Atlantic!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

On Saturday we started our run 10 miles west of Fort Lee, New Jersey. The stretch to the George Washington Bridge was one of the most dangerous parts of our run but the adrenaline  rush of  several near death experiences saw us carve out an impressive 7mph pace for this first section. We crossed the bridge and symbolically entered our last state at 178 Street on Manhattan.

Registration for the NY Marathon was relatively straight forward but connecting with the Press Office was a more eventful story. We ended up (in our sweaty running kit, obviously) on the 44th Floor of the Hilton amidst tables groaning under  the strain of smoke salmon and avocados. Whilst more polite and very skinny Kenyan athletes held back, Steve ripped into the feast with unrestrained gusto in a bid to eat his own weight in food inside 20 minutes. Our story spread and by the time we took the lift back to the ground floor (to resume our run to Coney Island) Kathrine Switzer (NY Marathon winner, 1974 and the first woman to run Boston as a numbered entry) was asking us questions about our trip too.

So, on to Brooklyn via another famous bridge....

We arrived at Coney Island at 6pm just as the sun was setting - 79 days 22 hours for the crossing.

As billed, we dived  into the Atlantic to complete our 3,100 miles journey. On emerging we realised that Jim Shapiro, author of 'Meditations from the Breakdown Lane' was there too. Jim's book had been the inspiration for our trip and so this was a very fitting end to it.

Ben, Steve, Chris and Julia on the Coney Island  beach - too late for ice creams.

Chris with sister Sue

Chris with son, Tom.

Major thanks to Chris's niece, Felicity who made the celebration cake. Chris took no time to eat California, Oregon and Washington State.

And so the day drew to a close but we took heart from the fact that we now had four hours in bed before we needed to go to Staten Island for the start of the marathon.