After a month of sporadic efforts to train at the Moro Lorenzo Sports Center, occasional battles with a bothersome ankle sprain, and another unexplained foot injury, I’ve finally managed to fulfill my birthday promise – finish the Men’s Health Philippines Urbanathlon.

I’m not one to make long thank you lists, but I sincerely feel that the situation calls for it. These people, after all, have been played a big part in my growth as a person.

• To my current officemates, who were more than understanding whenever I’d beg off from weekday drinking binges so I could train.
• To my Summit family, who honestly provided me with the most fulfilling working environment anyone could ever work for.
• To all my friends, who were trying to convince me to go out the night before the Urbanathlon (Sorry guys really had to sleep early)
• To Lisa Gokongwei, Aurora Mangubat, Denis del Callar, and Neil Palabrica, for giving me the opportunity to work with the most life-changing magazines in the world.
• To my family for putting up with my constant nagging for healthier food
• To Mariel, for constantly pushing me to try new things. I think all these changes are because of you. Still not giving up my videogames though
• And of course to Carlo Buan and Ryan Roset, whose arms I didn’t have to twist so they could suffer with me.

Now, for those who want to know how long I took and what place I finished, it was in the vicinity of an hour and twenty minutes. Anyways, that’s beside the point. Bottom line is I finished the thing.

Let’s just celebrate… I’m 28! Woohoo!

*Update: I finished a 200 out of a possible 440+ participants. Not bad, but I sincerely believe I could have done better. Additional images and complete list of participants can be viewed here.