For the past few days, Hurricane Irene has been all over the news. Gov. Christie (NJ) was telling beach goers of the Jersey Shore to “Get the H@#! off the beaches,” not to worry about their tans and to get to higher ground. All very true. Besides Hurricane Irene blowing up my twitter newsfeed, the other subject highly being tweeted were by my runner friends training for various marathons and half marathons. Many were about switching tomorrow’s (Sunday’s) long run to Friday or Saturday. My long run was split into two runs yesterday- 8.5 around the Kelly Drive Loop and another 5.5 at the gym. I couldn’t imagine trying to do double digits on the treadmill (or dreadmill).
Then there are the other effects of Irene. In the Philadelphia/ NJ area alone, 2 half marathons were cancelled due to the weather. The Wildwood 1/2 Marathon in NJ scheduled for tomorrow was cancelled on Friday. Not sure people would be interested in running a 1/2 marathon in 60-100 mph winds and hurricane like rains. There was also the Perk Up 1/2 Marathon for tomorrow also on the calendar. Again, not a fun thing to try and run in. I was set to run the Lehigh Valley Zoo 10K in the Allentown area. Even though Allentown is a good 60-70 miles from any sort of river or major body of water, winds were set to be up around 60 mph and the rain was suppose to be felt that far in state. Luckily, the event coordinators rescheduled it for September 18. The bad news, it’s the day of the Rock n Roll Philadelphia 1/2 Marathon I’ve been signed up for since last year. Can’t be in 2 places at once unfortunately.
The only upside to the hurricane is that it’s giving me a weekend off of running. The past few weeks, I’ve hit 40+ miles a week and I’m currently up to 150+ miles for the month, the most I’ve run in a month ever I think. So Irene, I thank you for that. I thank you for forcing so many of us runners adjust our schedules around you and for giving us more rain in the wettest August Philadelphia has seen (not really). And for messing with our power (kidding again).
To all my fellow East Coasters, be safe this weekend!!