Stan Span 6K

We have a new bridge connecting Illinois and Missouri in St Louis!   It's the Stan Musial Veteran's Memorial Bridge.  Affectionately known as the "Stan Span".  

The bridge is gorgeous!   It's so beautiful at night.   The bridge opened Sunday and there were many events on the bridge on Saturday.  

At 8 am there was a 6K run for Stan Musial also known as "Stan the Man".  He's a legend in baseball.  He was St Louis Cardinals #6 (hence the 6K).   He is so loved in St Louis.  He passed away last year and the baseball season was dedicated to him. The players had a  #6 patch on the sleeves of their uniforms.  There was 6 in the outfield grass during the opening week.   St Louis is crazy for Stan.

Friday night we picked up our packets (at a stupid location in St Louis - traffic, lack of parking, etc).   The first 2500 (increased from 1500 cause of popularity) got a commemorative medallion.

It snowed a bit Friday night.  It was really cold Saturday morning and the road was not totally clean.  We were in the 3rd and final wave (11:00/min  + pace).   The atmosphere was so wonderful.  I wished I had worn a cardinals jacket as there were a lot of people sporting Cardinals attire and I was jealous.   I hadn't ran outside in a long time.   Unfortunately my knee didn't like it, even though I haven't had any problems on the treadmill.  So that's concerning.  

My husband started running with me at the beginning and he ran for quite some time.  The on-ramp to the bridge was quite a hill and I think that's where he lost it a bit.  When I got on the bridge I stopped on the side and he wasn't that far behind me, so we posed for a selfie. :)   I started running again and after the turn around I stopped to take more photos of the bridge and the river.    I felt like photos were more important than running.  This was the *only* day the bridge would ever have people on it.  I had to take photos.  :)


This was right at the start of the bridge.  I was still kind of running and while taking this photo.  I have to say it was really crowded so at least I'm a naturally slow runner.  lol

The "cables" are really sleeves of many cables.  Something like 32 to 70-ish cables depending how far the sleeve is from the pillar.

I love the ice in the Mississippi! :) 

I had to get a photo of myself! :) 

The atmosphere at the start was so fun and energetic I forgot to start my Garmin. Oops!  So my stats are a hot mess.  I love how it looks like I ran through the river. 

A 6K is like 3.7 miles so you can see that I forgot the start the Garmin and I also forgot to stop it.  I realized that while I was in line for water.   Didn't add any real distance, but added time.  Ha!  But this was all for fun (though I did count this as my 4 mile training run I was suppose to do Sunday). 

I would never have thought I'd sign up for a running event like this.  Running has opened up so many things. This run was just so fun.  I'm so glad my husband and I did this together.  

In other news, my new (old-discontinued-previous) shoes came Saturday when we got home.  I'm breaking them in with a 3.5 mile run on the treadmill tonight.  I hope they help my knee issues.  I have been foam rolling my IT band.  That seems to be what is causing the knee pain, but I'm really not sure.  I was super bummed it was hurting during this run, after not hurting for weeks on the treadmill.  Hopefully the new shoes help.  Fingers crossed! :)