Guest Race Recap: Manhattan Half Marathon

As predicted, I made the executive decision around 5:45am Saturday morning to wimp out of the half marathon. Whooping cough plus fever just seemed a little too aggressive to run on, even for me. Whatever, man, I paid my dues at last year's Manhattan Half! Kim, however, braved the Arctic conditions and is here to give you this week's race recap. 

I'll be stepping in to do the race recap for the Manhattan Half Marathon.  Dearest Monica has been stuck inside with the plague lately, and as any cautious runner (or Runner's World's Twitter feed) will tell you, there is a simple guideline for running while sick: head colds are fine, but as soon as you have a fever, you need to give yourself time to recover sans running in the cold.  

NYRR photo of the winter wonderland...

On playlists, pre-race nerves, and the (Washington) Post

There's no denying it-we're in the home stretch.  The Marine Corps Marathon starts in less than three days (courtesy of the stress-inducing countdown that we've managed to ignore for the past few months as the number fell inexorably lower), and both Monica and I are in the last stage of our taper--the part that comes with all the nerves and apparently a feeling of being overstuffed thanks to our new glycogen reserves.  Hot.

There are no doubt thousands of articles, blogs, and seasoned runners willing to provide advice on how to combat the intense stress we're going through now, but true to style, I'd rather stay calm through a series of distractions and occasionally reminding myself that we have trained for this and will be fine.  Our last long run we did together (16 miles a few weeks ago) was fantastically reassuring and steady at a 10 min/mile pace, and provided a big enough boost in confidence that despite my necessary downtime to let my muscles get their act together (thanks, plantar fasciitis) I feel like I'll be fine. 

This is good, because almost all of the articles about the MCM that we've seen over the past week or so (Monica's mother has been sending her basically everything she sees, which is lovely) have somehow managed to mention the fact that some people don't finish the race (see the Post's article entitled Not everyone will finish the Marine Corps Marathon. That's what makes it a race. Seriously guys? Not helping). 

'Cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run

Welcome to the story of three moderately athletic individuals with very well toned beer muscles who decided to throw caution and good sense to the wind to train for the Comrades Ultramarathon, the ultimate human race.

For those unfamiliar with Comrades, it's a 56 mile (89 km) race that has taken place in South Africa annually since 1921 with the exception of those pesky WWII years, making it not only the world's largest ultramarathon but also the oldest. The event is run between Pietermaritzburg and Durban, one year uphill and the next down. These 56 miles are said to "challenge everything he holds dear, his value system, his lifestyle. They will ask nothing less than his view of the universe." Sounds like fun, right? Uh, sure.

Now contrary to popular belief, Greg, Sheryl, and I are not completely insane - there will be many, many 5ks, 10 milers, half marathons, and a few 26.2s before Comrades 2012 rolls along. Comrades is clearly not the sort of race one wakes up and decides to wing the morning of. This blog will document our trials and tribulations in not too painstaking detail over the next two years as we prepare for what is bound to be a life changing experience. And obviously, if we commit in the blogosphere to running Comrades, then we can't flake out - pride and dignity, what little we have left, are at stake!

Coming soon: 2010 race plans, training adventures, experimentations with spandex, hungover runs!, and hopefully not too much chafing.