It’s finally here! Race Day!!
One nice thing about the NYC Marathon is that it always is on Fall Back weekend so we get an extra hour of sleep! Sean & I set our alarms for 4:30am because we needed to be at the subway station by 5:10am. The train ended up arriving late, at 5:21am but it did eventually get there thank goodness. There were some other ladies waiting and they had been there since 4:30am with no trains.
We got to the Ferry Station around 5:50 & caught the 6:00am ferry. I love taking the ferry because you can see the city from a different angle plus you can see the Statue of Liberty too.
Once we got to the Staten Island, you need to take a bus to the start area. Last time I ran, I remember going out a different door but this time it was very organized with a little walk to the buses so there was a lot of space to spread out.
The bus ride was about 15-20 minutes, I think? It seemed decently long to me. Once we got off the bus, we had to go through security and then we showed our bibs before entering Fort Wadsworth.
They said to allot 90 minutes to get to the start if taking the ferry. we left the hotel around 5:00am and got to the park about 7:11am so it did take a little over 90 mins (although that was partially due to the train taking longer than normal).
It felt warmer than normal this year but we still had our throw-away gear (that was going to be donated) on. While it was warmer, it was still colder than we are normally used to.
Sean’s wave started at 9:10am and mine at 10:40am. Not only were we in different time waves, we had different color wave too. Sean was in Orange Wave 1 and I was in Green Wave 3. Being in green this year meant that I have now been in all 3 Color Waves!! The Green Wave in the past was something that was looked down on because of the rumor of guys peeing off the bridge and it coming down to the green wave.
My first priority upon getting to the start was to find a Dunkin hat! I have seen people with them every year and I for whatever reason have never seen where to get one and this year I was determined to get one!
But first, hit up the portos. Then we headed to the Orange start area, which was right near the Green Wave start and where the Dunkin hats were!!
We grabbed our hats, which made me super happy.
Next up we got bagels and then sat down to eat and wait for our starts.
From where we were sitting, we could see the bridge and the starts of the various waves. There was someone announcing every time a wave went off to not be alarmed by the start cannon.
Sooner rather than later it was time for Sean to head to his corral. I walked him over and then headed back to the Orange area. We got our pre-race photo and then he went off.
I got another bagel and then thought I might walk to the Green Wave section but it seemed out of the way so I sat down near the VIP tents & the Green Corral.
I saw the Michelob Ultra team walk by, I knew a few people running with them but I didn’t see them in the pack.
I chatted with a few other runners, watched the first two waves go off, ate my second bagel, hit up the portos again and then made my wave into the Green Corrals.
I didn’t remember exactly how it was set up so I took my sweat pants off in the field and then walked in to the corrals. By the time I got inside the corral, I was actually feeling kind of warm, but we still had a over a half hour so I didn’t want to take my sweat shirt off too early.
You could tell there were a lot less people than in the past because the corral wasn’t very packed. About 10:26 the corrals moved out to the start line. It was pretty cool because we could see one of the other starts too.
Someone sang the National Anthem, then they got us ready to start. As per normal, they shot off the cannon & then New York, New York by Frank Sinatra played as we started the race.
Next up…The Race!!
