The Bengaluru-based septuagenarian runner Y S Rajendra Kumar (79), his son and grandson have made it to the India Book of Records for being the only three-generation runners to have completed the Procam Slam, a running event that involved a full marathon (42.2 km) in Mumbai earlier this year.
The trio set the record by successfully completing all the runs in the event that included TCS World 2019 (10 K), Airtel Delhi Half Marathon 2019 (21 k), Tata Steel Kolkata 2019 (25 K) and Tata Mumbai Marathon 2020 (42.2 K), organized between April 2019 and January 2020.
Kumar, his son Darshan Jain (52) and grandson Tanmay Jain (22) have been practicing running for close to six years now.
The highlight of their achievement was that the three of them coordinated their fitness, nutrition and training for one whole year, ensuring that they stayed in the best of their form until the last event. Another important feature of the record was that all three had to finish the running events within the cut-off time, which was 90 minutes for the 10k run, 3 hours for the half marathon, 3.5 hours for 25k and 6.5 hours for the full marathon.
Speaking to DH, Darshan, a businessman by profession, said completing the run within the cut off time was the most challenging. "My father had to maintain the time. However, in the end it turned out that he fared better than people half his age." he recalled. They tried to complete the slam in 2018 but his father suffered an injury on account of which all three of them could not run together, he added.
What more, at 79, this was Rajendra Kumar’s first full marathon too. Kumar said methodical training and discipline got him through. "Perhaps younger runners can afford to miss out on a running session here and there. For me, regularity was important. Every alternate day I turned up for the training. On days I did not run, I practised yoga," he narrated.
All three runners attributed their success to their coach Pramod Deshpande of Jayanagar Jaguars running group, who drew up a separate fitness regimes for all three, according to individual strength and endurance.