Its all about life!!!: Pandharpur cycle-wari 2023 ....When its your calling

Sunday, June 11, 2023

Pandharpur cycle-wari 2023 ....When its your calling - Part 2

Day 1 - 03/06/2023- Pune(Hadapsar) to Pandharpur - 200 km.

10 of us started from hotel at 4:15 am which was 7 km away from the flag off point.

1500 participants started from Noble hospital at 4:30 am, we were late by 10 mins but that gave us room to cycle, and we avoided crowd.

It was pleasant in the morning; everyone was excited and as per plan we only stopped at the hydration points with idea to cover max distance before lunch.

We had 4 marshals Abhijit and Sachin leading the way , also because they are excellent riders as well as photographers 😀.

Naresh and Milind tailing to make sure that slowest rider is not left out of sight.

Let me mention this that riding fast is easier than riding slower than your usual speed to support other. And we did follow this arrangement for good 90% of the time which helped the group to finish the ride together.

It was beautiful road, and we were enjoying the ride. Indo athletic society, the organisers of cycle wari had done excellent job in support / hydration and even water sprinkler when we needed it the most 😀.

By 12:30 or so we reached lunch and we took decent break till 1:45 / 2 pm and resumed the ride .

By this time we had covered good 135 km and 65 more to go. But now sun was testing our endurance and the road also started with decent ascends.

All in all it was getting tough… but that’s what endurance ride is all about.

Finally we reached last support point just 4 km before the destination. It had huge but beautiful Vittal Murti and that was perfect spot for photo session 😀

4 riders completed their first 200 km in challenging conditions... Kudos to them.

Finally after approximately 14.5 hrs of total elapsed time out of which 9.5 hrs was actual cycling with 900 mtr total elevation, 38+ temperature , we reached Bhakt niwas Pandharpur and collected our well deserved medal🏅.