I Lost 27 Kgs in One Year of the Pandemic. Here Is My Story.
How running changed my life
Editor’s note: This is the author’s experience and results will vary for everyone. Always check with your medical provider before starting any type of exercise program or diet.
May 1st, 2020
Growing up, I wasn’t physically active. I never had a big thing for any kind of fitness, and I limited most of my interaction with sports to weekend binges at a local pub watching footy. Travel made up a big part of my life and I flew in and out of airports, consuming airport junk food. Mix all of that with a sedentary lifestyle and a terrible diet, and it’s fair to say that at 37, just before the pandemic hit us in India, I was the living, walking definition of obese. I huffed and puffed for basic chores and even a flight of stairs was a hurdle I skipped over, opting for the elevator.
Then the pandemic kicked in. In India, we were locked down for weeks and that just added to the weight gain. At my peak, I weighed all of 117kgs, and with all kinds of mental illness kicking in, I found safe haven in sleepless nights and binge-watching OTA streaming services.
Lack of sleep and increased self-doubt meant the weight kept piling on incrementally. Bad health creeps up on you, and you don’t notice it. Sure, you can measure it — in weight, waist sizes, how long you can run, etc. — but it does creep up on you, a pizza at a time. That’s when I looked at myself in the mirror and remembered a line from a James Bay song, “it’s funny how reflections change.”
After four weeks of prison-at-home, it was time to step out again, albeit for grocery shopping. The “new normal” had kicked in; we were out with masks. For the first time in weeks, I felt cheerful again. Simple normal occurrences in late April — the rustling of leaves, the measured, benign precipitation in Bangalore — felt surreal, and almost romantic. At that moment, in the light pre-monsoon drizzle of May 2020, I decided to just sprint. Aimlessly. Recklessly. For as long as I could.
I didn’t even last a hundred meters. It was a lamp post to another lamp post. I was out of breath. I walked a bit — a few hundred meters — until I caught my breath. Then I tried again.
Same result. I was horribly unfit and was putting on a laughable public display of my lack of speed. Or stamina. Or strength. Or any kind of fitness.
But I tried again. And again, and again.
When you are the kind of person who travels to another city every week and hits up a pub twice a week, and then, when you are locked down in a tiny apartment, you cherish that moment forever. You simply do not want to go back home. I didn’t want to go home that evening.
By the time I reached home, I was sweating. My knees ached, my heels hurt with every step, and I had blisters on my toes from wearing the wrong socks and shoes. But it didn’t matter; it felt amazing. The app had indicated I’d done 7 kilometers in an hour and seven minutes.
That night, I slept like a baby without any dreams. The next morning, I decided that I’m going to repeat this every day.
I love fast food. I love my weekly, and sometimes, daily drink. And I absolutely enjoy the occasional dessert. But there was no way in hell I was going to sweat bullets every morning, only to pile on the calories at home. In many ways, running forced me to discipline myself in other areas, and at the same time, I tried to make these changes sustainable.
The key mantra for me was to work on micro achievements; set smaller goals, and then beat them. With some research, I worked out four pillars to improving my fitness — meditation, exercise, diet, and sleep. The end result? I lost twenty-seven kilograms in about nine months during the pandemic. In that journey, I overcame recurring anxiety, I’ve built the tiniest of muscles, and as far as fitness is concerned, I feel about eight years younger, in my early 30s. My waist size went from 38 to 32, and my shirt size went from 3XL to L. I no longer have to click selfies from a vantage point that resembles the top of Burj Khalifa.
These four pillars: meditation, exercise, diet, and sleep (acronym, MEDS) are the key to it all, and I’d like to break down my experiences with them. It’s no surprise running was the most prominent part of my routine that helped me shape my journey.
Exercise
My exercise routine, for the most part of the year, was just running. I’ve stumbled on, and enjoyed core and strength training only recently. For a good part of 2020, all I did was run.
Sounds boring?
Well, it wasn’t.
To begin with, I ran to sweat. I paid little attention to speed or mileage; it was just a question of getting out, putting one foot in front of the other, and going with the flow. To be honest, this remains my favourite way to do it; untimed runs without the pressure of progress. They work great to relax the mind and refresh the body.
Over time, being the geek I am, I found myself addicted to performance improvement. I measured this in two ways: speed and distance. Most articles on the internet talk about focusing on distance, and they are right — I’ve found that speed comes automatically. I dabbled around with a few apps until I settled in on Strava, and started with 5km stints at about 9 min/km.
Those are laughable times to most serious (or even amateur runners). Maybe they are. It didn’t matter. I was going out there, every morning, and setting a timed 5k. Every day. Sometimes twice a day, without rest days. Days when I woke up and just wanted to curl in bed, and then kicked myself for being lazy, and then stepped out. In just twenty steps, I felt better, and then went on to finish my 5k. This became a habit. I would reward myself with carbs on the weekends for being consistent.
Guess what those carbs did? They made me want to run more.
Needless to say, it wasn’t long before I was injured and found myself brooding at home. Every runner is different but the one thing we all have in common is, we are stupid. We ignore obvious signs of pain and patch it up with something — anything, heat spray, gels, ibuprofen — just to go out and do what we love doing.
Eventually, I worked out a balance. I worked on my form. I tweaked my diet to bring some performance improvements and invested in good shoes. All of that merits a separate post. But over time, I saw I could run faster, run longer, and run better (without being a zombie in the final lap, basically).
I had my best runs during the monsoon. The rain came pouring down, and under a hood, I experienced the runner’s high every day, week after week, for months. I felt united with the earth that I continued to pound with my legs. I felt absolutely no pain. The cloudbursts felt like more of an embrace from mother nature, egging me to go on and on. I saw younger, fitter people take shelter under roofs above the porches of their homes. But I went on, and on, and on. Some would look at me incredulously. Some took inspiration and stepped out the next day. But for the most part, they were convinced I was nuts.
Well, I was nuts. I love getting high — but this was different. Running put me in a state of ecstasy that alcohol or weed never can or will.
So I continued to run, well after the monsoon had departed Bangalore.
By June (one month into my journey), I was averaging about 48 minutes for my 5K. By July, I had brought it down to under 45 minutes. By August, I was clocking well under 40 minutes.
In September, I switched to alternating between 10ks and 5ks. My first 10k PR was 1:26:00. I got my 5K times to under 35 minutes. This was, for me, a huge milestone. I was creeping up to that elusive sub-30 5k.
By October, a week before my 38th birthday and almost six months into this journey, I was 18 kgs lighter. I clocked a 5k of 32 minutes, and a 10k of under 70 minutes.
On the 18th of November, after binging on pasta the previous evening, I made an attempt to run a 5k under 30. I was sure I could get there. Unfortunately, after 2kms, Strava screwed up and the clock had stalled.
I was sweating, exhausted, and ready to head back home to try the next day. Halfway into my retreat, I just shook my head. “No freaking way,” is what I told myself. I went back to the park where I usually train and ran another attempt.
Twenty-nine minutes, forty-three seconds.
Holy mother of God. I was overjoyed. I could hug a hundred strangers in my sweaty state, thank God for them that a pandemic existed and I was socially distancing.
I came back home, poured a beer, and promptly enrolled into a half-marathon and a 10k race the next month.
I finished the half-marathon in 2:27:00. The next week, I ran the 10k in under 60 minutes.
At the turn of the year, I consistently hit under 30. By the time I reached my one-year anniversary of running, I had done a 5k PR of 26:41. I’m now hoping I can find something in me to go sub-25. I weighed myself — a drop of twenty-seven kilograms. I looked in the mirror and remembered those lines again. “It’s funny how reflections change,” crooned James Bay in the distance.
What do these numbers mean?
Nothing. Numbers are just to keep score with yourself. What the numbers don’t tell you is how better you feel. For me, no matter how bad things are at home or at work, running is how I deal with it. A great day? Celebrate with a run. A shit day? Vent with a run. The reward for eating healthy? Run. Want to eat a burger tomorrow? Put in the miles today to make up for the weekend binge. That’s how I see it — a mechanism to push myself to my limits, but consistently, at a measured pace.
I don’t enjoy mindless sprints, although I do them just to tone the abs. I enjoy mini-goals, from one lamp post to another, from one tree to another, under the sun, in the rain, and feeding biscuits to strays. In that process, I spent an hour away from home; I plan my day, or week; I strategize on company affairs; I work out whom to hire, whom to train, and whom to inspire. My mind is buzzing with ideas, and by the time I’m home, I’ve lost negativity through the sweat, and I’m ready to take on the rest of the day (or night).
Diet
I’m not a fan of diets. However, I did have to change a few things, and I worked out what I feel are sustainable changes into my diet for the good. I identified a fasting window of 10 pm to 12 pm (that’s a fourteen-hour fast I can sustain every day). I classified what I would eat into few categories:
The untouchables — This is stuff I completely avoid; and for me, that’s anything with a lot of sugar, and anything that’s cooked in a lot of oil/deep-fried. I cut sugar out of my life completely during the week, including my coffee, which I now enjoy black.
The daily bread — Stuff I eat regularly. My daily diet is high in fruit, grilled paneer, chapatis (made of wheat flour, not white), Mediterranean dips (hummus, mutabal, baba ganoush), curd, and nuts. I have a peg or two on a regular basis, that helps me with my creative days.
The weekend binge — I go all out, but restrict this to ONE meal during the day, usually a rice meal, burger, or a pizza. I make up for it with increased training and reduced salt intake otherwise, focusing on fruits to substitute a meal.
I also increased my water intake, to make up for lost sweat. Consistent, adequate water intake makes up the most important part of our diet and it works wonders to kill appetite and keep your engines in optimal shape for the runs.
The mornings before my timed runs, I enjoy my black coffee, throw in a few nuts, and probably a piece of plantain. It may not work for everyone, but it works best for me — I find my runs the most relaxed on those days.
Sleep
Come what may, I sleep a minimum of six hours a day, and often, eight hours a day. If I have meetings or chores, I take them, get done with them, and go back to sleep. I simply can no longer function on reduced sleep. I cannot run on reduced sleep. It’s a decision I’ve made with myself, that sleep is the one thing I will never, ever compromise on.
There’s history — I suffered from sleep paralysis for a good part of my 30s. Those were scary nights and I never want to experience them again. So what I do is, I sleep. It sounds selfish and arrogant, but the world can deal with my absence while I wake up satisfied. A lesson learnt the hard way. One thing that helped me sleep better during the pandemic were essential oils. Lavender and sandalwood remain my favourite.
Meditation
I’m not religious. Not one bit. So when things go south, I find solace in music. Classic rock and pop from the 70s, 80s, and 90s remain my favorites. For meditation, however, I practiced simple deep breathing and stretching in bed. Yes, in bed. I’m inherently lazy, and more than focusing on yogic positions, I found it more rewarding to breathe in a relaxed state, while listening to two things on the bedside Alexa. The first is Buddhist monk music, which is almost hypnotic. The second is a set of ambient sounds that you enjoy. Personally, I find light drizzle on a rooftop, or the sounds of the ocean as the most soothing, and I doze off with ease to these sounds.
At the start of this article, I indicated how this routine helped me physically.
But above all, the thing I value the most is I am mentally almost unbreakable. I say almost because there are good days and there are bad days, and we’re all, at the end of the day, human. There are days when it creeps in — solitude, imposter syndrome, a lack of purpose — but those days are rarer and rarer. And even in the worst of moments, I’ve found that stepping outside and returning home drenched in sweat has purged that negative emotion. Almost cathartically.
This is all down to those runs. It is fascinating how something as simple as putting one foot ahead of the other can bring so much benefit to the mind, body, and soul.
I can say, without a shred of doubt, that I am a better manager, a better worker, a better lover, a better son, and in all likelihood a better reflection of myself with the miles I’ve clocked and hopefully will continue to clock.
Running changed my life. I hope it changes yours.
The author is a nerd who dabbles in code, slides and spreadsheets for the daily bread. Almost the entirety of the rest his time is spent in running, watching, talking about and thinking of football and Formula 1 while attempting to survive as nomadically as life permits him.
