First of all I'd like to apologize for being so late. I've been very busy with things heating up as March 13th rapidly approaches. Although I assure you, things were not heating up last Saturday morning.

My alarm went off at 4:45. Wake up, breakfast, shit, shave, shower. My outfit for a race is normally laid out for me the night before. With a blizzard on the horizon, I was unsure what clothes to lay out, so I made sure I had several different options.

NYRR.org said that the race had become a "fun run" and entrants did not need to actually run the race in order to qualify for the New York City Marathon. Qualifying was not my goal, running the damn race was. I bundled up in multiple layers, Tweeting "I feel like Ralphies brother. #Overdressed." The last thing I wanted was to show up at the race already frozen.

I traveled to the Upper East Side to pick up my number and walked 15 blocks to the bag drop. An hour and a half after leaving my house and I now had to decide on an outfit to run in.

I chose the old pair of shoes that I wore to the race as opposed to the new pair of shoes that I'd planned to race in, due to the fact that there was already 4 inches of snow on the ground so why ruin a brand new pair of shoes. I had two fresh pairs of socks in my bag but I decided to go with the ones that were on my feet. The snow was coming down so hard, a fresh pair of socks would have been wet again before I got my shoes back on, so fuck it!

I stripped down to my running pants, threw on a pair of shorts over my pants to make sure I didn't get any dick pain like I had the previous Sunday. On top I had a long sleeve base layer, a short sleeve running shirt, and two running jackets that were designed for rain. A stocking hat, lightly tinted glasses, gloves, and hand-warmers. Off I went to find the starting line, 15 minutes after the race had already started. Which didn't much matter considering there were no timers.

I crossed the starting line into the frozen tundra. Snow coming down at all angles. Of the 15,000 or so runners that had signed up, only maybe 1000 showed up. The most difficult part of the race was passing people. Because for the most part, people were running single file in order to find the surest footing. It was much like running in sand, but if you followed the footsteps of hundreds in front of you, the sand was a bit more compact. Passing someone however, meant going out into the untouched sand which was deeper and took much more effort to get in and out of with each footstep.

I assure you, this was no sand. Quite the contrary. It was 24 degrees with snow coming down from the right into my right eye. As soon as I turned a left corner hoping to have the snow at my back, it was coming down from the left into my left eye. I realized that the snow was coming from all angles and there was nothing I could do about it except hold my glasses half way down my nose in order to block as much snow as possible but allow enough breathing room to keep them from fogging up.

On I went. Each and every mile slower than the last. As opposed to a well run fair weather race which would be the exact opposite in terms of pace per mile.

By the time I crossed the finish line I was over it. The snow was coming down harder than ever and I just wanted to get changed and warm up. Team Drunk Diet made our way to baggage claim, picked up our shit, and wondered off in the freezing cold. Wet, aching, and unable to move our mouths properly to speak, proud.

We found a diner where the hostess told us to sit in the very back near the bathrooms so we didn't scare the other customers.

After a bowl of chicken noodle soup I made my way to the bathroom to change out of my wet clothes into some dry clothes which were no longer dry due to all the damn snow everywhere.

I made my way back to our table and changed in to some fresh socks. I pulled a pair of pants over my pants. All while saying fuck shit and piss repeatedly with a table of young kids right next to us.

You can't take me anywhere.

We made our way downtown to one of my alma maters and celebrated our success over some beers.