empire state run up recap

Mary Wittenberg at the finish

The winners, an injured Suzy, and Thomas being interviewed

Me and running legend Nina Kusick (she won NYC marathon and boston! in 1970s).

Ana, John, me and Frank after finish

Thomas Dold (10:07) of Germany and Suzy Walsham (13:27) of Australia repeated as the NYRR Empire State Building Run-Up champions on Tuesday, February 3. Dold's victory was his fourth straight in the race, while Walsham marked her third consecutive win.

I forgot how much fun this race is --even on the tail-end of a flu-chest cold, I survived. In the middle of the race, I had to stop and walk slowly --I knew that was an extra minute..ran through the snow on the 86th floor to finish in 17:07. Frank came in 7 out 177 men in 15 minutes and change!! A good time was had by all --the NYRRC does a great job with this event -baggage check, t-shirts, medals to all finishers and lucite empire state building paperweight age-group awards...plus breakfast -coffee, bagels and pastries. And we get to take the elevator down. After I finished, I saw the first woman, Suzy Walsham, in a stretcher ---she injured herself somehow (will have to read the reports) and still won. I also met an ultra-woman, Suzannah, who is in Massanutten. She ran this 3 days after running the cape cod frozen ass 50K...and John G., who works around the corner, came to the finish. And we saw our friend Ana, who is running Caumsett park 50K. And, the best part -Frank introduced me to marathon legend Nina Kusick -she is 70 and has done the run-up 8 times.
Meanwhile, I am bummed to miss this weekends' bronx 1/2 or 20K (travelling to FL-good weather but no races) as will be healthy and it's supposed to be 50 degrees --go figure.