The brain was unable to process the contrast of the beauty in front of my eyes and brutality that the beautiful terrain was putting me through.

Sweat was pouring out of every pore of my skin as if I was riding through a sauna that engulfed me and following me along.

Muscles I did not know existed were cramping, screaming, protesting the  punishment being dished out.

Memories of a lifetime were being written using the indelible ink of pain and suffering.

Many epic battles between the mind and the body have been fought on the day on the vast and bloody long battlefield that was Tour of Thekkady!

And winning those battles and crossing that finish line felt like nirvana that’s achieved after years and years of painful penance!

KEG Tour of Thekkady!

KEG Bikers ( pronounced as /keg/ /bɑ́jkəs/  , KEG derived from Kottayam Endurance Group) is a group of passionate long distance cyclists hailing from Kottayam district of Kerala, India.

The club has a unique requirement of a minimum number of ride-kilometers for its members to renew their membership every year, to keep all members as active cyclists – one of very few cycling clubs to have such a requirement enforced.

These passionate bunch of riders decided to organise a challenging event that aims to give a taste of what a really tough Tour de France stage would look like if organized in their backyard. Thus Tour of Thekkady was born four years ago with 54 participants in its first edition. The route has four major climbs and a million minor ones through out it’s 160km length resulting in about 3000m of elevation gain.

Starting in Kottayam and ending in Thekkady going via Idukki through a bunch of lakes, rubber, cardamom and tea plantations and a range of hills and mountains, the route is one of the most scenic and toughest I’ve ever ridden. The hot and humid weather conditions of the region adds an extra degree of difficulty to the already difficult course.

Starting with 50 odd participants in the first edition and about 130 participants across the race and tour categories last year, this year’s edition has seen 236 participants across race and tour categories.

Dark Knights Ready For The Battle!

The 5 am start to the race meant it was pitch dark as we started. About 100 of us lined up with our front and rear lights mounted in non flickering mode and our pre-race jitters flickering. 

The first 3km out of Kottayam were neutral km where none of us were supposed to cross the lead vehicle. Even at 5 am there was considerable bus and truck traffic as our peloton moved along at a brisk pace once the race was flagged off.

There were a couple of hairy moments in those initial kms that put me on the backfoot a bit. One on coming bus forced the peloton to panic and move quickly to the left forcing a few off the road. Another impatient bus guy from the back drove in and inserted himself into middle of the pack cutting off a bunch of us from the main bunch.

After years of riding and racing and as I get closer to half a century on this planet, my risk appetite has gone down considerably. I prefer getting home safely to the family over any medal or prize money. So, I decided to ease off and ride safely with a smaller group rather than kill myself trying chase back to the peloton. The field of red rear lights of the main pack quickly disappeared into the distance.

I managed to latch on to a few riders and started riding together. I kept reminding myself it was a long day and we need to keep fuelling. Even before sunrise, it felt like we were in a sauna. It was so humid.

Brutal Climbing Starts!

After the initial flat terrain through the towns in the initial 30k, we get into the hills with the first one, a 4km climb at 32km mark. It is a gentle climb and just a mild teaser for what lies ahead on the tour.

The light was just coming up as we climbed up. I saw the CBR(Cycling Brain Racing team from Bangalore) train coming up. I was confused. How the hell were they coming from behind? Why weren’t they in the front group? These were the questions I was asking myself and them as they flew past up the climb.

I later learnt that the boys were missing the handicap racing we do at BAR(Bangalore Amateur Racing) they gave themselves a 8 min handicap and arrived at the start point late. They started the race at 5:08am while the rest of us started at 5am. I promised them that I’ll bring back the handicap race at BAR and not to make an already hard race harder for themselves by starting late!

As I was just finishing up the climb, my friend from Mysore Veera Manikanta caught up with me. We rode together on the rolling terrain towards the second climb which is a 12km HC climb gaining 750m of elevation. He was looking strong and he pushed off once we got to the climb. I kept going at my pace and came across my Spectrum Racing teammate, Su Yin who was one of the strongest contenders for podium in women’s category.

We started riding together. I didn’t want to disrupt her pacing and let her set the pace on the climb. She was spinning effortlessly as I was wondering how long I could hold on to the feather weight champ flying up these climbs. I was able stay in my tempo and on a climb as long as this, it is always great to have company rather than being alone.

As we were approaching the top of the climb, she caught sight of a rider in front. It was one of the riders in her category and she opened up her after burners and dropped her and me at one go. I kept going at my tempo and caught up with her again on the downhill. My 20+ additional kilos of weight over her comes in handy on the downhill as the gravity does its magic and propels me down the hills.

As we began the 3rd climb, the 8km cat 1, I saw my friend Veera Manikanta ahead and he seemed to be struggling. He seemed to have messed up with his nutrition and bonked. On a long hard race like this, one has to put as much emphasis on the nutrition on the day as one would put on the training leading up to the event. If you let your energy levels dip, it is hard to recover from such a deficit and complete the race strong. About 60-90gms of carbs per hour becomes an absolute necessity do well.

As we were climbing, Su Yin remarked how we got lucky with the weather being relatively cooler. She just jinxed it by talking too soon as around 10am, 5 hours into the ride, the sun dialed the heat knob to the maximum.

Sweat began pouring out of every pore of my skin as if I was riding through a sauna that engulfed me.

On the climb, I was able to stay with Su Yin for the first 5k of the total 8k but was able to catch up with her again on the downhill and rolling hills leading up to the last major climb at 127km mark. I began to cramp right at start of the climb and Su Yin flew off ahead.

I began counting down every meter and it was a battle between mind and body. Muscles I did not know existed were cramping and screaming, protesting the  punishment being dished out since 5am that morning. 

Memories of a lifetime were being written using the indelible ink of pain and suffering. Many epic battles between the mind and the body have been fought on the day on the vast and bloody long battlefield that was Tour of Thekkady!

And winning each of those battles and crossing that finish line felt like nirvana that’s achieved after years and years of painful penance! It was a bloody relief!

An Epic Ride and A Course Record!

Sreenath won this race multiple times and holds the course record of 5:15 from before. He lined up at the start in this edition with a goal of not only winning the race but also rewriting his own course record and taking it under 5 hours.

So, he was on that mission from the get go drilling it at the front of the race. Around the 20km mark he broke away from the group. An young Mangalorean rider from Bangalore, Hardik Rai, dared to join the fierce pace and latched on to his wheel.

On the 12km HC climb, Sreenath opened up the after burners and dropped the youngster. Hardik realised that he bit off more than he could chew as he went cross eyed bonking completely.

Sreenath not only stayed away until the finish, he rewrote his own course record by finishing it in an amazing time of 4:48!

Hardik got passed by a few riders but managed to finish 3rd in the individual category! Brilliant ride from him. Harith Noah, the Dakar moto champion, finished 2nd behind Sreenath!

In the Women’s Category, Su Yin managed to pace herself in steller fashion and almost caught the star rider from Mangalore, Gleonna, right at the finish line. Gleonna who went past her very early in the race, at about 60km mark managed to just about stay ahead of Su Yin by a few Milli Seconds. That was crazy close!

In the Team Category, despite being the late Latif’s they were, team CBR ended up finishing 2nd in the team category. If they didn’t give themselves the 8 min handicap and started the race on time, maybe they would have actually won the team category. They volunteered to donate INR 500 towards BAR cake everytime they show up late to the BAR races to hold themselves accountable for getting to the races on time in general. I’m going to hold them up for it.

Team RaceFit took the win in the team category despite finishing with the same points because their fastest finisher was faster than CBR’s fastest.

Team SL7 finished 3rd in the team category.

In Master’s Category, Sanjeev Sharma from Delhi took the win with a super strong ride followed by Aneesh at second and Raghesh Nair taking third! I managed to sneak in a fourth at my snail’s pace on the climbs.

A Brilliantly Organized Event!

Tour of Thekkady as a one day race and as a one day tour, I think, stands out as one of the best in more than one ways.

The course is worth it’s weight in gold in the difficulty, the beauty and the road quality it offers! The climbs were brutal and yet beautiful. Brutally beautiful! The roads were of fantastic quality. The descents were silky smooth. My only complaint is that we don’t have enough of them.

The support offered on the route was phenomenal. There were police personnel through out the course at important junctions managing traffic and directing the riders on the correct path. The volunteers providing water support hovering all over the course covering riders of all abilities were amazing!

The way the organisers kept the communication channels upto date with all the necessary information from the minute we registered for the event till the end of the event was phenomenal. To pull off an event of this scale and difficulty in this part of the world is not an easy task and the did an exceptional job. I’d highly recommend the event for anyone who likes a challenge! You won’t regret it.

But, of course, there are always things we can improve on. For me racing in the dark is not worth it for my current risk appetite.

In fact my Spectrum Racing teammate and a longtime friend and mentor, Rajesh Nair a.k.a BabaVelo who was in the front group was shocked by the hairy close calls in the dark, took an instinctive and perhaps an impulsive decision to pull out of the race and stop around 10km into the race due to safety concerns. He was right at the front end of the race till that point.

His feedback to the organisers, which I completely agree with, is to extend the 3km neutral section to 25-30km until we get out of the busy areas and perhaps until closer to sunlight. A pack that’s protected by leading and lagging vehicles until we get out of busy areas, closer to the hills and free to race later would mean the race results will be decided more by one’s strength on the bike in the hills rather than one’s risk appetite of racing in the dark and in manic early morning traffic.

The organisers have to start that early considering all other things in the equation including the time it’ll take the slower riders in touring mode to finish and how hot it gets in this part of the country once the sun comes up. So, starting at 5 am but having a neutral start until the first 30k or so might take care of safety concerns of the most. That would be my only suggestion/request to the brilliant team behind this amazing event.