Central Park - New York City

I was up in New York City for the first time in my life last Thursday - Sunday. My wife had been up in the NYC area for work the first part of the week so I flew up Thursday to spend a long weekend in the city. We had beautiful weather most of the time we were there and had a blast. There was so much to do in so little time. Friday went to the top of the Rockefeller Center and then we took a 3 hr bike tour along the Hudson river and over the Manhattan Bridge into Brooklyn and back across the Brooklyn bridge into Manhattan and back up along the Hudson river. I haven't ridden a bike in quite a while and I had a sore butt afterwards. The weather was so nice out that I barely even broke a sweat. I had wanted to get up and go running Saturday but it rained Saturday morning so I decided to sleep in instead. Sunday was quite a bit cooler and windy, but I went out for a run that morning before we had to check out of our hotel. The temperature was about 50 degrees out with 20 mph winds, but it was sunny out. I hadn't brought a lot of warm stuff for running, so I was trying to decide if I wanted to wear my Boston jacket while I ran. It was my only jacket I had packed and I knew I needed it for the rest of the day and I didn't want to get it all sweaty. I decided to head out and take my chances in the cold. It was about 10 blocks from my hotel up to the south end of Central Park and then I ran a full lap around the park. It was a little harder than I expected with the wind and the terrain had a lot more hills than I expected. The Olympic trials in 2007 did about 4 loops around Central Park and that was not an easy course. I forgot to bring my camera to snap some pics while I was running, but I got started late enough that I didn't really have a lot of extra time to be taking pictures. It was a beautiful day out and after about 5 minutes I was warm enough though the blasts of wind were kind of chilly at times. I did learn that when you run along the sidewalks in New York if you stay on the metal grates above the subway, you get a nice blast of warm air that keeps you warm. According to mapmyrun.com, my route from my hotel and around the park and back was 7.6 miles and I ran it in about 51 minutes which was a little under 7:00 pace. Considering the hills and the wind it was a decent pace. I felt good during the run though my quads were a little sore at the end of the run in the same areas where they hurt after Boston. It was a fun run to do and it's cool to say that I've run in Central Park. I think New York would be a fun place to live for 6 months or maybe a year because there is so much to do, but I don't think I'd want to be there much more than that.