‘In spite of the rain’ seemed to be the thought for the day as the heavy rains in Chennai on Saturday night and the drizzles in the early morning did not stop either the organizers or the participants from arriving at the specified spot.
Maverick Fitness Studio and TI cycles were conducting a bi-athlon for the members of Maverick at the Besant Nagar beach. The bi-athlon comprised of two events cycling and running. The participants were to cycle for 5 kms followed by running for 3 kms in the Besant nagar area. There were 70 participants, men and women and they were busy discussing how some of them were cycling after years. They were eager to get started and there was generally a lot of satisfaction in the air that rain did not end up playing spoil sport.
Sr.Vice-President of T.I Cycles, Dr. Raghuram flagged off the event and the participants whizzed away on their cycles. The entire route was clear of traffic and Maverick trainers were stationed along the path to motivate participants, they came back to the same spot and started their run. Six participants walked away with prizes. First prize winners Anurag and Shilpa in the men and women’s category respectively won Racer bikes, Rajkumar and Rekha Sudarsan an I Pod Shuffle and Mohammed and Bhagyalakshmi won Timex Sports Watch. There was a lot of jubilation and the participants were cheerful as the event concluded.
A word with Anurag and Shilpa and I could hear the excitement in their voice. Anurag said, “I thought I would win as I was an athlete 3 years ago, but definitely Maverick has good trainers and equipments that helped”. Shilpa expressed, “It felt good to win because I could prove myself and I should thank Ram, my trainer from Maverick”.
Enquiring into the background of the event, I had a chat with Shankar Basu who is the CEO of Maverick Fitness Studios and the brain behind this event. Basu is only the second Indian to have obtained certification from National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA) and he is also a peak performance trainer at the National Cricket Academy. He said “Bi-athlon has been organized for the first time in Chennai. Our objective is to create a fitness culture here as we see in other countries. We have started playing a role by organizing different interesting events every month. We want our members to enjoy being a part of Maverick and help them achieve their fitness goals. We inspire certain life style changes and also motivate them with these events. There is a lot of excitement and practise before these events. In the process, we also help the general public to get more fitness conscious. We plan to include non-members in our events in future to create a socially conscious fitness revolution and we are rocking with these events”, he concluded.
R.Krishna Raj is the Managing Director and Gita Krishna Raj heads the administration of Maverick Fitness studios with three centers at Adyar, Anna Nagar and T. Nagar in Chennai and one in Bangalore. Today people are becoming health conscious and definitely the initiative taken by Maverick and TI Cycles will go a long way in spreading awareness and enveloping more people into the fold of wanting to be healthy and fit.