Before this: NYCM2011: All over the press / NYCM2011: At the NYCM Press Conference / NYCM2011: FootLocker Run – Bart, Ryan, Bobby, Carrie, Steph, well… everyone was there!/ NYCM2011: Who wasn’t at the expo? / NYCM2011: Have you seen a Marathon Morning like this? 

After we left the VIP tent we walked over a couple of hundred meters to the skybox, where were got to see our friends and family… The had gathered a few of our closest peeps around 5 am in midtown, bussed them to the start and they were going to bring them back to the finish line. As I don’t “need” a big entourage (disregard whatever Mr. Bacon says…!!!), I had there my BFF Flor (who you’ve heard tons of) and my other BFF Christine and Jack.

All ready to cheer and have a fabulous day with a VIP pass!!

You KNOW I am gonna be making faces if there is a camera…!

Ready at the start. It was the 5 of us, our friends, the NYRR people, the Footlocker people, photographers, news people, and our handlers, press car and bikes! Just about… 60 of us?

A start for 5 people, pretty ridiculous… We started at 8:45 am. The elite women start at 9:10 and the elite men + Wave 1 started at 9:40, so we would have the roads for ourselves for a while… this was gonna be soooooo fun!!!

They started introducing us, one by one, and tell a bit about our stories. It was in the loudspeakers that were blasting in the Athlete’s Village and the start and everywhere. A few friends told me they heard it all from their corrals… If you are interested, you can watch the video, link is below.

See in the picture below someone in a blue jacket?? Sunglasses? He was sitting in our little press bike. I didn’t notice then but once we got going, the bike was right ahead of us for a while. Once I started running, I saw who it was!

David!!!! (David Willey, Editor of RW!!!). I was shouting like a maniac “I’m MsRitz, I am sure you read my blog every day, cause of course you do!”. Hahaha, it was pretty hilarious… but I will chat with a tree. In the desert.

Touching the ground is optional!

I am practicing. If I start super fast, it’s cause I am smart, right?

Sal’s mom was behind shouting about how I had nice legs… I thought it’d be funny to show them my running tan… Ah, gotta do something to pass the time!

The horn blew and we HAD to go…

I can tell by how I am lifting my left leg what I am thinking “Come on foot, you can do this, you really want to do this, come on!” Off we go onto the Verrazano. A whole mile uphill right from the start. All I wanted was for my foot would hold out, and to enjoy the view not worrying about it. I wanted my NYCM, my fun time on the road, my party thru the city. And I had no idea if I could do this, I had no way of knowing what my pace would be like, I really had no clue what lay ahead. All I knew is that I had to run at least two miles as there is not a train stop on the bridge. So we go.

I have a 3 minute video of the start, when we all get introduced, it’s here. And then, another video of us going into the bridge.

In the meantime… Flor, Christine, and Jack were off to watch the elite warm up and start. Not a bad day if you are not running…!

They then went to the bleachers in the finish line, got some food, watched the winners and waited for me to show up! That’s a nice perk of being my friend!!

If you want to see more pictures my friends took of the start/finish, there’s some good ones here. Now, the juicy part… the race. Coming right up with sweet potato fries!

Need to speed up though, so much to talk about (the Ed Norton breakfast, the marathon press conference on Monday, meeting the winners, etc, oh, and I am hanging out with Matt Long tonight for a social I put together for my Team in Training Ironman team!)before I can jump into Philly crazy-excited mode!

After this: NYCM2011: Beyond The Finish Line (finally the last post!) / NYCM2011: Marathon Monday (Ed, the breakfast, Carrie, the press conference, etc.!) /