This NYC weekend was a “yes” weekend. After Christy, Meaghan and I booked our adventure for the USATF Nationals, the New York Road Runners announced the return of the United Airlines NYC Half. It was the same weekend. On a cold winter morning, I was lifting weights at 6am and got texts from Christy, sharing this news. And telling us we had to sign up. By the end of my strength session, we were all registered. YES.
I didn’t hold onto any goals for this NYC Half Marathon. I had never tried to run a half marathon after competing in 3000m and 1 mile in a National Championships. I intended to run it without a watch. I figure that no matter what, it would be an awesomely large experience. The track was the focus and it was awesome and also left me with this bum hamstring from my cooldown fall fiasco.
Coach Lee was with us in NYC as his wife Britney was racing. We spend the weekend together. I was mindful that I didn’t want to make him “work” on his vacation by having him assess my best NYC options with me. On Saturday morning, during warm up for my 1 mile event, I didn’t think that I would start the NYC Marathon. My hamstring hurt so much. After we sat at our Broadway show on Saturday afternoon (Six: amazing), the hamstring felt a little better. I was only feeling it pull in ¼ of my walking steps. I told Lee that I would start the race but bring a subway card in my pocket. I tell him I will just hang with Meaghan for as long I can to help her and after that, I will have a very fun run through the streets of New York. He’s open to that but insists that discomfort and tightness is ok but that injuring myself is not ok. I leave it here.
Race morning comes with a 4:20am wake up and a 5:00am friend meet-up in our hotel lobby to walk to the subway station. Marcel shoos and we scream a subway rat out of our way, we have a race to get to! It’s still dark when we land a Prospect Park in Brooklyn and the Worm Moon (March’s full moon) is brilliantly bright in the sky.
Dawn must have broken while I braided Christy’s fast braids. I have her seated on a tree stump. Meaghan says afterwards that this is a lovely moment of pre-race sisterhood. It was.
While we were in the pre-race porta-potty line, I told Meaghan and Britney this: I am giving myself room to surprise myself. It might be my day. I don’t know yet. My hamstring might have a flashing red warming light. Or my whole track body might say, “nope, not today.” But if my wheels fall off, I say, please don’t say goodbye. Don’t worry about me. Just run on. Know that I am ok and I am transferring all of my fierce to you so you can have the most kickass race. They agree.
As is an issue sometimes in a big race’s athlete village, there’s not really space to warm up. I do some drills behind the portapotty bank and the drills don’t feel good- I am super tight all along the right posterior chain, I still can’t do B’s without pain. My leg isn’t moving well.
Next, another lovely moment of racing sisterhood unfolds. This is a 22,500 person race. Meaghan and I are seeded in corral A. Ahead of us are the professional field and corral AA. Then our fast corral. We pop in here, where we belong. Meaghan has already been warning us that she gets emotional in the starting corrals. We see some of this at the Armoury and we love it and also tease her that she was removed from split calling due to the crying. I tell Meaghan to look around in this Corral A. We are surrounded by fast men. We both feel that deeply. We worked hard to belong here.
There are a few other women around. A pacer steps in with a 1:25 sign. That’s exciting. We didn’t know if there would be a pacer. He wonders aloud to himself, “where should I stand?” I say, “Stay right here please, next to us!” He easily agrees. I love this. If a wheels falling off situation develops, now I know that Meaghan will have an extra measure of support on the course.
So back to sisterhood- there’s a woman in her ? late 50’s ahead of us. Pink visor. Heavy makeup. We are all packed in tight, like sardines. Next thing I know, she pops a squat and is PEEING in the start corral. A flood spreading…. Onto my vaporflies, Meaghan’s Vaporflies and the pacer Chris’s Hokas. What the what?
We don’t have time to process this weirdest of starting corral behaviors as the anthem plays and the gun goes and we are off.
Based on how I felt when I got out of bed, I genuinely thought that I might manage up to 8km at half marathon pace with Meaghan before my wheels fell off in this 3rd race in my tripleheader. I also always give myself some headspace dedicated to fierce and ability to surprise myself.
From our first steps, I knew that it wasn’t going to happen. The wheels weren’t going to fall off. They were never even on. I had left my wheels, righteously and victoriously, at the track at the Armoury.
As promised, there’s no goodbye with Meaghan. I first simply tuck behind her, before we even hit our first kilometer split and then I proudly watch her run away, tucked into the pacer’s circle.
I see this split, 4:18. It’s the only one I will look at for the rest of the day.
I flip my mental race book to the next page: HAVE FUN! Watch is away. I now get to run through Brooklyn and Manhattan, head up, focused only on having fun and running in a way that ensures I don’t need the subway card in my pocket.
I see Lee and Brett around 1km. I’m not with Meaghan, Lee has a watch, he knows what’s up right away. “That’s good, Erin,” he calls to me. “Have FUN!”
I will, Coach!
It’s so very fun.
Brooklyn is just stellar. I hear the first DJ of the morning. I love it. Then we are running directly towards the Manhattan skyline. It looms gloriously in front of us, like a souvenir snow globe except real. The sun is shining. The buildings are literally sparkling. I am pretty much sparkling with run love too. Somewhere around here, I have this thought that this is my celebration lap. The 3000m was the important race. I delivered. Now I get ONE MORE TIME to celebrate and then I hear a dj playing this Daft Punk song.
Sparkling.
We reach an urban percussion band using pots and pans. Eyes sparkling with joyful tears.
The Manhattan Bridge is just breathtaking to run over, in both skyline view and effort. I’m thinking here that Britney should catch me first and then Christy. They started in corral C. I eventually accept that I have missed Britney but should have Christy come up behind me soon. The Brooklyn Bridge is to my right. It’s stunning.
Then, in the most epic of sisterhood race fashions, I hear Christy’s delightfully loud voice:
“Erin! How are you doing, my friend!” Sounds a mix of concern for my clearly bum leg and also excitement that we have actually found each other. I hope that she also holds some excitement that I get to witness her running so very strongly, crushing this course. I have been thinking about what I will say to her for several kilometers.
“It’s not great but I’m going to make it and I am having so much fun!” I tell her. Then my special thought-out message, “Take all of my fierceness with you and go get it! Kill it!”
Christy smoothly, confidently and strongly sails by me. “The fast braids are FAST!” she calls back. I yell at her to relax her shoulders and she’s off over this magnificent Manhattan Bridge.
I run off the bridge, buoyed by Christy’s strong stride and so happy for my own self. If there’s ever a race to run for pure fun, this is it. A Big Apple Tour. I descend the bridge’s off ramp, into the Lower East Side. I’m not expecting what happens next.
The sidewalks on both sides of the street are jam packed with screaming spectators. Like I have not seen since pre-COVID. A man is on an elevated platform with a microphone. He’s yelling, “NEW YORK! Are you seeing this, New York!? We back, NEW YORK! WE MADE IT. What’s up NEWWWW YORKKKK!”
I have an explosion of emotion. I can’t do anything about it. It bursts out of me and so do tears and a few sobs. I am so fully filled with gratitude to live this moment and so emotional because a lot of life had to be lived to deliver me to this moment. A global pandemic. The early fear for my chidlren, my loved ones. The impossibly long hours and difficult grind of being redeployed to COVID work. I have not done my own job in 2+ years. The hours on the road and training, both lockdown-alone and also with my strong women crew. All of the luck and hurdles that it took to get my 4 person strong women crew to this road race in New York City along with Hammer friends Marcel, Jenna, Andrew Y.
This moment is alot happening all at once. I’m happy. I’m emotional. There’s the heartache of the covid pandemic mixed all up in it. A few more sobs burns my throat as also trying to use my throat to breathe, to deliver oxygen to my legs.
“We back. We made it.”
I hold onto those words as we run through the Lower East Side and onto the FDR Highway along the Hudson River. I’m back to feeling so lucky for the opportunity to do this. Now I am thinkg that this is not just a celebration but also my Victory Lab.
I think of my friend Rami along FDR. My hamstring has either stretched itself out some or has numbed itself into submission here and I’m just running and enjoying the sunshine on my face and the spectacular skyline on my left and smiling so big at each person I can hear yelling encouragement at runners from their highrise windows. It’s delicious and I don’t want it to end. Looking up the road ahead, there’s a crush of runners coming up FDR and I can’t see where the left turn onto 42nd Street will be. I will enjoy this for awhile. My mind wanders to a conversation that I had with Rami about World Master’s Athletics Outdoor Championships. I was supposed to compete at in July 2020. It was one of the first events cancelled when COVID wave 1 started. That meet will occur this summer in Tempere, Finland. I recall saying to Rami, “Would I really go all that way to Europe to run an 18 minute or less race?” Rami replied, “You could always run slower. Maximize your race entry.” hahah!
I think of that here, where I don’t want it to end. I can run slower. Maximize my experience.
I also think of my run friends Jarvis and Gerald here as I run in this incredibly diverse race field. I wish they were here to experience that. We have had conversations as friends and with my run company, Love Training More, about how White many of the running events locally feel. Thinking of them here makes me happy for a few kilometers. FDR is a long stretch. About 6km.
I am still running in my very first pair of Vaporflies- they haven’t seen that many races due to COVID. I am quite sure that I’m blowing them out along FDR. There are now varying degrees of distress signals coming from my legs. My shins are starting to burn with a searing stripe of track spike related strain. My upper hamstring tendons don’t feel like tendons. They feel like tiny golf pencils, stiff and unresponsive. A few times every kilometer, my foot is extra heavy to pick up. Lee told me not to get injured. To run it in to Central Park but not to risk an extended injury. I find a pace that I think is the right balance, I will make it there. I will take some time off to recover after. I’m not going to mortally injure this hamstring. FDR ultimately ends with a left hand turn onto 42nd street, heading to Times Square.
Time Square was just 100% extra. It’s simply phenomenal to run through the streets of Time Square; having them closed just for you and 22,500 runner friends. The atmosphere here was electric and all focused on the runners. I get another unexpected fireworks burst of emotion and I have a few more throat-burning/swallow back sobs moments.
Then OMG, it’s pee lady with her pink hat. WTF. I haven’t looked at my watch since 1km but figure I am running close to a 1:40 half marathon. She floats in front of me.
Nope.
Not pee lady. Nope. I can not have pee lady finish ahead of me.
I had chosen a self-preservation-victory-lap pace that would get me my medal, let me see the things and avoid using my subway card. Now I press on the gas just a little. No real change in hammie. So I press harder. I now permit myself to run harder to close this out. I don’t have any power coming from my right leg but it’s not zinging any worse than it has been. It feels good to run like Erin.
I close it out happily, fiercely, ahead of pee lady. It’s a 1:36:25.
Except for the few burst of emotion, I smiled the whole way from Brooklyn to Central Park.
I don’t that I can smile any harder. And then I reunite with my Strong Women Crew and I was wrong because now I am bursting with even bigger megawatt smile as I celebrate THREE PBs!
- Meaghan runs a 1:24:58
- Britney runs a 1:27:59
- Christy runs a 1:31:26
Incredible performances!
Thank you Christy, Meaghan and Britney for sharing this. Thanks to Brett for the expert crew support and Lee for the ever supportive coaching. Thanks to Marcel and Jenna for joining in the early am fun and post coffee celebration.
What a celebration. We are so lucky to have lived these moments together.
