Mumbai-based Sarthak Malani, who works for Pinkathon, is in Chennai to organise India’s biggest and only women’s run in Chennai on July 2. What makes him special is that he runs backwards in marathons! In an interview to DC, he opens up about the reason behind running backwards, also called retro running.
“I ran my first backwards half marathon (21 kms) in Ahmedabad in 2015. Some people think that I do that to gain attention and some think that I am a mad man! The real reason was a knee injury called the Runner’s Knee,” he shares.
Later, he discovered backwards running and its benefits. “I was surprised that people in China and Japan have been practicing backwards walking for 100 years now! A lot of athletes follow backward walking and running as a therapy when they are injured,” he elaborates.
The curious 25-year-old decided to give it a shot and began to feel the difference. “I started increasing my distances gradually and soon reached a stage where I was so confident about my backward running that I decided to run my first backward half marathon. I have been running backward since then.”
He says that there was no special practice for the run. “There is no doubt that running backwards is a risky thing due to obvious reasons. For about four to five months, I ran in an empty park early in the morning to get a grip on backward running before I could hit the road,” Sarthak says.
Watching people reacting on running backwards is the best part, he says. “They always ask me a lot of questions and when they know the reason and science behind it, everything starts making sense to them,” he concludes.
