Race day almost here...(Lisa Colagrossi)

Race day is fast approaching, and I must admit I am nervous! Diana called me a veteran runner. Well let me tell you, she is very kind! I began running seriously about a year ago and have done two half marathons. The times were nothing to write home about, but I finished before they re-opened the streets, so I was pumped. I have never worked with a trainer before, just got advice from fellow runners, (namely Heidi Jones).

Working with Jimmy Lynch has been a Godsend. Even though we have communicated mostly by e-mail and cellphone, the training schedule he designed for me really helped. I feel like I have an actual plan for the race, instead of just winging it. Fatigue is the biggest issue for me (working the 3 a.m. shift is a killer). My main goal this week is to get as much rest as I can and complete the final training runs without getting hurt.

What I love about running is purely selfish. This I do for me. It has nothing to do with being a wife, a mother or even a reporter. I can't wait for all of us girls to be at the starting line, grim determination on our faces, about to push ourselves to the limit. I am already so proud of our Eyewitness News first timers: Diana, Tara and Lori.

My husband and two little boys will be waiting for me at the finish line. I don’t know if I’ll collapse, cry or throw up (maybe all three). So on Sunday, if you see some chick chugging by with a brunette ponytail and a beet red face, give me a shout out. I'll need all the encouragement I can get!

Half-Marathon Training Continues

By Diana Williams

We ran the loop in Central park Tuesday night. The picture on our Web site shows us after our six-mile jaunt. Lori Schulweis, Tara Zimmerman and I are all running about the same pace, which puts us two steps ahead of a tortise. Our goal isn't speed. It's just to finish the race, and we are feeling pretty confident we can do that. We have all run at least one long run, and now we are shortening our distance, while increasing our speed. It does get a bit maddening when everyone running in the park keeps passing us. The only people we jog past are those who are walking. 

I said yesterday that I was almost sidelined from the More Magazine Half Marathon. It's funny how getting into shape can throw a body out of whack. After a month of running, I began to have excruciating pain. I ended up needing surgery for what turned out to be endometriosis.

I was off my feet for a full week, but back up and running 13 days later. It took me a while to get back on track, and I will probably finish slower because of the surgery, but I'm glad to have it out of the way and to be back in good health.

Speaking of good health, I interviewed legendary Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter today about his battle with cancer. Three years ago, he was diagnosed with Hodgkins disease. He writes about it in a new book, and his advice applies as much to cancer as it does to our race. He quotes Winston Churchill who said, "Never give in." It's the title of his book, and I'm sure that thought will come in handy as we hit the hills in Central Park on race day.

Eyewitness News women 'On the Run'...(Diana Williams)

Less than two weeks from now, a group of women here at Eyewitness News will run in the More Magazine Marathon and Half-Marathon in Central Park. The idea came to us at the beginning of the year when 5:30 p.m. Producer Tara Zimmerman received an e-mail from the Road Runners Club about the race.  A half-marathon with all women appealed to her because she thought it would be less intimidating. It appealed to the rest of us because we were all looking for New Years' resolutions that we could actually follow through on, or so we believed.

Our group started out quite large, but slowly dwindled.  As the training got underway, some realized the time commitment was more than they expected and dropped out.  There are now five of us.  Heidi Jones, runner extraordinaire, is our inspiration.  Lisa Colagrossi, also a veteran runner, is training and ready to go.  Lori Schulweis will be with us too.  She is a production coordinator for "Live with Regis and Kelly." You may be familiar with her because she is part of the show's Staff Fitness Challenge.  To read her blog, click here.  So far she's doing great and is psyched for the race.  There's Tara, who ran in high school and has been training vigilantly. And finally, there's me.  I'm no runner, but always up for a challenge and I didn't want last year's training for Kilimanjaro to go to waste.  Once again, Jimmy Lynch, a fitness guru and a gifted muscular therapist,  is helping out.  He's coordinated our schedules, given us stretching exercises and provided endless advice and answers.

During the next two weeks, you'll hear from us about the race.  Right now, an estimated 7,000 women are expected to cross the finish line. We would love to have you out there cheering us on in the park. For More half-marathon information, click here. 

WABC will be sponsoring another half-marathon this summer, so maybe this race will spark your engine and get you running too.  Tomorrow, I'll have more on our training and tell you about the health concern that almost had me on the sidelines.   

After the resignation

By Jim Dolan
March 13, 2008

So here is where our law and order Governor has put us. I spent Wednesday night outside the apartment building of a 22 year old former drug abuser and recent prostitute who was, apparently the last of many young women to work in Elliott Spitzer’s employ, as they say, off the books. We will forget, for the moment that he is a 48 year old married man with three young daughters. And we will forget, for the moment that a generation of young, political acolytes believed his promises and believed in his promise, and for this moment, we will forget that he convinced an army of people to give up their careers in the private sector for the chance to make a difference in people’s lives. 

We will forget all that, because so many others will discuss it. The tragedy here, of course, lies not in the fall of a politician (somehow, I’m certain, we’ll survive the loss of the “*&%$#@% Steamroller”.), but in the collapse of a family. Mrs. Spitzer and her three daughters will feel this for a lifetime. A year from now, we’ll have trouble remembering the name of David Paterson’s predecessor.

But for this week, you and I have been dragged down in the muck with the governor. Men are asked by their wives "What’s up with men and hookers, anyway," as if a man might understand this simply by virtue of his gender.   Parents are forced to discuss with their children, old enough to read the headlines but too young to understand them, the sordid details of what caused the governor to resign. And there I was last night, the last place on planet earth I wanted to be, trying to learn details about a tragic, pathetic 22 year old woman who came to New York to be a star, but who turned to prostitution when the dream didn’t work out.   A woman who had the misfortune of being assigned, no differently that a livery cab driver who is assigned a fare, a dalliance with her destiny.

Some speculated last night that Ms. Dupree would enjoy her 15 minutes of fame. Sure. Much as she enjoyed having to tell her mother that she was the high priced call girl who slept with the governor in Washington, DC. Much as she enjoyed having to tell her brother and her friends from home, all people she had convinced that things were going just great in the big city. And much as she enjoyed her neighbors learning that she wasn’t a sales representative after all.

When I was a young reporter, I worked at a TV station in Charleston, West Virginia. The prosecutor of Kanawha County back then was a guy named James “mad dog” Roark, a tough as nails, anti-drug crusader who promised to clean up Charleston. He was later arrested, charged and convicted of buying cocaine off  a dealer on a junior high school playground. And stealing cocaine from drug busts he had overseen as prosecutor. Like Spitzer, he had a political future as bright as the morning sun, and it ended up being eclipsed only by his own demons and his considerable hubris.

Roark spent time in a Federal Prison. Its still unclear if Spitzer will. But he has damaged the lives of all he touched. His wife and children, worst of all. But also you and me, who have had to wallow in the slime he generated this week. And a 22 year old girl, a girl whose life was  already so desperate she had to sleep with men like Spitzer to keep her dreams of stardom alive, and whose life has managed, somehow now, to get even worse.

She will be a footnote in New York State history, the tragic answer of a trivia question. But while the world is offering up prayers that the Governor is able to repair his marriage and atone to his family, consider, for a moment the collateral damage. About the parents discussing the headlines with their children, the husbands discussing it with their wives, and the 22 year old woman who just wanted to hold onto the illusion of success a little while longer. We are all collateral damage in the implosion of arrogance and selfishness that brought about the political end of Eliot Spitzer.