Nagaraj Ramanathan, a retired IT professional in Bengaluru, says that ever since he started running, he has been able to lower his bad cholesterol levels. Nagaraj’s HDL cholesterol too has improved and his weight is under control.Always a sports enthusiast, who took to swimming and racket sports, Nagaraj started running only in his late 40s when a colleague introduced him to Pramod Deshpande, the founder of Jayanagar Jaguars running group.Nagaraj recalls when he started, he would run by himself, clocking 10km in 65 minutes. “Marathons were never on my mind, but peers in the group convinced me to take part in 42k Tata Mumbai Marathon in 2019. I think that’s how most people get into marathons, due to peer pressure or to beat their personal best.” He soon became a regular at long-distance runs — in Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, Kargil, Malnad etc. In his latest, Nagaraj finished the 160km Border Run from Jaisalmer to Laungewala in Dec 2024. He completed the run in 23.4 hours.Inspired by him, his wife Deepa too got into running seven years ago. She’s 50 now, and finished her first marathon in Bengaluru in Oct 2024. The couple said running has helped them socialise and make new friends. “It elevates mood, promotes good sleep, helps fight depression and menopausal issues,” Deepa gets candid. She adds running brought more discipline into her life, made her a morning person and now, the two are conscious of what they eat.Bye-bye knee caps at 60Driving trucks long distances across the country was taking a toll on P Thomas’ health. By 50, he had developed lower back pain, knee pain and ever-spiking cholesterol levels. Fed up, Thomas started running, hoping to get some relief. He says that now he doesn’t take any pills, and had stopped wearing kneecap by his 60th birthday.Now 64, Thomas reset his life the moment he realised that he needed to live long and healthy if he were to support his children. But as a container truck driver working for a logistics company in Bengaluru, there was little he could do for fitness. But he made the best use of the limited hours that were at his disposal. “While I drove to cities like Delhi or Mumbai, I would stop the truck on the side of a highway for a while and run for a kilometre or two. I slowly increased the distance and soon, running became a habit.”Thomas had no idea about marathons until he shipped beer meant for VIPs at a Mumbai run. He soon asked his wife to register him for a 10k run in Kochi Marathon, but she ended up enrolling him for a 21k. “I went in anyway and felt really good after finishing the run. I realised I can achieve more, and registered for some more runs,” he says.Thomas says running has helped change his perspective on life. “As a lorry driver, I never dreamt big. I had a simple life, earning to support my family. Now I have serious plans to run the Boston marathon.”Running with asthmaAyesha Bedi, a 27-year-old entrepreneur, was never into sports while growing up. When she and her sister were insisted to go for runs early in the morning by their father, an orthopaedic surgeon, the siblings would go and chill in a park and return home later, claiming to have been running, confesses Ayesha, who was diagnosed with asthma at the age of seven.It was only in college in the US, she says, that she realised she wasn’t her fittest version. “At that point in life, I was on steroid inhaler on a daily basis, which could have had a long-term impact on my body. I had excess weight I wanted to lose and I could tell I wasn’t feeling good. I would go to bootcamps, boxing classes with my friends and I could tell my body wasn’t performing to its maximum capability,” she says. That’s when she turned to the popular HIIT (High-Intensity Interval Training) workouts and strength training to build muscle mass.”Later, I started focussing on my cardiovascular endurance as I wanted to improve my lung capacity,” she says. Soon, Ayesha took to running. It also helped her stay away from gadgets and reduce screentime. She notes that in closed environments like gyms, she would look at her phone a lot to check her next exercise. “So, running started off as an outdoor experience, where I could put my phone away. I could be at peace and track my progress on my own. At first, I could run only a kilometre or two. Slowly, I increased to five and then to seven kilometres.”To further her personal goals, Ayesha signed up for Tuffman 10k run in Delhi last year, having done only 7k runs until then. “I achieved the milestone of 10k. Then, I tried to push myself more and signed up for a half-marathon in Delhi. I am really proud that I finished the entire 21km run non-stop in 2.5 hours, which was a big achievement for me,” she says. Ayesha, who moved to Delhi from Bengaluru, says regular working out — 3 days of strength training and 2 days of running every week — has helped her reduce inhaler use remarkably. She doesn’t go on runs with her inhaler anymore, and requires only a puff a day now. “If I can do it with chronic asthma, frankly, anyone can run and stay fit,” Ayesha signs off.