Simply The Best

‘Where legends are made, and reputations are formed.’

This was the narration for the television documentary, Simply The Best (Saturday, 12.00pm, Mediacorp 5). I had returned, today, from a heat-infused 140km bike ride, and caught a glimpse of Joe Montana’s biography. The famous football player for the San Francisco 49-ers played from 1979-1992, and is now a Pro Football Hall-of-Famer. Then, the focus shifted to the Ironman Triathlon World Championships in Kona, on the Big Island. Our first interview on this blog was with Dave Low – he is from Honolulu.

Ironman (triathlon) started as an argument as who was fittest: swimmer, cyclist or runner. On one fateful morning of 18 February 1978, 15 people swam 3.8km, rode 180km, and ran a full marathon. The three disciplines were based on three existing race already in Honolulu, Hawaii. Today, thousands of triathletes compete in more than 20 Ironman distance races to qualify for about 1,500 slots in the world championships on Kona each year. Both Dave Low and Craig Holland have completed Kona. Next week, we will feature Oz Pearlman a professional magician and ultra-marathoner who completed the race in Kona, too.

What would drive normal people to do an extreme endurance sport, be it an ultra-marathon, swimming the Amazon River, scale Mount Everest, complete an Ironman or Deca-Ironman (ten times)? Perhaps, they are normal people leading abnormal lives? Or, is it amazing people living normal lives? Dr Kua Han Wei, a Singaporean completed 10 Ironman races over 10 days and is world-ranked for his achievements in endurance sports.

Congratulations to our Singapore Women’s Everest Team (www.womenoneverest.com) for making the summit to Mount Everest this week! On 20 and 22 May 2009, the NATAS-SWET created history when they scaled the highest peak on earth at 8850m: Joanne Soo, Lee Peh Gee, Jane Lee, Lee Lihui and Esther Tan.

Simply awesome!