Frozen Bonsai Half

Even though the race had frozen in its name, I still figured it might be fun to run. Hey, why not? A half in Central Park, easy peasy close, and I could run it super slow.

The night before I was up late at a friend's play in the Bronx, so I was on little sleep. The train got me there too quick, so I froze while waiting. I began pacing, which was better than standing still. I piled on layers. I ran into Karen, who told me she was still feeling ill effects of her late night, and ran into Stephanie, who ended up PRing.

I started out sub 8s for quite a while. I felt okay, was thinking of all I had to do. Then around mile 8, my feet started hurting. It was out of control painful, and I was involuntarily audibly moaning. Then Wayne biked up and I whined to him while he whined to me. He was supposed to bike with a bunch of people for six hours but everyone bailed and now his back was hurting so he headed home with 20 miles instead of 50 or 60 or more.

I finished, and limped to the train. My feet were killing me.

The medal was nice, the course was fun, the after spread great. Go NYC Runs, with another awesome race.

only in new york city

on a fifteen miler this morning, i saw two women and one man at the side of the lake in central park, meditating. that was normal. i found it slightly amusing that the women were wearing bikinis. hey, i can meditate and tan at the same time!

sunday's half-marathon

so i ran the coldest race i have ever run before on sunday: a half-marathon in central park. i know, sounds fun? at the start, it was 20 F (feels like 7F!) and i was literally crying. it was that cold. my hands and my toes hurt so much. my feet started to thaw out after the first four or five miles, but it was such a miserable race. while running, i realized i was running way slow, and told myself it was okay. honestly, i haven't been training that hardcore lately, just starting to get back into things. and because i was crying in the beginning of the race, i told myself, "this is just a training run, not a race. a run." as long as i finished sub-two hours, i'd be happy.

if you're wondering, how bad was it, here's how bad:

• there was black ice all over the course, mostly by the water stops
• when you got to a fluid station, instead of grabbing a cup of water, you'd grab a cup of solid ice. this happened to be on several occasions.
• my fingers hurt with the cold the entire race.
• when i peed around mile 8 (i had to go!), steam rose up in the porta-potty after i peed!

so i finished in sub-two hours, to trev cheering me on, "hurry up, let's get pancakes." after, mark and mark and trevor and i got hot cocoa and then mexican food "that you don't need a wheelbarrow to take you home afterwards" and i spent the rest of the day warm--hot shower, warm apartment with candles burning, lots of tea, moving-watching under the blanket. i hate the cold. training for a spring marathon is hell, i'm slowly learning.