It appears that I have not run a race for a full 1 year. I am not sure about it. I might have forgotten to post some of the races. In any case, like every year, I went to run the July 4th Freedom Run in Woodstock this year. I also had my close friend from Dallas Sunil Roy who was visiting us with his family join us!!

By my clock I posted 24min 15 secs but took quite some time to get to the starting line. The usual festivities and celebrations were there. Sunil and I hung around for a little while as we enjoyed the crowd.

5 miles in Alpharetta roads. Interesting incident – I was running on the outer lane against oncoming traffic on a not so busy road. Three cars happen to come from the other side (facing me). As they pass by, I realized one was a cop car and he yelled something on the megaphone. Not sure whether he was warning me to get off the roads or the other two cars to move over to the other lane for me. Has anything like this ever happened to any of my runner friends? — at Starbucks.

Effect of 15 degree cooler temp (started earlier when it was 84) over the same 7 mile route: 45 seconds per mile and no breaks required. Didn’t feel dizzy at the end of the run either 🙂

7 mile run in 99 degrees. The sun was too hot. Had to slow down to a 10:35 pace and still took three breaks under the trees.

Sunday morning 4mile run at 9:16 pace with the indomitable Samaresh Mukhopadhyay. Somewhere in our third mile, we saw a couple of other runners and I was like – “I know ‘er. It’s Knower 🙂 “. Always great to catch up withLia Knower – one of those rare friends I have that run for 100 miles…. in one go!! That makes her simultaneously certifiably crazy as well as an inspiration for me every time I want to give up after 8 or 9 miles of running 🙂

5K run + full sun + 95 degrees = blisters in both feet 🙁 Ouch! Ouch!

Not sure what made me sweat so much today – the resurging Atlanta humidity or the biggest snake I ever saw on the road. Fortunately, it was run over way before I had to run around it. — at Starbucks.

Early morning run. Great weather in Milton. Now for some Starbucks.

Life’s best 10K run. Sub 8 pace. 49:29 mins. Thanks Bob, Prasenjit and Prabir. — with Prabir Majumder and 2 othersat Big Creek Greenway Trailhead – Fowler Park.

7 years back to this very day May the 20th, then 38 years old, I went for a run. I promptly passed out in Dallas heat but went back the next morning and eventually fell in love with it. In 7 years, I have made some of my best friends on the road, enjoyed some of the best scenic beauties in over 10 countries, learnt (again) how to run barefoot (and then minimalist), raised money for over 50 charities, ran thru nearly 20 pairs of shoes, singlehandedly propped up Starbucks quarterly results 🙂 …. Would not have happened without my wife who got me into it in the first place and some early encouragement from John McGehee (who runs better than most I know at the age of 63!!!)