Joe Klinerman 10K

Yes, I froze my you know what off! 

Yes I pressed my HotHands on my 

little frozen eyeballs after the race.

We all froze.

At 8AM, Saturday, January 7th, it was only 28*F, in Central Park. 

And about 30 minutes after the start, it started to flurry.

Brrrr!

I love running in NYC. This was the 3rd race I have run through Central Park. I guess three's a charm -  I took 3rd place in my age group! Hey Coach Joel, I think my race head is getting better.

Although, I did hold myself back a little in mile 6 - I have this big fear that I will get hurt before Boston 2017. I keep telling everyone - if I gotta crawl, I'm crossing that Boston finish!

So far, I have trained for four marathons, and have only made it to the start of two. The last two, Boston and Berlin, are scheduled at times in the year when my Crohn's Disease is most likely to flare. This s#cks because I am not absorbing anything that I eat, and am always running in a dehydrated state. After this last flare - which I suspect was really bad due to my having to get a mandatory flu shot at the hospital I work in - I wound up anemic. I have actually run my last three races before the Joek10K pretty much really run down.

I am happy to say that even though I was freezing, I felt strong this time. Did I do anything different nutrition-wise? Why yes, I did, and I thought you'd never ask. Here's what I did:

1. I tried the Beet Boost the week before the race. I'm sorry, I wasn't a fan. It actually made me a little nauseous.
2. On race day, I committed the number #1 sin of Sports Nutrition: I tried a new drink. Beet It Sport. I have had beet juice before races - so this wasn't that much of a stretch. Beet It Sport is a concentrated juice claiming to give you 400mg of dietary nitrate per 70 ml shot. It went down faster and better than I expected - it was very tolerable. I think it helped!
3. I also ate a Honey Stinger Energy Gel 30 minutes pre-race. I like these better than the Gu's b/c they are less thick. Still packs 27 grams of carbs - just enough energy for me and for my goal time which was 45 minutes.

Well, I felt strong, even coming up the hills in miles 5 and 6, but I did not meet my 45 minute goal time. I ran the 10k in 47:22, pacing 7:38. Not bad for such cold conditions!

How cold was it? It was so cold that the top of the water was frozen in the cups offered at the water stations!

There was like 1/4 inch of ice on top of the water at the water stations!

Running in the cold makes your mouth feel really dry. It's weird, your eyes can't stop tearing, but your mouth is like screaming for water. I didn't stop for water along the course - heck it was ONLY a 10k (saying that in my best half marathon snobbery voice). But at the end, I needed water. I picked up a frozen cup - and a volunteer warned me, "Just bang the cup on the side of the table a few times." I tried, but - it was quite frozen - so I slammed it on the ground - and, WALAH! It was like striking gold! Gulp, gulp gulp!

I would definitely run this race again. There were tons of volunteers, who were super helpful. We got in and out of Manhattan in record time, and the course was great - it's Central Park, of course it's great! Mostly all downhill for the first 2 miles, then you start to circle around, and climb back up some hills to get back to the start. I'll tell you - those hills are way more easy in the 10K then when you run them in the NYC Marathon!

And yes, knowing that I placed does inspire me to connect to the Alecia Keys song in some weird way!

And when I went to the Port-O-Johns before the race, my eyes weren't tearing up only b/c it was so cold, or b/c I knew I had to undress in 28*F weather to pee - but b/c I was listening to people all around me, who all spoke different languages, theye were from all over the world - all getting together in a peaceful way, to simply ...run!

Train Smart, 

Eat Right

#B3yond Nutrition, LLC!