beat the bridge 10K

After finishing the Deja Vue half, I headed down to Annapolis for the Beat the Bridge 10K over the Chesapeake Bay. It was the little bridge in Annapolis, not the giant one further east and south.

I spent an hour in Wilmington with traffic on 95. the rest of the trip was kind-of uneventful. I drove the speed limit the whole time. Couldn't risk another ticket. The last one, two weeks ago, in the school zone cost $169.50 and earned me three points!

I arrived at the Navy Stadium for the expo and packet pickup in plenty of time.

I think it is the only football stadium that has it's own plane.

My hotel was 22 minutes north near the Baltimore Airport. It was weird being alone. Usually Bonnie or Lydia is with me. No restaurants in the area so I ended up eating there. I picked the hotel because it was a sponsor hotel. I really didn't check into their website because it was a sponsor hotel. Almost every hotel offers free wi-fi and breakfast, right? Wrong. I had to buy internet to do class. And I had to find breakfast in the morning.

My shuttle time from the Navy stadium was 8 am. I left the hotel for the 22 minute trip at 6:20. I'm a little obsessive about being early. Ask the others. I needed to get off exit 24.

I found a McDs and bought an Egg McMuffin, and hit the road. At exit 23 the world stopped. It took on hour to get the next mile and park. There were at least 20 buses. Maybe I'd be on time. The line went 3/4 the way around the stadium. It took 1/2 hour to reach the bus. And another twenty minutes to get to the start line.

I arrived just as they were calling my wave. And I was off. No time to think.

I have few pictures. We walked right into the sun. Hopefully the pros got a nice one.

There was about a 1/4 mile in the park, then about two miles up the bridge, on mile that was sort-of flat, and two miles down. There was port-o-potties on the bridge—twice. And an elaborate water station. It was a cup free event and you had to bring a water vessel.

The final mile was in a park-like area. But there was no clock. I didn't know what my time was until
I got home. Awaiting me in my email was this elaborate graph. And a link for my finish. I'm the walker, not Elvis.

The drive home was pretty uneventful. Though I wish I had someone to help drive. I was tired.

This is my ninth metal from an event. I'm not a medal person. I'm not even really excited when they hand me them. And I'm running out of space on the shelf above my desk. Guess I'm going to find a box for them. Maybe I have an envelope box somewhere. Or maybe I should put them in an envelope and send them off to Medals4Mettle. They repurpose them for kids fighting life threatening diseases. I'll think about that another day.