Saturday, March 15, 2008

2007 - a look back



Another great year with TeamAsha - we survived the heat and chaos at the Chicago Marathon, ran the beautiful Marine Corps Marathon in Washington DC and finished strong at the Silicon Valley Marathon in San Jose. Along the way our runners raised money to help educate and change the lives of less fortunate kids back in India.

Another year with four marathons (including 1 during my Ironman). Napa in March, Chicago & Marine Corps (DC) in October and Ironman Canada in August. Apart from that a few of us did the Tri OneOOne Triathlon (3/4 Ironman Dist) in June, Vineman 70.3 (Half Ironman) and a century bike ride in July.

2007 was a year when a lot of my friends achieved personal sporting highs:

Anil Rao, Alan Geraldi, Gary Friedle and Padma - Finished their first 100 mile race.
Rajeev Patel - ran three 100 mile races in 3 months! He also finshed the tri 101 (3/4 Ironman Dist Race)
Vinod Herur - returned with me to do Ironman Canada for the second time.
Mark "Irondog" Williams - finished another (10th?) Ironman Canada!!

2007 was a good year for me as well - With Personal records at;

Napa Marathon (26.2 miles) - 3:56:40 (Previous Best 3:59:12 - in 2006)
Vineman 70.3 (half Ironman) - 5:48:29 (Previous Best 6:06:03 - in 2003)
Ironman Canada (full Ironman) - 13:14:52 (Previous Best 13:53:26 - in 2002)

First Quarter 2008 update:
Napa Marathon March 2008 - Here I am - 11 pounds heavier - but still managed a decent finish at Napa with a Personal Best of 3:49:00 - Vinod Herur ran a carzy 3:30 and qualified for Boston! Awesome Vinod. Gururaj, Bharti, Lila finished their first marathons - congrats to them - they are all 1/3 of their way to an Ironman finish...:-)

A week after Napa I went bowling with a few friends and on the first roll I pulled my piriformis muscle - that's it...the extreme sport of Bowling is out...I'll stick with Triathlons, Marathons and maybe some gentle skydiving.