Pre-Race Rambles
Our trip to New York would be our first vacation in a long time that wouldn’t be centred around traveling for a race. I was looking for things to do in New York on New Year’s Eve that didn’t include standing around all day waiting for the ball to drop in Times Square. I discovered that the New York Road Runners put on a race through Central Park that kicks off at midnight, complete with fireworks and a sparkling cider station at the half way point. How awesome does that sound?
Neil took a bit more convincing that this might be an awesome way to ring in 2014, but he did agree. We opted to do a nice dinner out to celebrate early, so we headed to Craft, a restaurant that we absolutely loved on our honeymoon.
One seven course tasting menu complete with wine pairings later (plus a nap) and I think Neil and I would both have been okay with sleeping through New Year’s. But we were in New York!!! And it was New Year’s Eve!! So we groggily got ready for the race and attempted to make our way to Central Park.
By now it was 11:30 and I was completely unprepared for the insane amount of people that were outside our hotel. I thought we were fairly far from Times Square but people were packed in on the streets and sidewalks. The subway station entrance right outside our hotel was closed and just trying to make our way across the street to the other entrance…through all of the people…was absolutely nuts. Then my Google map app told us we could take one subway right to the start, but we figured out after waiting a bit that this train wasn’t running. Luckily we figured out what trains we could take, arrived at the 72nd Street Station and ran from the station to the very back of the start line. We made it with about five minutes to spare before midnight!!
We had time for one quick photo and then we were counting down the final seconds of 2013! The fireworks at midnight were spectacular. They went on for fifteen minutes and were just gorgeous.
NYRR Midnight Run Race Report
Because we were so far back from the start line we had plenty of time to watch the fireworks before we started (maybe 10 minutes). It had cooled off to -5C, but with the wind chill it felt much colder. Thankfully I had picked up a Turtlefur neck warmer that day and with all of my layers I felt toasty warm. Neil and I took things nice and easy, running 4:1 intervals and gawking at the fireworks for as long as possible.
This was a pretty fun way to ring in the new year. Everyone running the race was happy and in a great mood. At the halfway point there was a sparkling apple cider stop!
It was so cold that the cider was freezing inside the cup! Right after the cider stop there was a dance zone!
The race was four miles and we finished 52:10.
It was a really neat race and ringing in the new year in Central Park was so much fun! Thanks to Neil for running the race with me!
How did you ring in the new year? Have you run a new year’s race before?
So much fun! My husband and I always run a race on New Year’s Day. Funny. I wrote about turtlefur recently and people didn’t know what it was. They are the best!
That sounds like a great way to ring in the new year!!
Nice socks 🙂
What an awesome way to ring in the new year!!! Glad you could convince the hubs to go for it 🙂