Breakfast at Vellore, Lunch at Krishnagiri and dinner at home, 405kms/16hrs 49mins

This ride is dedicated to my loving parents for their upcoming 25th wedding anniversary.

Nothing much to write about as I was concentrating on riding. Not many snaps too. Also I might miss some timelines as I did not note them much.

Planned this ride with Dipankar Paul. Target was to head 200km towards Vellore and return back.

Started from Marthahalli at 2am with Dipankar. Reached silk board and turned on Hosur road. DP was having two sets of Deal extreme lights and were more than enough for cruising at 30-35kmph. Somehow I felt my right leg was not at optimum performance. Continued with a doubt in mind that it might screw up enroute. Roads towards Hosur were empty with occasional truckies passing by.

Crossed Hosur and the descends started. Took couple of hits in potholes at well over 40kmph. I am still getting that pain in elbows :(. Stopped at a CCD at 65km mark but could not find anything to eat so I had a coffee and got our hydration packs fill up. Reached Krishnagiri and headed towards Chennai. Road was awesome and really loved riding. Stopped for a pee break only to find 110km on speedo in 3hr 37mins. We went ahead and crossed 165km by 8am. It had rained here the previous night so the surroundings were pleasant. Dipankar wanted to do 200km by 9am so as usual he started pushing at 37-38kmph. I was getting tired while keeping pace with him but the crazy bugger just went ahead. Finally at 0915 we stopped after crossing 202kms. Returned and had a break of 30min while we munched on much needed breakfast. Explained why our bikes cost so much to a elderly gentleman.

Started for Bangalore and ran straight into headwinds. Also sun was starting to show up we were getting ready for the bit of sufferfest. En route Dipankar took his trademark 10min powernap on the roadside while I acted easy to keep curious onlookers away. Still got queries about him from 4 guys. Started riding again and during next stop had 500ml cokes each. I emptied the bottle while DP was busy telling me advantages of sweetened drinks while riding. And frankly that seemed to work. Rode nonstop for next 45 or so on the coke boost. Found a coconut vendor on away and had some coconut water. 

DP answered many questions from other motorists. A guy riding Pulsar asked me why we were riding. With my answer that we are practising, he gave a very very strange look and sped away with helmet protecting his left HAND.

We reached Krishnagiri at around 3pm. Stopped at a roadside hotel for a lunch. By now is was so hot outside that I could not even eat properly thanks to high body temperatures. DP was also tired so we decided to rest for sometime.

 Started out again at 4 and the rolling terrain started. I had seen the descents in the morning so was worried about the climbing. Surprisingly we climbed fast at ease. Best thing I learned was to get out of saddle and pump efficiently. I was surprised when he told me that major climbs were over. To me they did not seem difficult at all(dunno why). At 5pm we were ~68kms away from Bangalore so we decided to take it easy and relax. DP had his secret booster drug here :P. We started again and reached to the CCD. 

The place which was deserted in the morning was now buzzing with people and I was so full of dust that we had quite a few curious looks. Had a Chicken sandwich and cold coffee here and decided to wait till nightfall as riding at dusk is something I dont like much. I asked DP to ride slowly from here as I did not have any headlights and someone coming in my path was the last thing I wanted. Also traffic increased quite a lot from here and I had to be very attentive while riding. Crossed Hosur, had some narrow misses with some morons riding service lane in wrong directions. Took a break just after entering Karnataka and had some water. I ate a lot of dust and smoke from krishnagiri to hosur ride. From here just took the return route and reached home at 9 with a wide grin and a badly smacked butt.

Something important I came to about myself that, I energise well if I take a 10 minute break. All in all this was a nice ride and never felt like I had to push myself too hard except 165-200 mark. Thanks to Dipankar for riding with me.

Total distance 405km

Riding time: 16hrs 49min

Total time: 19hrs