Surviving the Corporate Challenge

“I’m not doing that again!”  My instant reaction (I think it was verbal) after crossing the finish line of the J.P. Morgan Corporate Challenge last night.  3.5 miles of ducking and dodging 8,000 semi-runners, walkers, plodders and the dead.  Gah!

The route started along the West Drive near 77^th in CP, turned east at the 102st transverse and then south along the East Drive to conclude at the 72^nd Street transverse.  When I first started racing a couple of years ago, I never really cared about getting out of the blocks quickly … there was nothing quick about me.  I’m not much quicker now, but I definitely don’t like stopping and starting.  I certainly don’t have the patience for walkers clogging up wide swaths of the race course.  In a word, last night was a mess.  The organizers had good intentions … there was a designated section for non-competitive participants (READ: WALKERS!!) as well as corrals based on minutes per mile.  Did any of those numbskulls pay attention? Nope.  Did the walkers in the 6 min/mile section bother to pull out their headphones when folks actually running the race came up behind them?  Nope.  I arrived late, but still … You can sense my annoyance.  Now imagine that I was this annoyed and I had already decided not to “race” the thing.  I was getting seriously ticked off that I might not be able to even get a semi-workout in.  So after the first 100m I decided to run along the side of the course … on the grass, then on the Bridle Path … for mile 1. I saw a few CPTC teammates getting ready for their workout (really wish I had joined them!) and they screamed/cackled that I was cheating .

I wore my watch, but paid no attention to it.  Only if I felt I was going too fast would I take a look to force a slow down.  However, the sea of fit, unfit and should-be-shot took care of that for me.  Instead, I rumbled by feel … although I spotted the clocks at the mile markers.  It wasn’t until mile 3 that I had enough space to actually RUN.  Fortunately, mile 3 consists of the more challenging part of the 5-miler on Sunday.  Therefore, it was nice to get some positive muscle memory going (I will need it).  We finally hit Cat Hill for the last 800m and I started feeling good … which was timely because that’s when I crossed the finish line.

I continued on with the sea of people to grab a banana and some putrid coconut/pomegranate drink.  I admit that my palette can be limited, but I think coconut anything is just awful, wrenching stuff.  I should have stuck with water.  After finally escaping the crowd, I head up the West Side Drive again to try to meet up with my CPTC teammates during their session on the Reservoir.  After a few minutes of chatting, I headed home.  In the end, the numbers resembled a decent, yet truncated workout:

I’m DEFINITELY not doing that again.