WIPEOUT !

Saturday, I got up early, put my easy 4 miler in, and got ready to hit the road, for our vacation.

Nothing special, an quick out and back. Here are the quick stats:

4.05 miles (35:27)

Lap/Mile

1 9:17

2 8:53

3 8:36

4 8:17

.04 :24


Ok, onto my Sunday 16 miler. I set the alarm for 6:15am, and got up. It wasn't a great nite sleep, and Saturday was a busy day.

Early up for a 4 miler,

pack up the family,

and head downashore,

clean the place and unpack,

Hit the beach... gotta do that!,

boardwalk with the family,

and finally hit the sack around 11:00ish.

So, I wasn't feelin' it, when the alarm went off.

I decided on an out and back run from Wildwood, thru Cape May, and back. I had a decent idea of the route I was going to take.

When I was packing the essentials, I wrote down the wife's cell number. Scary when you don't need to remember phone numbers anymore! I wrote it down on a business card I found, and put it in my back pocket along with 2 gu's, and a camera. I just thought it would be a good idea to have it, just in case. Little did I know, I almost needed it!

Memo to slef.. memorize her phone number. My road ID has our home number, but not her cell, and now that I am not running just around home, I need to get the wife's cell number on it.

I felt a bit tired in the beginning, and just was content to put the mileage in.

Since I had much feedback to add some pics, since you never know what you'll run across.

This shot is of one of the back bays, on the way to Cape May.

This guy was hanging out in front of the 2 mile landing, where there are 2 great restaurants.

ROADKILL ! One dead possum.

The $1.00 toll bridge. This was a tough hill, with one lane , so you have no room for error, crossing it.

I started out slow, hoping to get more into the run, the longer it went. Things where going OK, until I got to around the 6 mile mark. That's when I ran into trouble! I was running on the sidewalk, on a road in Cape May, headed to the center of town, when I tripped over a raised portion of the cement sidewalk. I think it was raised due to a tree route. I think that was my problem, as I was paying more attention to the lower tree branches, than the sidewalk under my feet.

Well, I hit it, stumbled, and fell hard. As I fell, I was able to get my right hand and arm up, so I kinda rolled, with that protecting my head. Luckily, I did not hit my head. I did land pretty hard on my right knee, which was scraped up pretty good, along with some road rash on the right elbow & outside of my right hand. After I fell, I got myself up on one knee, hit the stop on my watch, and kinda collected myself. I checked to make sure I wasn't injured too bad.

I did see a few cars pass, which of course no one stopped. I'm sure one of them had to see me fall.

I had remember I had just passed a sign that had said "welcome center 1 mile", so I started back up after a few minutes. When I got there, the place was nothing more than a little bus terminal, and of course it was closed. I was close to the center of town, where I had ran a few years back, in the Great Cape May Footrace, a 5 & 10k races. I thought for sure there would have been a water fountain, so I could at least clean up my wounds.. WRONG! I was close to the beach, where the Ocean Drive Marathon & 10 miler start is. I found the convention center was open, and used their bathroom, to get some soap & water. I hate the bathroom that don't have paper towels. They just had the air dryers, so I grabbed some toilet paper, to dry the leg off.

It didn't look that bad, when I got it cleaned up, but it was still a nice road rash. I was able to refill my water bottle with some nice cold water, form their water fountain, which was a benefit. When I got done, I followed the route that was the OC Drive Marathon. The knee did bother me a bit, but I tried the best I could, to put it out of my mind.

I lumbered along, and was glad to get the hell out of Cape May.
As I got closer to returning to the Wildwoods, I noticed that I would be about a mile short, on the return, so I started to think of how far I would have to run past our house, to get in 16 miles. When I hit the 15 mile mark, I was around the start of the boardwalk, and wasn't feeling good at all. It was about 9:30am, and the day was starting to heat up. I felt a bit of nausea, and called it a day at 15:38 miles (2:29:57).

I hated to cut a run short, but I wanted to air on the side of caution. I have a 18 miler this coming Sunday, and it was just the start of the family vacation, so I didn't want to do something stupid.

Let me tell ya, when you stick the open wounds in the salt water, it feels good until you get out, than you get that stinging.. Well, 6 miles is on tap for Tuesday, so we'll see how it goes.

Lap/Mile
1 9:34
2 9:24
3 9:28
4 9:35
5 9:44
6 10:07
7 10:31
8 9:42
9 9:30

10 9:32
11 9:34
12 9:52
13 9:40
14 9:47
15 9:57
.38 3:53