…out of the SUUUN! under the Whitehurst… Whitehurst..

The Whitehurst Freeway rises above K Street in Georgetown, and it carries vehicles along the Potomac River between the Key Bridge at the west end and Rock Creek Parkway/K Street at the east end. Named after H.C. Whitehurst, the director of the District Highway Department at the time of its conception, the bridge was built in the 1940’s and was the District’s very first freeway. Steel shortages at the time delayed its construction and it opened a year behind schedule, in October 1949. The final cost: $3.3 million. Included in the demolition was the house of Francis Scott Key, writer of the Star-Spangled Banner.

Source: http://www.dcroads.net/roads/whitehurst

Not much to write about this morning, especially after one of the worst sports weekends in DC area history, at least that I can remember… So here’s a photo I pulled from the archives, taken 3 years ago in March, of the old stone bridge on Beach Drive in Rock Creek Park. We used to run in that direction, over the bridge, more frequently when we lived at our old apartment, but it’s been awhile now. When we would go by, I always expected an old troll to be sitting under it, eating little children or whatever it is that trolls do. Now that the leaves are starting to change, it would be a good time to go back and see it.

The Georgetown canal. If you squint your eyes, don’t the clouds look like they make a big heart?

   
We did it! Woooooooo, we are triathletes! Here is a photo of the Potomac swim (it’s taken with Matt’s new birthday present ) Congrats to our entire Team in Training Team for finishing this race, and thank you to everyone who cheered us on–parentals, coworkers, Jill, Pat, Jami, Slutsky, JJ, Jessica, Zack, Brigid, Keith, Jayluf, and Kristen, and everyone else (Aine, Carolyn) in my swim corral who helped me stop freaking out. yay, you guys rock! (please feel free to comment on your favorite part of race day.) Here are some of the other photos from the day…
   

Time results:
   
Lori/Matt    
overall place: 1563/314    
TIME: 3:18:04/2:37:31    
swim: 39:25/33:53    
transition1: 3:03/2:28    
bike:1:27:01/1:10:02    
transition2: 2:25/1:24    
run: 1:06:12/49:45    

   
The course itself was great- the Potomac was less gross/intimidating than we had been thinking all summer, and the water was actually refreshing at 7:45 in the AM. No bodies or Loch Nessies were spotted, though I did graze a piece of driftwood. eeek! Sighting on the back end of the swim was nearly impossible – foggy goggles and the sun directly in my eyes. I had to stop a few times, remove the goggles, and tread water to look for the yellow buoys. But I made it out of the water, and up the ladders, and to me, that was as good as finishing the race because the part where you could drown was over.
   
The bike course was smooth “these roads are like butter” as Matt would say… and no real hills, up or down. There was, however, a more-than-24-hours-dead deer on the side of the road that stunk like nobody’s business, but other than that, no real issues. AND, most importantly, no flat tires!!
   
The run was tough for everyone it seemed. By that point in the day, it was getting really humid and into the mid-90s. Black pavement is hot. No shade was unfortunate. But I did happen to look up a few times and see things such as the Washington monument, the Jefferson Memorial, and the place on Hains Point where The Awakening used to be. Pretty!
   
Now we are looking forward to getting those finish line photos back. I did a standard arm-raised in victory motion, but Matt went for a leaping fist-pump. Sure to not let me down.

   
Also wanted to point out everything that I ate today, starting at 5am:    
pre-race: 1/2 banana, 1/2 whole wheat bagel, 1 bottled water, 1 caffeinated cherry sports beans pack    
during-race: 1 orange sport bean pack, 4 bottles water, 1 lime sport bean pack    
immediately-post-race: 1 bottled water, 3 powerades, 1 pickle, 1/2 turkey sub, 2 mini packs of Skittles, 1 banana, 1 slice cheese pizza    
lunch: a baked potato, steak, cantaloupe and grapes, 1 dos equis, veggies and dip, 12-ish caramel cream candies, cherry-whipped cream pie    
10pm: pomegranate fro-yo with fresh pineapple, strawberries, and blackberries
   

Now time to sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep……