Statue of Liberty

One of the things I've never done is the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island tour. We booked tickets for a day when the weather was supposed to be a bit warmer and joined the airport style security line to board the boat.

30-40 mins before getting on the boat!

Of course it was barely 12 degrees but the sunshine and staring upwards meant a little forehead sunburn the next morning!

Mysterious army chinooks accompanying two helicopters

The short boat ride is cool. You get a good view of Manhattan and Ellis Island and obviously the statue gets larger the closer you get. I've only really seen it from so far away.

The boats went to Ellis Island every 20 mins so you were free to wander the small island and spend some time there. Although the small food court reminded me of a crowded American High School cafeteria what with all the visiting tour groups so we gave that a miss.

We only had the tickets up to the mid level pedestal as the newly reopened crown tickets are sold out until late May. But the best view is supposed to be form there anyway.

Empire State building compared to the new 1WTC

How bout deez nutz?

Small Anne & Murd

The small museum in the base was actually really interesting with how it was constructed and shipped over from France. They had a few letters from immigrants written mainly on the 100 year birthday saying how it was the first thing they saw entering the harbour area with all its references to freedom etc.

We did a 30 min guided tour of Ellis Island. Some interesting stuff and you had to use your imagination to picture the lines of immigrants and what they had to go through on arrival to this new country, hoping they would pass the medicals and tests.

There wasn't too much else to see as Hurricane Sandy wiped out all their proper building climate control so they had to move most of their exhibits out.

After nearly 5 hours of on the go time we just passed through the Wall Street area then headed back into Brooklyn for some excellent BBQ food.

Mmmm, smokey

Being a tourist again

Mum and dad finally got round to visiting so I booked the whole 9 days off work and set about being their tour guide for the trip. This meant visiting a lot of places I've been before but I also got to tour a couple of places I've never been to.

Just walking around the different neighbourhoods is so much a part of any visit to New York but it's something you can't really get tired of as you always see something new or some little bit of graffiti or art or humour that someone has added.... such as this little hot dog under a tree.

I put up with the walk down a crowded 5th Avenue, Rockefeller centre and through the nightmare that is Times Square, etc; those are places no local wants to visit at any time in order to give them the full New York City visit.

Unfortunately there were a few rainy days mixed in with the Spring sunshine. It had been so cold and dry before that I said they must have brought the rain with them!

Some of the 260+ Easter Faberge egg scupltures that were dotted around the city. They must have been well hidden as we only spotted about 6 of them!

"The Kelpies" sculpture by a Scottish artist in Bryant Park as part of Tartan Week here in New York.

Madison Square Park had these water towers that when you stood underneath and looked up it had the effect of being a lot taller inside with this neon lighting.

C'mon, lets celebrate

Last Sunday the Dons finally ended their silverware drought!

I had seen weeks before that the game was on at 2.30pm UK time so I thought I'd get to see it on the BBC website as I don't normally start work until after 1pm on a Sunday. Of course, I didn't realise the US clocks go forward a few weeks before the UK so in the end I got to see the first half then had to leave.

I ended up seeing the remainder of the game when I got home, combined with the extra time and penalties it was after midnight here before I was done. At least here, as long as you stay of twitter, etc it is quite easy to avoid the results of games back home.

Heather had deferred her Marine Corps Marathon (DC) entry until this year. After managing to do a reasonable amount of running here I was tempted with the distance. So I entered their lottery at the beginning of the month and last week I found out I got in!
So hopefully if all goes well I'll be running my first ever marathon in October.
Training for a half marathon at the moment, I ran 8 miles and although the pacing is different, the thought of going out for training runs 2 & 1/2 times that distance is scary. More so how my legs will feel and what will I eat? I just have to put it out of my head until June or July and these other races are out of the way and concentrate on it then.

So Anne & Murdo are due here tonight! There was supposed to be another big storm front this past Tuesday brining 2-6" of snow but it past out over the sea so it is just very cold instead.
I think that is it for the snowy weather and apart from some rain forecast it should be up into double figures by next week. Just in time for touring the city with the parents!

A Spring Duathlon

As of last week, the city had been buried under 57.1" of snow this winter. This makes it the seventh snowiest winter in NYC history (the record was set in 1995/1996, with 76 inches). There was supposed to be another storm midweek but it bypassed New York and it was just super cold instead.
If we had got just 4 inches, it would've be the fourth snowiest ever, 8 inches would have been the second snowiest!

After all that suspense the clocks sprang forward here and the weather immediately picked up from hovering around zero to at least 8 degrees and by Saturday it was supposed to hit 11! I only went and stepped back in time and entered a duathlon; 5K run, 14M bike, 5K run in Prospect Park.

So I finally got my road bike out from long-term storage in the back of the bike shop at work. Bit of lube, installed the tri-bars, two test drives in the park, a sore arse, but good to go.

Due to construction the race start/finish was moved to the Centre Drive instead, so the initial 5K run distance ended up being 3.75M which we just found out a few days before. No biggie, just the times couldn't be compared to any of my regular 5K races there.

Due to the recent bad weather our soccer games had been cancelled about 5 weeks in a row so they introduced some double header games. I hadn't planned to play Friday but I couldn't let the team down and we only had one sub so my pre-race prep ended up being a solid hour of sprinting and 20 minutes in goal. Then supper around 10pm followed by a couple of hours of trying to get to sleep!

Up just before 6am and at the park just before 7am to collect my number. The downside was they didn't seem to have more than a couple of people doing the entries so after I picked mine up the line started to grow. The Classic distance I was in for was supposed to start at 8am but ended up not starting until 8.40am! Not great for timing your pre-race gel, warm-up, etc but didn't make too much difference I guess. They had an International distance, Classic, Sprint AND 5K & 10K runs but only about 400 total athletes across the entire events.

79 in the Classic distance but other than the first mile or so I had no idea who was in what event. Everyone melted into one big field, by 9am the park was filling with regular runners and a few bikers to go with the race runners and bikers. So I spent the rest of the run and the whole bike course just doing my own thing. At least rather than being on your own with nobody around there are plenty people to avoid hitting!

The transition area was on the somewhat muddy grass but it brought back memories to lay out your towel, position your shoes, helmet, etc and scope out the transition in's and out's. Plus the usual high end bikes on show.

I spent about 99% of the bike course on the tri-bars. Again due to the nature of Prospect Park I was doing just under 30mph down one side, 20mph along the top and bottom and slowing to 13mph up the hill. Of course, my neck is sore from the position I'm not used to. The Classic was 4 laps of the park, the International was 8 laps, god, that sounds terrible.

The second run felt sooooooo slow but finally I spotted a guy from my race so I picked up my pace from the rutt I was stuck in. I felt strong enough at the finish, was 2mins slower on the second run compared to the first.

One hour 36mins and 19th out of the 79 and 4th 40-49'er.

The post-race food was a cinnamon-raisin bagel with strawberry cram cheese. I'm just getting used to the taste of that on my bagels, well I've had it twice now.
Two errors I made was remembering I needed bike gloves, grabbing the fingerless ones and the full fingered then in transition before the race getting out the fingerless ones to find they were both left handed gloves, ha ha.
Then as I excited transition for the final run I took off my gloves and arm warmers and threw them to the side. Of course, I forgot about them and got home, stretched, was literally just about to shower then remembered so had to put back on some clothes and cycle the mile back to get them, doh.

So after the soccer and that, my whole body aches but it's a good ache, isn't it?

A Classic

Saturday morning was the first in a series of New York Road Runner races selected as "classics". After runner feedback NYRR's this year are offering some no-frills events open only to NYRR members and costing just $10. This meant smaller fields, no t-shirts, no post-race festivities, no awards and according to their website after the race, no complaints! They had water and I made sure I got my free cinnamon raisin bagel at the end.

No real training this week apart from one slightly treacherous bike ride to work but rolled out of bed at 6.45am to jog over for the early 8am start. 5 degrees and sunny, perfect considering it was pouring rain all day Friday.

the start ©NYRR

The first mile was out of the Centre Drive and up the hill then it's a gradual downhill mile, the end of the downhill flat mile and a marginally uphill finish turning back onto the Centre Drive.
This meant I had splits of 6.23, 6.31, 6.05 and 6.25 for a decent average of 6.22.

I finished in 25.25, placing 73rd out of the 1898 finishers and 5th in the 40-44 age group.
All three races this year I have been well over a minute faster than in 2013 but boy were my calves tight after this one and my hamstrings too. But I certainly had to stretch my calves on the way home, oooh wee. Home by 8.50am which is still funny to be home so early after a race but good I guess.

Later in the afternoon we went to our storage unit as Heather needed stuff to use on her upcoming family trip to the Phillipines. Then we walked to The Chip Shop and had haddock & chips. Fish was nice, uk-style chips with salt & vinegar were good for a change but it was more pub style than chip shop as it needs to come in paper and be eaten outside to be proper ha ha.

Next up is actually a duathlon! Something I haven't done for a couple of years so we'll see. I haven't been biking much and I'll have to blow the dust and debris off my road bike. No, I actually will. It has been stored in the basement at work pretty much since I arrived and it has a layer of grime on it.
Just hoping the weather and the roads clear up enough to at least get on it once or twice before race day comes around in the middle of March.

The Cherry Tree 10 Miler

One of the best races in the year I think. It's 10M early in the year, so it forces you into some good training to kick start the years racing and more importantly it's cheap and registration and the start are 10 minutes away. Nothing better than going to your own toilet less than 30 minutes before hitting the start line, all runners will appreciate that!

It had snowed the night before but they had plowed the park drive apart from a few patches of slush, probably the most slush I've ever ran through... for a road race! -5 degrees Celsius but not too windy.

© NYC Running Source

Look! There I am on the right.

So, three laps, steady, felt good. Park was cold for half the course and a bit warmer in the sunnier half. Decided to take a sip of water on the second lap, first time I've done a race where I could feel and hear the ice rattling in the bottom of the paper cup!
Ended up on my own-ish for a little while, then halfway round lap two you start encountering some of the slower runners and some of the relay participants. You get a boost when you go past the finish line turn-off as they have all the relay runners lined up waiting as well as the majority of the spectators.

Finished strong and ended up just over a minute faster than last year, albeit it wasn't quite as windy this year. 1.08.34 for 6.51 pace. 46th from 512 finishers and 7th out of 62 in the 40-49 age group. The overall winner was 52.33 by the way!

Then enjoyed some of the valentine's red velvet cake I made the day before.... after my chicken fingers and pizza were delivered.

Due to another snowfall during the week, later work hours and icy conditions I didn't get up to too much this week but another Prospect Park race on Saturday, a nice 4M.
Hopefully the weather is going to turn soon. Snow is all well and good but the trails are just too icy and hard packed to get any decent running in and I'm avoiding the road for as long as I can.

Superbowl Sunday

My running has been on a bit of a hiatus since the end of last year, even before that actually. But I've started getting back into it, helped by the chance to get out and run in the snow as well as some races I've entered. The first one of the year was the NYRR Gridiron Classic, a 4 miler in Central Park on the morning of the Superbowl.
Apparently the Superbowl is only beaten by Thanksgiving in terms of the amount of food consumed by your average American on that day. The race helps with that but at only 4M I only burned about 480 calories so didn't make that much difference when we had our steak and roast potatoes.... and ice cream... and crisps.

A lot of people in their Denver Broncos kit and a few in Seattle colours, the mid-course vote, two mats with team headers gave 58% to the Broncos. In the end that couldn't have been further from what actually happened that night!

We've had so much more snow than last winter. It seems every few days there is another snow shower. It's fine until it starts disrupting the trains or gets too frosty and icy.

 Weather turned out to be a mild 4 degrees with little wind, much better than last year. Again, with 5200 runners the first mile wasn't that enjoyable, trying to find a gap and not trip up people.

I didn't really feel that great, it was a bit of a struggle. I had just gotten over having the cold and it must have still been present as my heart rate ended up averaging 199, topping out at 211 at the finish, I didn't even do much of a sprint finish either.

But I must have maintained some strength from last year as I average a decent 6.22 minute mile for 25.27, 114th overall and 12th in my age group.

Next up is the local Cherry Tree 10M on Sunday. I haven't ran more than an hour for what feels like ages so on my day off and with our soccer continually being cancelled, last Friday I ran the 8M to work, used the showering facilities and then took the train home. Now I feel a bit better about it and although 3 laps of the park isn't that enjoyable the fact that race registration is at the school at the top of our road and the start is short jog away makes it worth doing... as well as getting that race distance in early in the season.