These posts seem to mostly be written on Monday's lately than over the weekend. Guess the weekends have just been too busy. This weekend it was time for our annual trip to Philadelphia to visit friends and participate in the Philadelphia Distance Run. The Distance Run is a half-marathon that Jo and I have run in for over 20 years and is a key motivator every summer to increase our running mileage. Hence all the descriptions over the last few weeks of being out for a long run. All in the name of training. We had a great run although the weather was slightly warmer than ideal. We managed to come across the finish line together and upright which is all we usually shoot for. The training over the summer certainly helped although we were both sore later and through today. Thought you might want to see the before and after photos, so here they are. In case you can't tell - the after photos is where we have our finisher medals and we look like the only thing holding us up is the fact we are leaning together.
To back up to the beginning of the weekend, we hopped into the car on Friday and enjoyed the usual traffic thrills in navigating I-95 through Connecticut and around New York city to New Jersery. We spent Friday evening with our friends Holly and Paul. Holly is recently retired from Merck - not through her choice, but as a result of one of the countless pharmaceutical company restructurings all the rage now - while Paul is over at BMS. So we had many of the major pharma companies represented. Holly is enjoying her "retirement" and is working as a fitness trainer which plays to her interest in staying in shape and her outgoing nature. Her only advice to us was to question why we keep running. Apparently, running as an aerobic event isn't high on Holly's training list. We had a wonderful dinner in nearby Flemington, NJ and spent most of the time catching up on each other's lives. Saturday morning after a short tune up run for us we headed over to Peddler's Village to buy Jo's favorite caramel corn - yes we had to go all the way to Pennsylvania to buy popcorn with heated sugar and nuts. But it keeps Jo happy and as every husband in the world knows - that is a good thing.
We then headed to downtown Philadelphia to check-in for the race and do some shopping at the running expo. Unfortunately, besides getting some running socks, none of the clothes really excited us this year. Dinner was at our favorite pizza restaurant, Pizzacata, in the "Olde Towne" (I might have added the e's to make it sound more colonial) area of Philadelphia. One of the hard things for both of us to see as we walked around Philly was that the old Rohm and Haas building now has a big Dow sign on it. Kind of sad to see your first company disappear that way. Wonder what Otto Haas thinks of the changes (he's in the big chemistry lab in the sky in case you weren't fluent with the Haas history). After dinner it was back to the hotel to rest up, watch a movie, read our books, and get our pre-race sleep.
Sunday morning was a beautiful day, if too hot, with a starting race temperature of 63 degrees. I already filled you in on the race details, so after the race we headed back to our hotel for a quick shower before tackling the cramp inducing 4 hour drive home in the car. It is really interesting to unfold yourself after running 13 miles and then sitting in a car for 3-4 hours, especially for the driver. Amazing what parts don't want to bend anymore.
Just so you know we do have some life during the actual week and don't just live for the weekends - which we honestly mostly do - we went to work, ran and lifted after work, and enjoyed one of our last clam strip dinners before the clam shacks close for the winter. Until next week.
These posts seem to mostly be written on Monday's lately than over the weekend. Guess the weekends have just been too busy. This weekend it was time for our annual trip to Philadelphia to visit friends and participate in the Philadelphia Distance Run. The Distance Run is a half-marathon that Jo and I have run in for over 20 years and is a key motivator every summer to increase our running mileage. Hence all the descriptions over the last few weeks of being out for a long run. All in the name of training. We had a great run although the weather was slightly warmer than ideal. We managed to come across the finish line together and upright which is all we usually shoot for. The training over the summer certainly helped although we were both sore later and through today. Thought you might want to see the before and after photos, so here they are. In case you can't tell - the after photos is where we have our finisher medals and we look like the only thing holding us up is the fact we are leaning together.
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