Race: France 8k
Date: August 21, 2016
Where: Central Park, NYC
Result: 31:01, 1st M50-54.
Zut! We arrived in NYC Thursday evening but had no hope of racing Sunday. The New York Road Runner’s France 8k had been sold out for weeks. A quick email to/from the race organization on Friday confirmed the situation. I said Merci but if anything changed just drop me a line.
Probably for the better any way. Sleep has been a priority. An early get up for a Sunday 8am start would be hard to swallow. And it was. But this is New York City baby. If you can race here, you can race anywhere…says the city that never sleeps!
My wife Melissa and I love running in Central Park. We ran it every day during our short vacation. One loop is about 10k around the park following the main road, traffic free but full of like minded runners and tourists on bikes. The route is somewhat challenging with a couple of good climbs around the north side of Harlem.
An email Saturday confirmed my unexpected entry. I was in the first corral among some 4600 entrants. Unexpected was my hotel’s 8 am breakfast opening, meaning none for me. Also unexpected was the rain that poured down, perfectly timed with the starters horn. It was hot. It was humid. It pissed down rain. I was tired and hungry and did I mention the hills?
France 8k Route
I raced a similar route here two years ago. But time must dull the memory of those hills. The race announcer even apologized for including them in the race route. Zut alors! After that suffer fest I need to get in more hill training pronto.
My splits went 3:50/3:46/3:43/3:45/4:10/4:05/3:51/3:38. Plus a horse race to the finish with a Japanese fellow who luckily was not my age (I lost). No rocket science needed to know which splits had the asskicking hills. I also must remember to warm up properly.
Ah but to race in Central Park! C’est magnifique! Simply glorious, even with my less than stellar performance.
