We're done!

Cannot believe it, but we are finally done -- hurray! More details soon, but here are the stats (click image to view):

Bhawna:

Yesh:

Night before!

It's the night before our marathon, and we're ready to hit the sack now! Thanks to everyone for their support this far -- we're pretty excited that race day is finally here!

In case you want to check our progress online tomorrow, you can go to the following website and look us up based on last name (Paul):

http://www.marinemarathon.com/Results/check_your_runner.htm

Also, it's definitely not too late to donate to the cause we're running for (we're a little short of our target :( )! Donations to Asha can be made online at:

http://ashanet.org/nycnj/?s=marathon&id=191&rid=1688 (Yesh)
http://ashanet.org/nycnj/?s=marathon&id=191&rid=1685 (Bhawna)

Looking forward to catching up after the run!

Frost Valley Run

Spent this weekend in scenic Frost Valley, NY, on a women's retreat (v. relaxing!). Had a 2-hour timeslot on Sat afternoon to do my run. Was blessed to have the best of everything on this one:

• wonderful weather: it was chilly, but perfect for running and I actually remembered my earmuffs and gloves, so was nice 'n toasty
• wonderful scenery: rolling hills, fall colors, complete quiet, flowing streams... amazing!
• wonderful company: had a glorious time with Cara who made the run fun and easy! Thanks Cara!

We made really good time (at least for me). 10 miles (I measured it today on the drive back) in ~1:45... wowee.

Right knee was in pain around mile 8, but was fine after a quick 1-minute walk. Left knee was fine!

My 1st Race Certificate

Got my official NYC Half Marathon certificate in the mail today -- my first race certificate (since high-school anyway!). It was signed by Mike Bloomberg -- huh!

Some stats:

• I came in #10101 (well, there's at least a lot of 1s in that number :) )
• Pace/mile was 13:18, which I was pretty pleased with (I run my 20-milers at ~14+)
• Net finish time was 2:54:22 (so my sprint at the end definitely helped me make it under 3 hrs)

The winners were Kenyans Thomas Nyariki (1:01:22) and Catherine Ndereba (1:09:43) -- they ran it in 1/3rd the time I did. Amazing!

Treadmill Twenty

As unbelievable as this may sound, I did my twenty-miler on the treadmill in our building today. Yup -- 5+ hours on a treadmill (no mean feat -- took all my concentration to not fall off it in all that time!).

Funnily enough, this wasn't actually the achievement of the day --setting up our DVD player to work with the flat-screen TV in the gym was. Imagine this:

• flat-screen TV up high on a wall
• TV cord too short to reach plugpoint or DVD player
• multiple extension cords from plugpoint to TV cord
• DVD player perched sideways atop 2 dumbells atop kitchen stool
• 2 switches to turn on the TV (one well hidden)
• lack of batteries in TV remote
• 1 hour later -- Bourne Supremacy plays on highly unstable TV/DVD contraption while B runs crazily on treadmill...

I'll be glad when all this madness is over!

p.s. run was pretty good aside from the last 4 miles, which I had to mostly speedwalk. The knees and ankles are starting to fall apart :(

Asha Project: Mukti

Mukti is the Asha project of the week. This, and projects like it, are why we're running!

Socio-economic development trust Mukti was established in 2003 from the vision of a Sunderban native Sankar Halder. Sankar grew up in an underprivileged family in the Sunderban and went through the trials and tribulations that people living in Sunderban suffer through. Sankar decided to involve educated and energetic local youth to develop themselves and their communities through various developmental projects. This vision led to the foundation of Mukti.

Mukti's mission is to implement programs for upliftment of the underprivileged, illiterate, poor and backward people of mainly the Sunderbans region by way of motivation and human resources development thus building a self-reliant society by efficient and effective utilization of local resources and implementation of environmentally sound policies. The goal of education is not only to bring jobs to people, but to improve their lives. We believe education will teach people to think, will help them understand why it is important to do family planning, will help them understand how to improve the agricultural methods, will help them understand why good sanitation is important, and will expose them to the many good and bad things in the world outside.

More details can be found at:

• www.ashanet.org
• www.muktiweb.org