Alameda Runners – Get After It!

It wasn’t long ago when golf and tennis were the most popular sports among Silicon Valley executives and uber rich snobs.  A recent Reuters article however, notes a continued trend I’ve seen (and fully support) over the past few years: the rise of popularity in endurance sports among executives and snobs.

There is a stereotype that all nerds are out of shape couch potatoes — and that may be true in many cases — but more CEOs and tech executives are turning to cycling, running, and other endurance activities to stay fit.

Image courtesy of mtc.ca.gov

“It is usually not a six- or seven-hour day, so part of it is, you probably want something to keep you mentally and physically in shape,” said Enrique Salem, Symantec COO, in an interview with Reuters.  “You want to do something that is challenging, that isn’t about running a business.”

The rest of the article can be found after the jump.

Sure enough, Reuters found another executive who enjoys getting out there and getting after it.

“I love setting goals,” said Jason Kila, Hulu CEO, in the same interview published by Reuters.  “Life is more interesting when you set goals that are not easy, and having a goal of a marathon … is a very fun thing that focuses you in a way that just running 3 miles or 6 miles a day does not.”

I’ve chatted with a few other executives over the years who say they enjoy cycling rather than golf, tennis, or squash.  SugarCRM, a tech company specializing in commercial open source CRM (if you don’t know, don’t ask), even had a cycling team that won Club of the Year a couple of years ago.

I hope to see this trend continue in the future.  Perhaps running and cycling will help keep these executives in better shape than sitting around the country club gossiping with one another.  (I’m not saying Salem or Kila would be sitting around gossiping if they weren’t out rocking the endurance world, either.)