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| Boat House Row at Kelly Drive Picture Courtesy visitphilly.com |
Saturday, February 7th marked the first of 2 20+ runs the McCracken’s are going to do in preparation for the Washington DC marathon. Jenn was doing an aerial training class in Manayunk so there is a popular lot right at the beginning of Kelly Drive that is right on the trail and maybe 400 meters from the East Falls Bridge.
We decided to set out towards Manayunk and jump on Forbidden Drive and then do a little bit of Kelly Drive to total up to 20 miles. We set off both on our ways both feeling a little unprepared. We both felt a little tired and dehydrated and not mentally ready for 3+ hours on the run. But we took our 5-hour energy (a staple for the McCracken’s in long runs) and 2 gels each. We decided to leave some water at my tire so when we pass we could grab some.
About 2 miles in we hit the main 5-mile stretch of Forbidden Drive and it was still a sheet of ice. We talked to a nice man that said it did not get better so we decided to head back to the car and do 2 loops of Kelly Drive (this would be the 2nd time we did this in 6 days!).
Kelly Drive is a great place to run. There is the Schuylkill River, the city skyline, and tons of people along the way. Jenn and I have started to run opposite directions when we run the loop so we get to see each other a few times throughout. Training for anything has its ups and downs, and lot of those downs are not always injuries. As we finished we both got back to a car that had a shattered passenger front window all in the car. Jenn’s North Face, zip up, purse with only a water bottle and keys were taken. Luckily nothing else was taken, but still a pain in the butt. Needless to say, the police didn’t even visit the car to write the report.
Our plans that evening were thwarted and we ended up getting our house re-keyed. Sunday, Jenn’s spare keys didn’t work in the car, so we waited 5 hours until we could get them chipped to the car. We spent a lot of time talking about what happened, and we came up with the concept of, “thus is life!” Just like we have some great runs and some bad runs, we also have great moments in life and some bumps along the way. It boils down to how you handle to bad runs and the bump in life.
Monday night, our gym called. Jenn’s keys were found in her purse outside a nursing home in the city. Only the North Face was taken and Sean’s car window was fixed. 20 miles and only one more 20 miler to go :-)
