Yesterday, I identified one of my lunch runs as the "bridges run." I work on Capitol Hill in DC and this run starts at the top of said hill. After a nice little warm up trotting down the hill, I run along the mall in a westerly direction, dodging leagues of school kids acting like, well, school kids. The construction that is the Folklife Festival preparation has added additional impediments, but on the whole, the mall is a great place to run. The WWII memorial is a choke point, which is a good thing. About once a week, a group of elderly veterans, many in wheel chairs, will cluster around the memorial. I cannot imagine the memories that well up in those guys; I'm glad they now have their spot on the mall.
The run continues over the memorial bridge, with the Arlington House in clear view. I loop down to the Mt. Vernon Trail and run south (more or less) to the 14th st. bridge. This part is unpleasant, unless you have run the Marine Corps Marathon. Running next to the interstate is better than running on the interstate as one does in the MCM. At least on my run, you can look down at the water and imagine how good it would feel to be in the water. In the MCM, there's no view from the HOV lanes. A run through the grass field adjacent to the Jefferson Memorial and over a wee little bridge separating the tidal basin from the washington channel, leaves me at the best spot to watch the MCM (Mike will attest to that). A short run north on 15th st. gets me back to the mall where I head east and back to work. Blech. Anyway, after that run I can scratch 7.3 miles in my log and I have run through two states (well, a District and a Commomwealth) and three bridges. I will have run past the US Capitol, the Washington Monument, WWII and Korean War Memorials, Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials, and run past Arlington Cemetary. Not bad for under an hour.
3 comments:
Thanks! I was thinking that it included Key, and so I couldn't figure out how it all fit together. But that is a sweet little run, and a nice pace. Finish strong, finish proud.
I tried out a portion of this run today, to my great pleasure. Thanks for sharing.
(Also, if you count the Humpback Bridge over by the Pentagon-- which you probably don't even notice, since you're going so fast-- it ticks the bridge count up to 4!)
Oh yeah, I forgot about that one. And, I should not have. When I am training for something, I usually *warm up* on the way to lincoln, then run at sub-5k speed over memorial bridge, down the trail, and shut it down at the top of that little bridge. That last little rise is a killer. I sort of stumble my way down the other side (if I don't, I didn't run hard enough).
Post a Comment