I ran in the American Heart Association Wall Street Run. The run itself was 3 miles, and there was a walking course as well which was around a mile long. It was a huge race, with over 12,000 people in attendance. I can't remember being in another race that so many companies had entered teams into. There were huge groups of people from Siemens, Citibank, Deutsche Bank, Merrill Lynch, Chartis, etc., all wearing matching company t-shirts. I guess these companies must have all donated money to the AHA, because they told us the event had raised about $1.7 million. Pretty impressive.
This was great for the AHA, but I wondered how much the race cost the city of New York. Most races I've run are held in Central Park, which means no major roads need to be closed. Occasionally there will be a course that takes us slightly outside the park, like the mini-marathon I ran last year that began in Columbus Circle and headed up Central Park West for about half a mile. But that was only one part of one road. For this race, big sections of fairly major roads had to be closed down. The start of the race was delayed by about 5 minutes (this is pretty much unheard of at NYRR events) because the race officials were waiting for confirmation that all the roads were clear. Must have taken NYPD longer than they thought it would. Luckily, the Financial District (FiDi) pretty well shuts down by 6:00 most evenings, and the race began at 7:00. It's always interesting to walk around down there late at night and be surrounded by huge buildings but not see a single other person or car.
The streets in FiDi don't run in straight lines and all have names instead of numbers, making it very confusing for someone like me who has lived with the grid for years. Just finding registration took ages. It also makes it tough to design a 3-mile long racecourse. Below is a map of the course. I've never had to make more sharp turns in a race than I did last night.
Once I'd picked up my number, I went into the corral for people who thought they'd be running somewhere between 8 and 9 minutes per mile. At least, that's what the sign said. Looking around, I realized that virtually none of these people were going to be able to run that fast. I think everyone just sort of lined up without any real regard for where. As it turned out, however, I didn't run as fast as I thought I would either, though it wasn't my fault. The gridlock was unbelievable. There were so many people clogging the corral that by the time the crowd carried me across the starting line I wasn't even jogging yet. I spent the first mile trying to make headway before settling at last into a steady jog. Passing people was way more effort than it was worth; as soon as I got by someone, there was another person directly in front of them to squeeze past. I saw a man nearly push over a woman who was plodding slowly along in front of him. She made an annoyed "tsk" sound, and said to her companion, "Doesn't he know this isn't a real race?" To anyone stuck in the middle of the pack, she was absolutely right. The crowding is typical of any race, but this one never really thinned out. The swath of bodies made it feel hotter than it was, and though the buildings blocked the sun, they also blocked most of the breeze, making this the warmest race of the year so far. The finish line felt nearly as claustrophobic as the starting corral had. Irritating as it was, it was sort of cool to see so many runners pounding through the narrow canyons of the Financial District. This is why I'd signed up for the race in the first place.
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In the end, it was a fun race to run, but I was relieved when it was over. I was hot and sweaty, but I had plans to meet Isang in half an hour for dinner. I hoped she wouldn't be offended by the state I was in and so was relieved to see her walk through the door in sweaty running clothes, too. Turns out she'd just finished a training run herself. It's good to know a kindred spirit.
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