Big-D 5K: First race of 2008

This is the race that got us all started with Team Asha Dallas. Last year on April 1st, ~15 of us trained and ran 5K/Half at Big-D race along with a bunch of Asha Austin runners. People were excited after this run and they never looked back. To keep the tradition going ~10 of us ran 5K on April 6th.
Luckily this year there was no traffic and we all were able to reach the start in time. I have never raced a 5K before and I wanted to give it all and see how fast can i go. I have warmed up well for about 10mins and was ready to start. I started off the first mile pretty strong and soon realized that I did a 7:11 min pace. I was happy about the pace but also worried that I will not be able to keep the pace as it felt hard. I managed to do the second mile in 7:24 but had to slow down to 7:40 for the third and ended up with 22:58 for 5K. I was really happy with the time, given that I hardly trained for a time.
It was nice to see newbies finish 5K in style including my good friend Sreenivas. He was not sure if he would finish this distance and now after 2 months he already ran 9 miles. he is currently training for half marathon. There were several new runners Sri, Laxmi, Divi apart from Sreenivas.

Ice Skating as cross training?

Last night we had an opportunity to test out Ice skating at
Dallas Galleria, thanks to my fellow Asha runner. We were almost 10 people from Team Asha. We were on the ice for about an hour and it was tiring. Initially, I was apprehensive especially after hearing to my wife, who started to freak out a little, but started to walk a little in about 10-15mins. I did manage to walk the first 4 laps next to the railing and only fell once! I got a little confident and started to walk/skate in the middle and managed almost 3 laps without falling or even holding to the rail. All in all I was very happy with my experience, considering this is the first time I stepped on ice. A few of us got excited and registered for classes for next month. I guess, ice skating will be an official cross training workout for Team Asha :)

Team Asha Marathon 2008

It has been a while since I posted on my blog. We have started our official Team Asha Dallas Marathon program on 12th July. We are training with Dallas Running Club (DRC) this year and we plan to run the Dallas Whiterock Marathon on 14th Dec 2008. We have been running unofficially with a bunch of people for the last 2 months and the response has been great. We got ~10-15 new runners and we already have ~30 runners doing the Asha marathon program this year. It is very encouraging to see new and enthusiastic runners. I have a feeling that we will have a very successful program this year, the second year in Dallas. I shall keep posting my progress and also that of our team in the blog from time to time.
On a personal note, my wife Sravanthi has also registered with Team Asha to be part of relay marathon and help the cause. Also, I want to train well this year and break the 4-hr barrier and get a PR for myself, all the while raising much needed funds for children in India.
Go Team Asha!