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After 3 years of being rejected in the lottery I'm finally in for the New York Marathon this year! My wife Robin and I will both be running it. Anyone else planning on going? Hmmm...I guess I'll have to actually start running again soon. I've been on a hiatus letting a sore heel heal up. Picked up some new shoes yesterday, and plunked down my $195 entrance fee <gulp!>. So, I guess I'm committed.
Yeah for you both!!!
Awesome - best of luck! My oldest brother (35) and his wife will be there too. They can't seem to stop talking about how fun it will be...
Thanks! I'm definitely looking forward to it. Robin did it and said it's pretty special as marathons go. She should know having done 32 of 'em. Good luck to bro' and his wife, Jman. I'm just planning on finishing with no thoughts about the time.
:clap:Congratulations:clap: Sounds like it will be quite the experience. You will have to post some pics and let us know what it was like. Surprised at the fee I had no idea it costs that much to run in the big races.
Yep a full report, pre, post, during, prep. :haha: Congrats! I bet it will be awesome!! :popcorn:
Congrats :cool2:
I had my best training run yet today! I've got up to ~16 miles twice before today. Neither time felt great and the 2nd felt worse than the first. But, I think jet lag from 4 day biz trip to Europe and poor carbo loading the night before were factors. Last night I made sure to eat well and get enough rest. Today I brought my son to be my "water mule". He spent 30 minutes riding his 29er MTB on the pump track next to where we leave the car and then quickly caught up to me on the fire road. I passed my wife and various groups of friends coming back from their various runs. Then it was just me, my thoughts and my breathing rhythm as I made the long climb up this fire road. From 4.5 to 6 miles it is *very* steep and then keeps climbing steadily for the next 3 miles to the top.
It was so nice to see Aaron waiting at the view point bench with my extra water. :2thumbs:
The only bummer was we had crazy thick coastal fog today that socked in the great view from up there. Oh well. As I drank and we chatted briefly about what time to meet at the coffee shop another woman came running up the fire road. She asked about the mileage to that point (9 miles) and what it was like to continue on the trail vs. returning on the fire road. I offered to run with her down the trail and she agreed. It made it nice to have someone to talk to for the descent. That she was attractive and friendly didn't hurt either, but I made sure to introduce her to my son and mention my wife a couple of times. :naughty:
Anyway, the trip down the West Ridge trail was great. Very fun winding through the forests, creeks and ridges on the single track. The time passed quickly chatting about runs, travel, music, and even a bit about you all on bogley! I made sure to take some Gu at about mile 14 and before we knew it we were back down at the fire road with just the last 2.2 miles to grind out. I think it took about 3:15 to do the 18 miles which is pretty good considering the terrain and the elevation gain (about 1400 feet). I said "bye" to Kim and met Aaron for coffee and breakfast burritos at the local coffee shop. After stretching I felt pretty darn good! No major residual pain and energized from a strong finish to a big run.
Iced up a couple of minor sore spots and I think I'm on course for a couple of easier weeks, then my 20 mile run in 3 weeks and then taper for the marathon. Feels like "light at the end of this tunnel"!
If people are curious here is a link to a trail map for this park in Aptos that I use for my long runs:
http://www.virtualparks.org/maps/fil...sene-marks.pdf
Awesome progress!!!!
Great job! You are inspiring me to get motivated again and train for something. :lol8: Been a bit lazy lately.
Good luck. I've done my first half this year.. would like to work up to a full marathon in the near future.
Well all the training is done. There is nothing I can do now to make it any easier other than stay healthy and eat well. The race is two weeks out tomorrow. I follow a rule of thumb of no more miles than days until the race. Last Saturday I did 20, today 12 and next week I will be cross training with some canyoneering :naughty: Keep up some short tempo runs during the weeks and that's it!
Booked a nice restaurant in Little Italy the night before the race and a place with good steaks the night after :nod:
The 20 mile run went really well. I've been struggling with some pains: feet, hamstring, knee. I can't say they have all gone completely away, but I felt the best I've felt since ramping up mileage after finishing the 20 and I still had some gas to kick it a little on the last mile. Eating well the night before is key as is getting good rest. But, I think this will go fine and I'll have some good stories and pics to share in a couple of weeks...
Time to close this out...I DID IT! My 5th marathon. Not my best nor my worst time. Considering the fact that I was hardly running at all 4 months ago and that I didn't train all that hard (no speed work, mostly ran 3x per week, two runs of 18 and one of 20 miles) I was quite satisfied with my time of 4:15. I'm sure many of you are thinking "why that's not really *running*", it's still something to cross the finish line after 26.2 and still be on your feet. I think the secret to my training was the week of canyoneering cross-training the week before the race. :cool2:
We arrived in NYC on Thursday before the race, and promptly went out to eat some good deli food: latkes, knishes, pastrami, pickles, ...yummm. The next morning we hit the marathon expo first thing to pick up our race packets, do a little shopping for schwag and meet some friends also in town for the race. We headed over to the High Line Park nearby (www.thehighline.org). There used to be a small train line running through the garment district to move goods to/from the manufacturing houses. Now defunct, they've converted the elevated tracks into an urban park. It's very cool! Then we went over and walked the Brooklyn Bridge from Manhattan to Brooklyn and had a pizza at Grimaldi's under the bridge. Coal oven fired thin-crust...OMG it was heavenly! We went back to our apartment to rest up and then went to...
The Book of Mormon! Robin insisted on getting tickets as soon as we knew we were going to NY. I'm so glad she did. It was perhaps the best musical I've ever seen. Somehow it is able to both poke fun at, and simultaneously celebrate quirky and admirable things about people, religion and of course Mormonism. Then, to top off a near-perfect day we went out for a post-show dinner of fusion Japanese food. Wow. What a day.
Saturday before the race we visited the Frick Collection which had a Picasso exhibit along with their normal renaissance stuff and walked around Greenwhich Village and finished with a big family-style Italian dinner in Little Italy.
Sunday. Race Day. At 6am we were the first customers at the Starbucks near us. By 6:30 we were riding a subway down to South Street terminal to get on the Staten Island Ferry:
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We had some nice views as we left Manhattan for Staten Island:
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By 8am we were waiting with the other racers under the Verazzano Narrows Bridge:
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They split up the 45,000 runners(!) into 3 waves. I left Robin to get into my corral in Wave #2 and wait for the gun:
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Running over the bridge to Brooklyn was awesome:
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Some random shots in Brooklyn & Queens:
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This is on the Queensboro Bridge as we cross into Manhattan for the first time (at about mile 16). Yes, that guy is peeing on the bridge :lol8:
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The Upper East Side was lovely and the crowds are nuts along that lower part of 1st Avenue:
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Then two quick bridges as we cross into the Bronx and back to Manhattan. In the Bronx there was a sign saying "You are in the Bronx now. You BETTER RUN!"
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Here the course crosses in front of the Plaza Hotel at the south end of Central Park with only about 1.5 miles to go:
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And finally the obligatory photos to prove I did it:
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Great job you guys!
Awesome. Congrats on getting that done :2thumbs: Thanks for the photos