New Jersey Marathon Expo

Posted by on May 5, 2012 in My Running

Expo banner on the main gate

Today I stopped by Monmouth Park Racetrack in Oceanport, NJ to pick up my race packet for the 2012 NJ Marathon. I used to live in this area about 20 years ago when I went to middle school in a neighboring town just 5~10 minutes away. The funny thing, however, is that during my childhood here I had never visited the Monmouth Park Racetrack. So this trip is pretty much a revisit of my old hood with a new flavor.

It didn’t take me too long to navigate the area and find parking, although there was some traffic congestion going into the park. Once there, I snapped some photos, picked up my stuff (also Jocelyn’s), and got out as quickly as I could because I needed to pack, sleep, and wake up early. Speaking of which, I should conclude this last-minute post and get going soon.

The weather forecast seems promising for tomorrow at the shore. Although it will be a bit warmer than I had hoped (63 degrees and partly cloudy) – at least it’s not going to rain.

I’ve had this lingering feeling for the past 2 weeks that my legs weren’t at 100%.  Also I’m not sure if I tapered too much this time due to some minor signs of over-training. But based on walking around today at the expo, I’d say they feel as good as they’re gonna get before this race.

Months of training and preparation have come down to this. Now I just need a good night’s sleep. In case you want to track my progress, use my bib number 2507 on this website. Otherwise I’ll see you all at the finish line!

Main entrance of Monmouth Park Racetrack

The front door of the expo building

I got disoriented in the sea of runners and visitors to the racetrack

I found the packet pickup booths!

NJ Marathon 2012 Bib

A starting gate of Manmouth Park Racetrack - yeeeehaaaww!

The starting line of the 2012 NJ Marathon

A closeup shot of the New Jersey Marathon logo at the starting line

My least favorite part of racing...

Author Bio: Kevin Lu is an engineer. He received his B.S. and M.S. in biomedical engineering from NJIT. Science, technology, and running are Kevin’s passions. In his spare time, Kevin trains for and participates in races of various distances. In addition to Beyond Distance, Kevin also writes for iRunnerBlog as a columnist. Find out more about Kevin here and follow him on Twitter.

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  • http://twitter.com/enthusiasticrun jocelyn

    Thanks for picking up my bib!  And I will wait to comment on your marathon recap, BUT spoiler alert on the comment: CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    • http://www.BeyondDistance.com/ Kevin

      Thanks for the random swag you brought me! Although it was semi-disastrous for both of us, we still got our PRs. We’ll have to run together in the same pace group in the future.