmeisters — AC — a racing team consisting of like-minded individuals with a bit of a talent for the sport and gusto to train, and train hard! Yaggi had a dream and I am sure he still does — To make Amdavad Crankmeisters a national level noteworthy and respect-worthy cycle racing team, something analogous to Team Sky at the UCI World Tour. Till today, I had found the dream a bit too lofty to achieve or even aim for. But, something changed today. Something that has been taking shape for a year now (more on that shall follow shortly).

So, the team started taking shape; with time deserving riders got added to our roster and as it stands today, Team AC is a ten-member strong coterie of individuals (including a female rider and a support crew). The team has had quite a few number of achievements spread across its teammates — couple of fabulous ironman triathlon finishes by Ingit Anand, a RAAM qualification and a fourth-place at The Deccan Cliffhanger 2015 by Yadav Gaurav, multiple qualifications for National Road Race championships based on state championship performances, and numerous other podium finishes and respectable positions at local, state and national level races and duathlons. But until today, I still wasn’t convinced that Yaggi’s dream was taking shape or was even close to it.

At the time of writing this note, it has been close to about 17 hours since Yaggi defied everything that circumstances and conditions threw at him and the naysayers thought was improbable, if not impossible. Today, Yaggi raced brilliantly, and almost in a manner that would probably befit a movie, or at least a documentary, to achieve the bragging rights of stepping onto the second podium step at The Deccan Cliffhanger 5th Edition.

Continuing with the tone of this note, I’ll continue being a wee-bit non-linear with my storytelling.

So, what exactly is The Deccan Cliffhanger? Well, The Deccan Cliffhanger is a ‘short Ultra-race’ (There might be a bit of an oxymoron involved in that phrase in the inverted commas but that’s how the Ultra-racers describe it. The actual Ultra-cycle races span more than 3000 km. For E.g. The best-known Race Across America (RAAM) spans about 4,500 km (+- 300 km) and is to be completed within 288 hours or 12 days in the solo category (Source: RAAM 2016 rules) for the solo rider to be classified as the race finisher. So far, there have only been two Indian finishers in this rather tough-nut-to-be-cracked race — Srinivas Gokulnath and Dr. Amit Samarth; both finishes coming in the 2017 race. Other Ultra races include (but are not limited to) The RACE (The Race across Europe) measuring 4,722 km, and the leviathan challenge known as The Red Bull Trans-Siberian Extreme extreme (14 stages in 24 days, each between 300–1400 km!)). It (I am back to The Deccan Cliffhanger) spans 643 km from Pune to Goa and is a RAAM qualifier. The elevation gain achieved during this race is close to 5800 meters (that’s about a two-thirds of Everesting during the race)! In the solo category, a rider needs to complete the distance in 32 hours to achieve the title of a RAAM Qualifier (RQ).

Yaggi started training for something big since November of 2016. However, he needed a structure, something he had always craved for. He knocked on the proverbial doors of Coach Deepak Raj, a 19-times Ironman Finisher including the IRONMAN World Championship at Kailua Kona, Hawaii. Post joining Coach Raj’s tutelage, Yaggi defined that something big for himself — To complete the BRM-200 (a 200 km Randonneuring event) in March 2017 within 6 hours and become the fastest Indian in doing so (the Indian record is not clear, though). Yagnesh almost achieved this feat and completed the distance in six hours and some pocket change (five hours and 54 minutes of ride time and the extra time spent in getting the brevet card stamped at the control points, nature breaks, etc.). Again, the ever-so-thirsty Yagnesh Ahir was clamoring for the next big challenge. In my opinion, there is nothing bigger than The Deccan Cliffhanger in India, and Yaggi duly signed up for it after consulting his coach. There began his tapas. Day in and day out, Yaggi kept up with the schedule designed by his coach, come hell or high water. Mind you, the schedule was not the one for the weak-spirited or weak-hearted. It involved 16–20 hours of biking and core workouts per week, a huge chunk of it during the weekends — a time when the majority of youngsters and young couples unwind and have fun. There were rides spanning five hours, six hours, seven hours at endurance pace with the last hour at a tempo/threshold speed, extremely arduous interval workouts and variations, and excruciating exercises to strengthen the core. Yaggi did them all. With élan and a smile on his face. He did them all keeping up with his work schedule (certain client meetings of his went beyond midnight). He got better, bloody better. The distances he achieved on the bike and at the speeds he executed them in, progressively improved. What seemed like an impossible task a year or two ago, was a walk in the park for Yagnesh now. In this process, he lost oodles of weight and looked meaner and fitter than ever. His gait dripped determination and purpose. No action was unaccounted for. Food and nutrition, sleep, partying, time spent in miscellaneous pursuits, everything was monitored. So much so that he skipped all nine days of Garba nights this year. Ask any Gujju, and he/she will tell you what that means! Yaggi even skipped the national road cycling championships, a mere qualification of which is a dream for many for various reasons — a government job, marriage, bragging rights, etc. There was only one goal — winning The Deccan Cliffhanger 2017.

Onto the race day and Yaggi makes a safe but solid start. He cruises to 150 plus kilometers, things well under control. But, what’s an ultra-race without its idiosyncrasies and its uncertainties? Yaggi gets hit by a vehicle from the back and tumbles to smell the tarmac, on the way picking up terrible bruises and road burns on both his knees and a deep cut near his left ear, something that needed prompt medical attention and some stitches. Now, any lesser man (or woman) would have resigned him(her)self to fate and would have lived to fight (read race) another day, next year or some other. But, Yaggi being Yaggi, would not let this hiccup derail his plans or the hundreds of hours of training to waste. His plan was simple and clear. Continue fighting. After having lost close to two hours in having himself medically attended to, Yaggi resumed his race. Kilometer by kilometer, hour by hour, with every ounce of sweat and pedal-stroke, Yaggi started to make it count. He started making up for the lost time. The reality, they say, is stranger than fiction. In “Jo Jeeta Wahi Sikandar”, we have seen Amir Khan and Deepak Tijori make up places in a 50 km race after their freak fight and contest for a sprint finish. Many of us let out a chuckle whenever we saw it happen during the numerous re-runs of the movie on TV or elsewhere. I certainly have. In a more realistic but still improbable scenario, Yaggi started making up places, leaving those racers behind who, at a point of time in the race, were almost 70–100 km in the lead! Yaggi made up enough places to finish second! And, who was he beaten by? None other than Dr. Amit Samarth, the first Indian to complete RAAM in his first attempt (no shame in losing to him, eh!). Yaggi completed the culmination of his tapas in 28 hours and 33 minutes. I will not mull on counterfactuals here but my question to a discerning as well as a non-discerning reader of this note — What do you think Yaggi’s timing and position be, if not for the freak accident?

As it always happens in life, his victory is not his alone. I am sure Yaggi would be a better person to recount all important and pivotal people to have contributed in his journey but to my mind, the following names appear — Ingit Anand (his training partner in many of his massive rides), Anuj Sharedalal (more of a brother to Yaggi than his friend and training partner), Kartik Kansara (the other RAAM qualifier from Team AC on the day), Deepak Raj (Yaggi’s Coach), Shaily Chauhan (Yaggi’s Nutritionist) and Yaggi’s crew members on the day. Here’s a brief description of each of them –

Robin Thakur — The most amicable person in the whole of Ahmedabad, my training and team duathlon partner, a triathlete, an aspiring ironman and a beautiful human being.

Mayank Tripathi — I could write a separate post on him for the respect I have for this incredible athlete. But, I just have one instance to cite which is enough to bring forth his passion for the sport. Mayank got married on 31st October 2017. On 4th November 2017, he was crewing for Yagnesh!

Dharati Metra Ahir — Yagnesh’s wife and his equal half. This feat would have been impossible if not for Dharati’s support. One of the sweetest individuals I have ever met, Dharati sacrificed her time and moments with Yaggi while he toiled away. Yagnesh’s incredible achievement is as much as Dharati’s.

Now, for the life lessons, I have drawn from Yaggi’s too-good-to-be-expressed-in-words sojourn –

· An indomitable spirit backed by a perfect work ethic is enough to conquer any challenge in this world. Everything else, apart from the union of two attributes I mentioned, follows from these.

· A coach/guru/teacher is a must. He/she proffers the much-needed direction, without which optimal results are difficult to achieve in an optimal manner.

· It’s not over until you decide it’s over. Whenever I come across incredible feats such as this, I am reminded of the US Navy Seals’ idea of efforts. According to them, when you think you are done, you are only 40% done.

Yaggi, I congratulate you on your feat.

Cheers

PS — This post is long because it has been a long while since I wrote anything but thesis and I wanted to get out of the rut. I have also been wanting to write something about sports. Moreover, in view of Yagnesh’s humongous achievement, this post befits its size.