So back home in the land of the living.  Fortunately I had a great flight back on Virgin Atlantic and managed to get four seats to myself at the back of the plane, best seats in the house when you can completely lie out flat and sleep.  Being so tall it is a rare occurance especially on a red eye flight but it enabled me to land back yesterday without much of a problem. 

So what a great trip for me, Bermuda was awesome and New York was better than I thought it would be.  For those who have been, you would agree that it has to be the best city skyline in the world and it was good to get some siteseeing done, albiet on my own! 

The race went to plan, although looking back I was gutted not to have dipped inside the magical 4 mins, though for a first indoor race in 2 years i'll take it.  Was just really good fun to be racing and enjoying the day and the atmosphere.  The Armory is the busiest track in the world for meetings and it is a testament to all their work that it is so well used.  The elite race is set in the middle of high school races, which is a great idea as they get to see some class races whilst being involved themselves with the day and the atmosphere.  The only problem was so many of them, you couldn't move!  We were put in a small room and the only place to warm up was outside.  Usually not a problem but it was -6 without the windchill!  Still gotta deal with these things. 

I didn't really know what shape I was in, have had one or two decent sessions, but the road mile in Bermuda was of no help as it was so slow, other than being confident, so I sat at the back and chilled out for the 1st 400.  The pacemaker and Adrian Blincoe went out hard 27 for 200 and were 1.56/7 at 800, but I was off that, slowly coming through the field, trying to pass at least one person a lap.  Coming to the bell I was still back in fourth, neck and neck with Rob Myers, the current American Indoor Champion.  The two of us worked hard and managed to reel in the the two who were out front.  Although it wasn't a blistering race timewise it was a good race for the crowd.  The race organiser Ian Brooks said that it would be great to have 3 guys coming off the final bend all in with a shout.  At the bell there was still 6 who could have won, and 4 off the final turn.  Fortunately I just managed to out lean Adrian Blincoe for 2nd, so all in all a good start to my indoor season.

We were done and dusted by 4pm so headed to Coogans Restaurant and Bar which is on the same block as the Armory.  I recommend anybody visiting New York to pay this place a visit, great food, great atmosphere, great people and great beer!  The place is owned by real running affecionados and they have memorabillia and singlets all over the place.  They even have the meet live streamed into the bar!  So when we got there everyone wanted to buy us beers, ofcourse it would be rude to say no, so cracked on.  A few hours, Kareoke (extremely badly) and many pints later we ended up in a Jazz club in Harlem!  Was a great night, but most importantly was up at 8am running 90mins around Central Park with James and Rob Myers.  It was funny because there was a half marathon on, and despite the weather being so cold about 6000 people running!  So we went the other way to the runners and effectively had the biggest pack run ever, just watching the others and getting in the spirit of the race, was really good and a good way to sweat the beers out! 

So thats it for now, back to work tomorrow!  Shall hopefully get a good weeks training in and then look for one more race before the Nationals, we will see.

Laters

Sp8y