Team Asha Rocks 3M!

Hi All,

Temperatures of 37 F, felt like 28 F with wind chill. In 'desi' terms around 0 deg C!!

We had a wonderful cheering squad who braved all the rough weather to keep the team going! A big thank you to Rajiv, Aparna, Chirag, Arvind, Gaurav and Pankaj. Each one of us have many commitments related to family, work and life in general. It takes a lot to wake up so early in the morning on a 'Sunday' and be just out there sparing time for the team! You guys made it a memorable experience for all of us and spurred us on to the finish!

( Thanks to Pankaj for co-ordinating the whole cheering effort for the team. )

Here are the stars of the show though :)

(In reverse alphabetical order, for a change ..)

Vivin
( http://www.ashanet.org/austin/soh/runners/vivin.html )

She is part of an elite category within Team Asha! Being a mom in itself takes all your time and resources (If you have any doubts, you can check with my mom on how much I troubled her!). How about being a Marathon Mom? While, Syona an adorable future Team Asha runner kept her mom busy most of the time, Vivin stealthily carried on with her running, with no complaints or cribs. She switched from AT&T to 3M as her target race rather late and frankly speaking we were a bit worried! But, she finished in style and made us all proud! Vivin and Ram long term Asha volunteers once again showed us why they are part of the reason Asha Austin trudges along year after year!

Sharanya Rao
( http://www.ashanet.org/austin/soh/runners/arvindNsharanya.html )

After moving to Austin, running would have probably been the last thing on her mind! But, today she ran the longest she ever has! She finished an half marathon for a cause that she truly believes in. All through the training she was worried how she will do on the D-Day and she did amazingly well today! Sharanya is not just a Team Asha runner, she is an active Asha Austin volunteer and has been attending meetings regularly. It was rather obvious that the enthusiasm and initiative would ebb into the running too. The training and silent dedication to the schedule ensured that she cut more than 10 minutes from her expected finish time! She declared that she doesn't talk much while running. I guess, she meant she lets the running talk. In her own words - 'We don't run for that piece of metal they give us at the finish, we run for the kids'.

Minesh Shilotri
( http://www.ashanet.org/austin/soh/runners/minesh.html )

Every class in the school has these bunch of guys/gals who sit in the last bench and have a lot of fun. They take it easy, but finish strong! Minesh probably slept through most of the long runs in the entire training program (Sorry dude! Had to quote you!). Minesh missed a lot of the training and the maximum distance he had done before was about 4-5 miles. But, it takes a lot of courage and determination to not back down with all this. With a nervous start all of us are worried how he is going to shape up at the race. Yet, he seemed to suggest he wanted more at the end of the race! It truly was a committed performance today from him. Team Asha respects the die hard spirit that he demonstrated for all of us today.

Khushbu Patel
( http://www.ashanet.org/austin/soh/runners/khushbu.html )

Can any one of us imagine being in pre-med school at UT, with atleast 5 courses every semester to handle, a student job and find whatever time if possible to train for a half marathon ? I am still kind of amazed as to how she managed it! With a rigorous schedule to handle at UT, she made light weather of all the troubles and kept on with the training as much as possible. The longest she had done before last week was 6 miles and today she did much faster than expected!! Through the whole race, it looked like she was just taking it easy. So, that probably means this was just a start! Khusbu has been more than a Team Asha runner - she is a long term Asha volunteer who took the intiative in representing Asha amongst the students of UT and garnering support at UT.

Arvind Viswanath
( http://www.ashanet.org/austin/soh/runners/arvindNsharanya.html )

The target was 1 hr and 54 mins and Arvind failed miserably in reaching it and could only do 1 hour and 57 mins :) . Well, atleast he says that. This guys is too good with his running and I am sure that he is going to kick some ----- if he wants to. With a job that requires a good amount of travel, it really does curtail options of training. But, I have never heard Arvind complain about it! Rather, his involvement with Asha and its efforts has been on a steady rise! If you don't believe me, let me introduce you all to Asha Austin's new chapter co-ordinator! Yep, he leads by example. The very first meeting he attended and heard about the marathon program, he signed up to be a part of it! His initiative and spirit of volunteerism didn't stop there. After the first meeting he attended, We know of almost no meetings that he has missed! Arvind really means a lot for Asha Austin in terms of dedicated volunteers and is amazing inspiration for the rest of Team Asha!

Finally, come the crazy runners who didn't have 3M as the target race, but did it for the heck of it!

Gayathri, Charanya, Manasi, Mohit, Vivek and Ganesh - Here are ppl who are on their way to their targets and 3M was an important milestone! They just didn't make it a training run and were there to cheer us all till the end! I am pretty sure they are going to excel in their target races!

(Note: If I failed mentioning anyone's contribution to Team Asha's 3M efforts, please do bring it to everyone's notice and mail the group.)

Go Team Asha!!

Thanks,
Santhosh.