How I Completed My First Marathon in Dhaka | The Velociti 15K Run 2025

Hello guys, this is me, Syed Zarif, and today I am here again.
Today I am going to share with you one of my new experiences. I know you have already guessed it from the title. I think most of my audience, who loves adventure and has a passion for outdoor activities, have already finished their first marathon. But yeah, it was my first experience in the marathon.

Well, let me tell you the whole story from the beginning. One day, one of my friends called me and said there is a marathon event named The Velociti 15K Run 2025 which is going to happen next Saturday. Again, he said he has a special discount for being a community partner of the event.

Here in Bangladesh, almost every marathon event is held on Friday, which is a government holiday here. But unfortunately, Friday is my working day, and Saturday–Sunday are my holidays. That’s why I can’t usually join these events. But when I heard about this event happening on Saturday, my heart just melted.

But again, there was a problem. One of my close friends’ weddings was on that day. And the wedding was to be held out of the city, so I also had to go out of the city to attend the ceremony.

But who will stop an adventure lover?? The next day I met him and somehow managed to convince him that I couldn’t attend the wedding ceremony. I then did the necessary registration for the event. It cost me 1050 taka.

Before the race day, I collected my kit from the collection point and was waiting for the next exciting day. On the way home, I bought a new short pant especially for the race.

The race was about to start at 5:30 AM, and I had to report to the race place called Hatirjheel Amphitheater before that time. Out of excitement, I took a little sleep and woke up at 4 AM to get ready. In my kit bag, they provided me with a jersey, a BIB (this is to track my running distance), and a batch of safety pins to attach the BIB to my jersey. As it was my first marathon, I planned to record the whole moment in a video. So, I also took my action camera, wallet, and phone in a small shoulder bag.

It was 5 AM then. Though it was morning, it was still dark everywhere, and the race place was far away from my home. So, I quickly called a bike from the Pathao app and started for the event. After almost 25 minutes, I reached the place at the very last moment and found my two friends, Mashrur and Debashish.

After I reached there, in a few minutes, the national anthem started, and after that, the whistle rang, and everyone started to run. It was an amazing moment for me. It was still a little dark everywhere, and there was a gentle breeze around. Everyone was running full of energy and confidence. They were inspiring me a lot.

After some time, the daylight finally came, and we reached our first hydration point, which was about 1.5 kilometers from the starting point. At the hydration point, there were members of the event management team providing us with water to drink. After drinking a glass of water, we again started to run. It was a 15-kilometer race, and there were hydration points every 1.5 kilometers.

After some time, we reached the second hydration point. Here they provided us with water, glucose, and dates to boost our energy. I took 2 dates and drank some glucose, then again started to move. While running, I was also making videos with my camera. There were also photographers after a few distances from the event management team as a complimentary service. The photo you are seeing at the top was also taken by one of the photographer brothers. At different hydration points, they were offering small pieces of ginger, lemon, watermelon, guava, and water mixed with glucose and saline.

The environment was amazing that morning, and there were several bridges at Hatirjheel. At first, I was a little nervous about the distance, as this was my first marathon and I hadn’t gone through so much distance by running before. But after seeing everyone around me, I think I got extra power in me.