And so I just ran.
*gasp* *huff* *puff* *wheeeeze* *grunt* *ow ow ow* *phew*
That about describes the sounds coming from me during yesterday's Dash for Democracy. Yes, I actually ran the Inaugural Committee of Seventy-sponsored 5k (or 4.8k as I learned later, totally shattering the surprised good feelings I had when I crossed the finish line 2 minutes ahead of my expected pace). Some things I learned from yesterday's race include:
1. My colleague here at WHYY, Jeff Bundy, is really fast. I had always known this but when I saw him running the other way on Market Street, meaning he had run all the way past City Hall, Love Park and around Logan Circle before I had even gotten to Broad Street, it was confirmed.
2. Hot wings, beer, macaroni and cheese, french fries and lots of mayonnaise do not make a good pre-race dinner.
3. The new smoke-free atmosphere at the bar in which I ate the above is a Philadelphia policy initiative that all distance runners should be thankful for.
4. Chaka Fattah is faster than I am.
5. People don't listen to their "traffic on the 2's" as often as they should, judging by the huge back-ups on each North-South street that intersected the stretch of the course on Market East.
6. Running on a treadmill in a nice warm gym is not the way to prepare for the seering burn that one's lungs experience in 30 degree running conditions.
7. I have 6 months until the next 5k I plan on running. I better get to training.
As promised, Jeff and I walked around and looked for someone whose costume best exemplified an issue in the 2007 mayor's race. The winner, Tara, came dressed as the money that she feels is corrupting the electoral process. She was advocating the public financing of elections. If you look very carefully, you'll see that in the picture I took of Tara, I coincidentally got millionaire, potentially self-financed candidate, Tom Knox! Talk about irony. A woman talking about getting money out of politics in the same picture as a guy who has already put $5 million bucks into his own campaign.
For her efforts, Tara received an official The Next Mayor t-shirt and she'll get an opportunity to write a blog post on this blog about whatever she wants. I'll be putting up her post, unedited, soon.
Along with Fattah, who was among the runners and Knox, who got 15 seconds of microphone time at the Power 99 table, the as-yet-only-declared-candidate, Michael Nutter was also on hand to celebrate this event. Other photos from the Dash are included here.