RabbitCat and bib assignments

My kitteh eats vegetables.  Arugula, brussel sprout, carrot -- bam!  Sadie is a gnawing maniac, and there was no regurgitation after the fact.  Merus, on the other hand, doesn't quite get it.  Not that she needs to; she makes a great background observer when confused as to the purpose of the main event. Two other videos were also posted lately -- a collection of shots from various afternoons of lazing in the chair, and Merus' attempt to eat my laptop cursor.  They have become smarter as to knowing there's something fishy about a camera, and lately when I pull the camera out they stop all activity and/or leave the scene.  But, luckily, the goofy and ridiculous persist if it place the camera somewhere and leave it on while I act as though nothing is different. 

Bib numbers and start information was released for all runners in the NYC Marathon.  If I recall correctly, there are some 47,000 runners in total.

All runners are divided up into one of three colors to determine which start path you run: blue, orange, green.  Blue and orange running across the top level of the bridge and green running on the lower level.

All three colors are divided into waves according to start time:  wave 1 at 9:40, wave 2 at 10:10, wave 3 at 10:40.  Wave 1 will consist of a certain portion of each color, as will wave 2 and wave 3.

Then, within each color/wave combination are corrals that further subdivide people according to predicted pace according to bib numbers.  7000-7999 are grouped together, 8000-8999 are grouped together.

As a whole, those in wave 1 are faster than wave 2 which is faster than wave 3, and same goes for the early versus late corrals.  The lower the bib number (closer to 1) the faster the runner, the higher the number (closer to 66999) the slower the runner.  You may notice the discrepancy between 47,000 runners and the penultimate bib number; not all bib numbers are assigned, as maneuvering room is needed through the long-term organization of it all.  Here is a chart where you can see it all in one graphic.  The elite, subelite and local competitive designations refer to those in the first corral of each color (the super fast low numbers).

Me?  I'm orange, wave 1, corral 12.  That means I get to start at 9:40 instead of waiting around for an extra hour, I get to run on the top level of the Verizano Bridge, and I'm the third corral within my color/wave and thus get to avoid the zoo of a start that happens to those later in the pack.  I'm incredibly stoked!  The race is still 6 weeks away.  Hard to keep calm in the mean time, though luckily school is at hand and eventually there will be midterms.

Did I mention how cool it'll be to run across the Verizano?  There are no pedestrian or cyclist lanes, so the only time a person can cross it (without riding in a vehicle) is during the marathon or during the clusterf*** of the 5 Borough Bike Tour filled with 40,000 people who don't know how to ride their bike.