NYC - Day 1

I was really nervous about flying in the day before the marathon. What if the flight was delayed? What if there was horrible weather? What if I didn’t get to pick up my packet? Fortunately, everything went smoothly and our flight into LaGuardia was about 15 minutes early!

We gathered our luggage..at this point, I didn’t care if it arrived, I had all my race gear stuffed into my carry-on, and we grabbed a cab and arrived at our apartment in record time. It was lunchtime and we were both starving, so we had time to grab a slice of pizza before heading over to the expo.

This is our little apartment in Grammercy Park...it was fun and different to stay here rather than in a hotel. We loved it!

The expo was AWESOME! I got to meet Dean Karnazes, Marshall Ulrich and Liz Robbins and get all their autographs. I also enjoyed looking at all the booths and especially loved the awesome NYC Marathon movie that highlighted each mile of the race and had some great commentary from the race director and previous NYCM winners. I wasn’t all that excited about the NYCM logo stuff, mainly because it was really picked over at this point and I was planning to buy the finisher’s gear on Monday.

Some pictures from the Expo...

Welcome! So Exciting!

Love this!

Meeting Marshall Ulrich...I also met his wife. They were both awesome!

Meeting Dean Karnarzes (aka Karno)! I wish I would have thought up some good questions for him about his crazy long ultras!

Me with Liz Robbins...I probably scared her the way I went on and on about her book. Here I think she is telling me not to worry about the hills Central Park, but I still did.

We spent about an hour and a half (and a lot of money) checking out the expo, then headed over to Rockefeller Center to meet up with my Sister-in-Law and Brother-in-Law and head to tthe "Top of the Rock".   The “Top of the Rock” is an observation deck, sorta like going to the top of the Empire State Building, but you have a better view of Central Park and you have a view of the Empire State Building. The views were amazing and we took a ton of pics. The history behind the Rockefeller is interesting as well, and I am a sucker for this historical stuff!

Me and the Hubs at the "Top of the Rock"

Once we were done ooohhhing and aaahhhing over the views, I connected with my Woodlands Fit peep, RunnerC, and we met for dinner. No carb loading for us! RunnerC swears by hamburgers the day before a race, so we headed over to Le Parker Meridian for burgers behind the secret curtain. My nephew ate there and swears they are the best burgers ever, so we figured we'd try it. He was right, they burgers were good…maybe not awesomely spectacular, but very good. We wanted to try the burgers at The Shake Shack too, but never had a chance.

After dinner, the hubby, SIL and BIL wanted to check out Little Italy. I am always up for a cannoli, so we hopped on the subway and headed there. I probably walked a little more than I should have, but it was all good.  As it approached 9 pm, I decided to call it a night. (Technically, with the time change, it was really 8 pm.) I went back to the apartment to get everything ready for the next day (and checkout all the swag from the Expo), while the rest of the gang went to a neighborhood restaurant (with large TVs) to watch football. I stressed about what time to set my alarm clock for, because of the time change and eventually just decided to stop stressing and go to bed took me awhile to really get to sleep, but I finally did….I woke up about 40 times to go to the bathroom. Not sure what that was about, maybe nerves? Before I knew it, it was time to wake up!!!

The Empire State Building all lit up with the ING NYC Marathon colors!
 I love how the entire city of NY gets into this event!