Saturday, September 29, 2012

DreamBig 2012 - #10 New York

STATE #10 - Hamptons, New York
Hamptons Half Marathon
Finishers: 1,332

September 28, 2012
I figured if I was in New York for a year, it probably was in my favor to take advantage of that and run...New York. I found a race out in the Hamptons and invited a bunch of friends to tag along and I would take care of all the accommodations. Well, once race weekend rolled around, it turned out to be just me on the Montauk train in route to Amagansett... alone. The weather was fairly cloudy but oh well. 

So I made my way out to the Hamptons and called a cab to take me from the train station over to The Hermitage where I had gotten like a 3 bedroom condo on the beach. I'm really popular. Because it was rainy and gross I spent most of the morning just chilling and watching movies.

I didn't need to go to any type of packet pickup because I had already gotten my stuff at a pickup in the city after work one day. Let me just say, this may not have been one of my favorite races BUT they for sure had the best stuff. We got really nice canvas beach bags, nice flip flops, nice towels, and then the t-shirts were pretty basic but everything else was awesome!

As it started getting late, I decided to call in a dinner order to Cyril's Fish House across the street and then make the dangerous trek over there in the dark along a dark road. So basically just walking through the ditches trying to dodge Jaguars and Audis. I enjoyed my fish pasta at the condo and then went to bed -- got to try them all out first to figure out which one Goldilocks liked the best.

September 28, 2012
Race morning! I had scheduled a service with the race for a raceday pick up. So I was up super early waiting outside of the main office with a few other runners waiting on the same service. We picked up a couple other runner along the way to the race before they dropped us off at a small school where we all waited int he gym. 

I was excited to kick off race #10 because being in double digits just made the goal seem real. Validity that I was actually going to commit to these races and progress was being made. I had an expectation that this race was going to be a running tour of a bunch of super nice homes but I was mistaken.

We started off running on the side of a tree shaded wooded road with not much around, aside from the aggravated passing traffic. We stayed on this road for quiet some time and then turned down another quiet, tree lined shaded long stretch of road. The variety of things to look at was really lacking. Every now and then we would pass a driveway but you weren't able to see much past the trees. Probably the point of it.




At one point we were running through what looked like farms and those had some really nice homes and orchards or something that looked rich. We turned back onto another sort of gravel type path where the marathon and half marathon split and ran on that for a few miles that took us back towards the road we started on. At this point, I think a lot of my pain was coming from the fact I was bored and had nothing to look at to entertain me. Other than that I was just ready to be done.




The last few miles sort of came and went out of nowhere because I just eventually turned my brain off. I made the last little sprint to the finish and then found a little kid sitting on the hood of a truck playing a Nintendo or something and asked if he would take my photo.


OFFICIAL RACE PIC - 10 states down, 40 more to go! #DREAMBIG
Post race I took the shuttle back to my condo and just chilled for the rest of the day since the weather was a little gross and I didn't exactly have much way of getting around. No one can dislike a chill day.

September 30, 2012
I woke up early dressed like a homeless person in all black sweats and got a cab to the train station where I hopped a train back to New York. I made it back in time to drop my things at the hotel and then meet Felicity from brunch and a walk on the HighLine to round out another race weekend!
Purse Umbrella - smooth Felic.

10 states down, 40 more to go! 
#DREAMBIG

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