NFL Back to Football Run

What's this? NFL in the title of a baseball blog post? Have we lost our minds? Are we confused? Do we not know where to turn? No. We are just cocky a-holes that enjoy boasting about our pathetic accomplishments. Plus, we promised Auntiedukes that she'd be in the blog and by the power of Grayskull, she will be in this blog!!! Last week, we asked you who you'd most want to attend a dinner party with. For no reason other than the fact that Lisa is obsessed with attending one of Derek Jeter's. Apparently he has gold place settings. She's fascinated. It's disturbing that 2 people chose Mark Sanchez and Tim Tebow. Neither one of them have anything interesting to say and Tebow doesn't even put out. Exactly what did you hope to gain by this experience? 2 people chose Jeter. These 2 invidividuals probably watched the same documentary that Lisa did. Eli Manning and David Wright each earned 1 vote. Here's the thing. While Jeter and the Douchebag Brothers earned 2 votes apiece, which trumps Wright's and Manning's 1 vote, 2-1 isn't much in terms of dominance. This means not a single New York golden boy garners enough passion from you people to warrant an influx of support. In all honesty, none of these men strike us as being the life of the party. In all of these instances, we're pretty sure that WE would be the entertaining ones in the mix, which is just sad. These are wealthy professional athletes. They should be fun and awe-inspiring, but they're not. We are. Those saps don't know what they're missing by not hanging out with us. Just ask Timmy. Timmy knows.

As you know, the evening before our drive from hell to DC to visit Nationals Park, we participated in the inaugural NFL Back to Football Run in Central Park with Auntiedukes, Small Fry, and two of Small Fry's cross-country track teammates. We ran under the team name, "The Intergenerationals" because we had a bevy of ages running with us, but for some reason, our team was unacceptable because the website never registered our team. The run was created to celebrate the start of the football season as well as to promote the NFL's foundation, Play60 and the course encompassed a 4-mile trail in the middle of the park beginning near the Strawberry Fields monument.

We met Auntiedukes and Small Fry near the start/finish line. But first, we took a few pictures of what we'd be soon running through. Leading to the start/finish line were flags representing each NFL team.

Auntiedukes had been nice enough to pick up our race bibs and Back to Football Run t-shirts ahead of time, but unfortunately forgot to pick up her own shirt.

While Auntiedukes went in search of the registration tent to pick up her shirt, we investigated the pre-race party. Boomer Esiason and Carton from WFAN did the pre-race commentary. Armani Toomer was in the house. So was the Vince Lombardi Trophy! We just wanted a picture OF the trophy, but there were some baby prostitutes in the area that wanted to press their breasts against the glass that the trophy was housed in. Weird.

Auntiedukes met us by the trophy and we headed back to the start line to get into our heats. Small Fry and her friends were in an earlier heat than us because they're super star road runners or something like that whereas we're lazy. We stood sandwiched between a bunch of other slow people talking about what we were going to eat after the race.

This is us waiting for Boomer to blow the horn to start the race ("it's always a guarantee that you'll find a hot girl in a Brady jersey" - Carton):

We had expected the runners to disperse a bit once the race got underway. While the crowd did thin out a little, we were forced to run in a crowd for the entire 4 miles. In fact, the crowd is one of the primary reasons the three of us ended up getting separated. We lost Auntiedukes at the first water station and then lost each other at the water station at the third mile marker. For at least half a mile, Serena couldn't figure out why Lisa was running up her ass or why Lisa wouldn't respond to her commentary. Finally, she looked over her shoulder and noticed that Lisa was NOT running behind her at all. In fact, the chick wasn't even a Giants fan. By that point, it was so dark that she couldn't even see where Lisa might have been. That last half mile was a lonely, quiet one. Lisa got to enjoy a conversation between two girls about their other friend who was cheating on her husband. Lisa couldn't help but think at the third mile maker that if this race had been a 5K, she'd be done by this point.

 

There was one final hill between the third and fourth mile that was brutal. Serena didn't think she'd make it until one of the pathetic cheerleaders announced that "this was the worst of it. After this, it's a flat run." Thank god. Lisa had to slow down and thought to herself, "what could possibly be worse than this? A dragon swooping down to eat me?" But the woman was right. That really was the worst of it. After that hill, it was a straight shot. Eventually, the top of the Dakota came into view over the treetops and you knew the end was near. You could see the bright lights from the finish line and hear the DJ playing music. It was at this time that adrenaline kicked in and Serena picked up her pace, passing one runner after the other. When she made the final turn and actually had the finish line in her sights, she broke into a sprint, desperate to be done with it. As she crossed the finish line, her legs felt like jelly and she heard Carton announce, "wow, that was some finish." She tried to stop to catch her breath and wait for Lisa and Auntiedukes, but a woman kept yelling at her to keep moving. What the sh*t? Like this woman had done anything physical all night. She was just standing there.

 

Back on the course, Lisa could also hear the music and see the bright lights. She once again thought she saw Jesus coming to her aid. She started to choke. Her lungs began to collapse or at least felt like they were collapsing. She wanted to cry because the finish line was so close, but she couldn't cry because she couldn't breathe. She continued to search for Serena alongside the trail to slap her high-five, thinking that Serena had already finished the run. She weezed across the finish line with her eyes squeezed shut. She too was yelled at for stopping. Eventually, we met up at the food/Gatorade stand. We inhaled bagels and plums like Hoover vacuums. Like there's a f*cking surprise. Soon after, Auntiedukes joined us as well.

 

This is us doing our victory poses like jackasses:

This is our crew:

Serena ended up finishing the race at 44 minutes, Lisa at 48, and Auntiedukes at 53. The cross-country team finished it in 2 minutes.

 

The race proved that Serena still had shin splints in her left leg, so our racing season is officially over. Our next race that we plan on running is the Run for the Wild at the Bronx Zoo sometime in April. This means we have several months to continue doing what we do. Not training and sitting on our asses while we drink beer and eat wings. Stay tuned. You may have animal costumes in your future.

 

Onto this week's baseball notes:

Andy Pettitte is scheduled to make his return on Tuesday. Holy f*ck balls. Serena nearly wet herself with excitement. He's only allowed to throw 70 pitches, but hopefully his return rights the pitching ship as CC Sabathia's return has done absolutely nothing but baffle Tigers Love Pepper...oh...and the Yankees. But who really cares about the Yankees when compared to Serena's fantasy lineup? Tigers Love Pepper has a guaranteed playoff spot whereas the Yankees do not. F*ck them.

 

Oakland A's Coco Crisp rode the bench on Sunday due to pink eye. There are very few things that grosses us out more the pink eye. The A's Clubhouse should be quarantined. We're not even sure why he was allowed within 100 yards of the stadium. He's like an outbreak monkey. It's narsty.

 

Clayton Kershaw has been scratched from today's game against the Cardinals due to inflammation in his right hip. The pitcher is scheduled to be sidelined indefinitely and will be seeing a hip specialist in New York on Tuesday.

 

Naturally, The Intergenerationals are super heroes of the week. Coco Crisp is a-hole of the week because he's disgusting. Go team!