i am corporately challenged!

That's right, I'm athletic!

Last Thursday night I ran in the JP Morgan Corporate Challenge with, oh, about 14,999 other people! It was absolutely the coolest thing I've done in a while. Bobbing and weaving through a sea of all sorts of people, I finished the 5k (3.5 mile) race in 35:36 (which was really more like 31:36, given our extended march in place at the start).

Team M&S headed out from our offices around 6pm, a ragtag bunch of non-matching-shirt-wearing competitors (which was kind of sad, when you looked around and saw all these cool, matching-shirt-wearing teams... but whatever). And to add to the fun of walking across town with a number pinned to your shirt, with a bunch of co-workers you might not otherwise choose to hang out with (although mine were all really cool, actually), it started to rain. A nice little drenching rain, the kind that hits you with big, fat, ice-cold drops in the middle of your head.
As we neared the starting line, the rain abated, and two of our team split off (because they actually cared about their finishing times) and placed themselves in the "six minute mile" starting area. The rest of us lingered near the border of "ten minute mile" and "non-competitive start" (which really felt like a euphemism of sorts -- "hey, are you going to the gym today?" "Naw, I'm going to the non-competitive sports arena.")

The race started, and we marched in place for a while. Four minutes, actually. My crowd-o-phobia (technically agoraphobia, but I don't want you to think I'm some stuck-indoors-weirdie) started to kick in... precisely when we started running. (Thank god.) And with that, Team M&S dispersed itself into the winds.

I started passing people. Walking people, running people, old people, young people -- clients! That was fun. "Hey, Company XYZ! We represent them! Oh, and there's Stinky & Winky LLP! They were on the opposite side of our deal!"

And as I passed walkers -- who had clearly started in the wrong section, thank you very much -- I thought about how proud I was to be running. Not running to represent my company (because for all anyone knew I worked at Old Navy -- and I was running under someone else's name, since I hadn't actually signed up to do the Corporate Challenge in the first place), but just how awesome it was to be able to move that way, that fast, that consistently, with that much power and without throwing up.

Just looking ahead and seeing this sea of bouncing bodies, packed almost elbow to elbow, navigating a way around them, through them... it was the neatest thing. Less than neat, however, were the waves of jiggling thighs. And I don't just mean one or two. Thousands of thighs jiggled. Which, while moderately horrifying, was also secretly cool. My thighs either blended in with Jiggle Fest 2007, or they didn't. I gave them the benefit of the doubt and didn't even think about them.

A mile or two in, I was still passing people (and granted, people were still passing me), and I found a cute guy from a law firm (I think Anderson & Olick?) and paced myself on him. Did he notice? Probably not, since I was mostly behind him. Realizing this, I surged ahead. But then I didn't have him to pace myself on. So I retreated. (Surge, rinse, retreat... try to internet stalk, fail.)

Anyway, the race ended and the runners were stuck in this penned-in area, feeling a strange urge to moo or baa. And the race organizers were handing out bottles of water, and (I'm not kidding here) PARFAIT. Just about the last thing I want to put in my body after running three and a half miles in the New York humidity has anything to do with Jell-o or cream. Barf central.

When the crowds thinned out (and all the cool teams went to their Post Run Tents, which we, alas, did not have), Team M&S was supposed to meet at Bethesda Fountain and head over to Brother Jimmy's, a BBQ restaurant on 91st and 2nd (or 1st, I forget). Which would have been fine, except that only one member of the team met me at the fountain, and by the time she got there, it was starting to rain again. And this time it wasn't going to let up so easy.

On our post-run-jog-in-the-rain-to-the-restaurant, we met up with some more of our folks and made as mad a dash to the bar as we could. I have to say, the race was way cooler (and waaaaay less smelly) than the after party. Talk about corporately challenged!

I had a really excellent time and would totally do this again. (Especially now that I have my M&S shirt... ahem, six days late.) I'm psyched, too that the run was for charity, and next year, if I'm still working here (please god, no!), I'm totally taking resumes and just handing them out along the way.

Although, now that I think about it... I have a bunch of headshot postcards left over, with my phone number on them... maybe I'd take them too. (Or should I just send them over to Anderson & Olick and ask if anyone recognizes me??)