Actor, model and marathon runner Milind Soman said that lot of people told him that Pinkathon will be a failure because women in India don’t participate in marathon events but he is glad that it has reached to its 7th edition because overwhelming response from women.
Milind Soman was interacting with media at the announcement of 7th edition of Bajaj Electricals Pinkathon Mumbai 2018 on Tuesday in Mumbai.
Milind Soman is considered as one of the fittest Indian on planet as he is really good swimmer and taken part in various marathon events all over the world, when asked Milind who is his inspiration, he said, “My inspiration is myself because I don’t know what I am capable of. I keep challenging myself as earlier, I completed Iron man completion then, I completed Ultra man competition and now I am planning to compete in double Iron man challenge so, it’s always physical and mental challenge for me.”
“Similarly, when we started Pinkathon, people told me that it will be a failure because women in India don’t run in marathon events so why are you starting an event for them? It was risk but I believed in it and I said let’s see and we will learn from it and now we are here to start 7th edition of the event and its all possible because of all women who have participated in it over the years so, I think whenever you do an activity or challenge yourself that time, you learn a lot.”
Talking about Pinkathon marathon event, Milind said, “I am very with the support for movement. The kind of community of women, we have been able to create which is focused on fitness and health is really amazing because we often see that we don’t have fitness and sports culture in our country. Despite that, women are associating themselves with Pinkanthon as they have realized that its vey necessary to take an effort for their health and fitness.
When asked Milind is there any kind of criteria to participate in Pinkathon, he said, “No. When our mascot is aged 103 then, we don’t have any age category. My mother is 80 year old and she always participates in Pinkathon. There is other woman who is power lifter, she is 75 years of age and she is also taking part in it so, there are many women who are above 75 years of age who completes 5 or 10 kilometers of marathon running. Even there was one lady who came along with her baby who is few months old so, the youngest participant I would say was three months old with her mother so, there is nothing that we have in terms of restrictions. You can run in this marathon irrespective of your cloth wearing preferences, background, locality and age.”
Other than promoting fitness and health among women, the race aims to create awareness of breast cancer among visually-impaired women and acid attack victims, when asked Milind about the initiatives which will take place during marathon event, he said, “I think the more we talk about taboo subjects, the better it is to generate awareness about it so, here we have stalls here which talks and explains about breast cancer and menstruation so, we encourage people especially women to talk about their issues so that, we will be able solve their issues to certain extent.”
He added, “To me, empowerment is big aspect of it because when you do something like running, it creates kind of feeling of self-achievement. People often think that they cannot complete even 3 kilometers of marathon but when they complete that then, they think that they can complete 5 or 10 or 21 kilometers of marathon running. The obstacles which you think of are all there in your mind but when you take that the decision to do a certain thing then nobody can stop from doing that.”
The seventh edition of Pinkathon, a marathon for women, will be held at the MMRDA Grounds at Bandra Kurla Complex on December 16.
Participants can register online at www.pinkathon.in/mumbai. An individual can participate in the 3-km, 5-km, 10-km, or 21-km run. The event organisers aim to attract 11,000 participants this year.
An initiative by the United Sisters Foundation, the marathon will have Apollo as medical partner.
There will be volunteers to train the participants in exercises, and take care of their diet.
