My New York Marathon race report.
Friday
Due to fog in New York all morning flights leaving Toronto to New York were canceled or rerouted, my flight originally scheduled for 7:30 on Friday was canceled. So I scrambled to find another flight. With all the delays flight we ended up arriving in New York just after 11:30 PM.
Saturday
Expo
-The Expo was held at the Javits center a short 30 minute walk from the hotel. The expo started a 9am so there was a huge line to get into the expo. The line moved well and only took us about 5 minutes to get in. Bib pick up was very organized and only took a few minutes to receive my packet. Next stop was shirt sizing, although they did not allow you to try on the shirt you were able to get a good understanding of the size needed. We walked around the expo for a couple of hours spoke to a few representatives and a race bunny to get a few pointers.
Since I did not want to spend the day walking we took a NYC yellow cab back to the hotel. Lunch at Carmines near time square. If you have never eaten at Carmines you are in for a treat. It’s the perfect place to carb load before a race. Large portions along with baskets of bread that feed two or three people. The rest of the day was spent resting at the hotel.
Sunday Race Day.
It was the end of day light savings time so to ensure I did not miss the bus to the start of the race I had a wake up call scheduled. The hotel did not change their time and I was woken up an hour earlier then schedule. I ended up taking the shuttle bus from the New York library to Staten Island and had a four hour wait before the start of the marathon. it was an epic start to America one with the New York City Police Department helicopters fly over of five helicopters. as Frank Sinatra was played New York New York we took off across the Verrazzano–Narrows bridge. This was definitely the best start of any race that I participated in. The crowd support in New York City Marathon was unmatched any race. Although this is a challenging course with approximately 270 meters of elevation gain you don’t notice it with the amazing crowd support on the whole course.
This is a very well organized race and logistically ran flawless with incredible volunteers.
I ran it as well! That fog was crazy. We had to modify our plans for the rest of the Friday but still had a great time. I ran the 5k with my mom (she walked, I ran) and chose to run the 5k in around 24 minutes knowing it would be a hot Sunday marathon so I wanted at least one race with an ideal time!