Good Wednesday morning.
If ever you have competed in any sort of race – running, biking, triathlon etc. – you will know that you are usually rewarded with at least two things at the end – a medal (regardless of whether you came in first or last, usually the winners get something extra, but the medal is an “atta-boy” for surviving across the finish line), and “free” food and drink.
I put quotations around the word “free” there because the cost of said refreshments are included in the price tag for the race, which can be anywhere from two figures (for your standard small local road race) into the high threes (for ironman-length races) and even higher, depending on the duration of the event.
This price probably also included some sort of swag, like a t-shirt or a hat, which you were handed at packet pickup but did not wear until after the race was over, because THAT, of course, would be very bad luck indeed.
Yes, I am superstitious when it comes to racing, what of it?
The variety of offerings on hand at the finish line can range from minimal – bottled water, bagels with cream cheese and/or peanut butter and jelly, fresh fruit, pre-packaged bars or chips – to the extravagant – I’ve seen this run the gamut from pizza and french fires to chili and corn bread, breakfast sandwiches, pasta and meatballs (leftover from the pre-race dinner, maybe?) and more.
You burned off all those calories, after all. Gotta refuel sufficiently so you don’t pass out on the way home.
To accompany this spread, there’s usually an array of beverages, including sports drinks, soda, lemonade, and – more recently – chocolate milk and beer.
Those last two have grown particularly popular when it comes to post-athletic exertion recovery drinks, along with pickle juice, which is somewhat less palatable, but really works like a charm. (Don’t believe me? Click here. Apparently, it’s also good for your gut, as it contains probiotics. Who knew?)
As for beer, you might be thinking: Huh, that’s odd, I thought alcohol was dehydrating; any one who has ever woken up with an epic cotton mouth hangover can tell you that.
True. However, light (low alcohol) beer, or own with less than 4 percent alcohol content, has been scientifically proven to be quite hydrating and good for recovery – in some cases, even better than water, as it contains carbohydrates and some sodium.
Of course, it’s better if you drink it with something in your stomach – something more than performance gels, goo, and Gatorade.
I won’t be indulging any time soon, as the whole concept of drinking after a race makes me feel a little green around the gills, but I do know some people who swear by it. And, since today is National Beer Lovers Day, drink up!
This is not to be confused with National Beer Day, which falls on April 7 to commemorate the the Cullen-Harrison Act, which President Franklin Roosevelt signed on that day in 1933 to end Prohibition early low-alcohol versions of beer and wine. Nine months later, on Dec. 5, 1933, federal prohibition was repealed entirely with the ratification of the Twenty-first Amendment.
Also, when one drinks a beer, one is communing with the ancients. The brewing of some version of fermented grain beverage began hundreds of years ago in ancient China, where it was known as kui, and has continued around the world by a wide variety of cultures ever since.
It looks like as good a day as any to sit outside and enjoy the beverage of your choice. The rain has finally stopped, though we will be seeing overcast skies with an ever-so-slight chance of a shower or two still lingering and temperatures in the mid-70s.
In the headlines…
President Biden said that he will meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the November G-20 summit in Indonesia “if he’s there.”
The summit, to be held on Indonesia’s tourist island of Bali this year, is the annual gathering of the world’s largest economies. Both Xi and Russian President Vladimir Putin are planning to attend the conference, Indonesian President Joko Widodo said.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the ensuing global energy crisis have emerged as a leading foreign policy priorities for the UK’s new prime minister Liz Truss, as she and Biden promised to strengthen their relationship in face of Putin’s aggression.
Biden spoke with Truss on the phone to offer his congratulations after she ascended to the PM post.
Biden is publicly urging California Gov. Gavin Newsom to sign a bill that would make it easier for farmworkers to unionize — a move that comes after the governor signaled a reluctance to sign the legislation in its current form.
As California endured its sixth day under a ferocious heat dome, the nation’s most populous state narrowly managed to avert rolling blackouts, even as temperature and energy use records shattered.
The California Independent System Operator, which provides electricity to most of the state, issued an emergency alert for the afternoon and evening, expecting energy deficiencies as a heat wave in the U.S. West was forecast to peak in some places.
Vice President Kamala Harris and her husband, Doug Emhoff, will participate in a commemoration this weekend at the National September 11 Memorial in New York. The Bidens will be in Pennsylvania, (at the Pentagon and Shanksville).
The Justice Department faces partly conflicting goals as it weighs how to proceed in its inquiry into the handling of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago following a legal ruling on Monday, former prosecutors say.
A document describing a foreign government’s military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities, was found in the FBI’s search last month of former President Donald Trump’s Florida home, the Washington Post reported.
Former Attorney General William Barr slammed as “deeply flawed” the decision by a federal judge to appoint a special master in the Mar-a-Lago top-secret documents probe.
Stephen K. Bannon, the one-time political adviser to Trump, is expected to surrender tomorrow to New York authorities to face state charges in an indictment that remains sealed, according to a person familiar with the case.
Trump once tried to pay off some $2 million in legal fees with a deed to a horse, according a new book by David Enrich, a business investigations journalist with the New York Times.
People who recently caught Covid can wait a few months to get a new omicron booster, White House Covid response coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha said.
Going forward, COVID-19 could be treated more like the flu, with one annual shot offering year-long protection against severe illness for most people.
As children head back to the classroom for the academic year, new data shows that pediatric COVID-19 infection rates have increased for the second consecutive week.
For two years, schools and researchers have wrestled with pandemic-era learning setbacks resulting mostly from a lack of in-person classes. They are struggling to combat the learning loss, as well as to measure just how deep it is.
China’s zero-Covid strategy of endless testing and lockdowns has hammered its economy and taken a toll on company profits, but it has delivered a windfall for test makers.
Worried about China’s geopolitical tensions and stung by pandemic shutdowns, Google, Apple and others are moving some work to nearby countries.
New York’s weekly COVID-19 tally fell 9% last week as authorities raced to start providing a new COVID-19 vaccine booster today to gird against the virus’ expected resurgence this fall and winter.
Sean Hennessey, the interim director of the New York State Fair, missed the end of the 13-day fair after testing positive for COVID-19.
Gov. Kathy Hochul teased changes to New York’s public transportation mask mandate, which has been in place since April 2020.
“With respect to masks, it’s absolutely in conversation right now and we’ll be making some announcements on that very shortly,” Hochul responded to a question during an unrelated transit announcement at Penn Station.
Hochul was at Penn Station to tout major improvements amid the billion dollar redevelopment project. Some of the improvements include dramatic new high ceilings that are three times the old height inside the Long Island Rail Road concourse.
Hochul’s campaign released a pair of TV ads knocking her rival, Republican U.S. Rep. Lee Zeldin, on issues ranging from guns to abortion as well as the attack on the U.S. Capitol disrupting the certification of President Joe Biden’s election.
Zeldin is sticking by Trump despite the political risks in in his blue-state challenge of Hochul.
Hochul refused to say why she hasn’t answered Zeldin’s demand for five debates across the state — saying only that she’s “willing to debate” her Republican challenger.
A panel charged with selecting candidates for Hochul to nominate a chief judge to lead New York’s court system should send her a diverse list of potential nominees, Democrats in the state Senate urged in a letter.
Farmers and advocates will continue to push state Labor Commissioner Roberta Reardon to see things their way after the Farm Laborers Wage Board submitted its final report recommending reducing the overtime threshold for farm workers to 40 hours.
“We believe this decision protects the rights of farm laborers while taking into account the needs of farmers,” said board Chair Brenda McDuffie, former president of the Buffalo Urban League.
According to the New York State Council of School Superintendents, while five years ago there were shortages of teachers in certain specialized subject areas like physics, now poor, rural districts aren’t getting strong teacher candidates for any subjects.
Yuh-Line Niou, a state assemblywoman who finished second to Dan Goldman in August’s Democratic primary, declared that she would not seek a rematch using the Working Families Party ballot line in November after all.
“I will not be on the WFP line for the general. We simply do not have the resources to fight all fights at the same time, and we must protect our democracy now.”,” Niou said in an emotional video posted to Twitter.
An appeals court has reinstated ex-Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s law license, which was suspended for a year following his sexual harassment and abuse scandal.
To become a lawyer in New York, one must share details of sealed cases and juvenile records. Critics say that the requirement may be illegal, and that it harms racial diversity, and are pushing to have it changed.
Mayor Eric Adams has sent a “fact-finding” delegation to the southern border, part of the ongoing battle with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott over the busing of illegal immigrants to the Big Apple.
Adams signed a package of bills into law that aim to improve maternal health and create more equitable outcomes for pregnant New Yorkers.
New York City is facing its most severe budget woes in decades, according to budget watchdogs who sounded the alarm on several fiscal dilemmas looming on the horizon.
EJ McMahon: “A few months into its third full fiscal year since the pandemic’s start, New York City’s finances have never looked so flush — and, at the same time, so precarious.”
Adams questioned why members of his own administration didn’t inform him sooner about arsenic being discovered in the drinking water at a massive New York City Housing Authority complex in Manhattan.
Residents of the Riis Houses in Manhattan were told yesterday to avoid using their tap water — while the timeline for when city officials first found out there could be arsenic in the water remains murky.
The New York City Council unanimously passed Resolution 283-A, which calls upon both Adams and NYC Schools Chancellor David C. Banks to immediately reverse the Department of Education’s (DOE) reductions to school budgets.
Big Apple students will be forced to hunker down in front of their screens — instead of enjoying a snow day outdoors — when the winter weather is at its worst this year, Banks said. “There are technically no more snow days,” he said.
New York City’s typically violence-plagued J’Ouvert festival and West Indian Day Parade went off without a hitch over the weekend for the first time in recent memory, officials said.
People held at the Rikers Island jail for younger detainees are being locked down in their cells at a higher rate this year — a tactic jail administrators may be using in an effort to quell violence, but one that critics say is being overused.
The stolen antiquities that were on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Fifth Ave., were returned to the Italian government.
“Sweeney Todd,” the deliriously gruesome Stephen Sondheim-scored musical about a wronged man bent on revenge, will get a big-cast, big-orchestra, big-budget revival next spring starring pop star Josh Groban in the title role.
National Grid, the dominant utility in the Capital Region, is predicting home heating bills in its upstate New York territory will rise 39 percent this winter, an increase of about $50 more per month over last year.
Chick-fil-A plans to build a restaurant on a busy commercial strip that links Troy to East Greenbush.
Republican county legislators plan to introduce legislation that would require county employees who visit residents’ homes to give out warnings about the dangers of illegal firearms.
After two years as Siena College president, former U.S. Rep. Chris Gibson announced he will retire at the end of this school year. He did not offer any reason behind his decision.
A local center devoted to innovations in policing — named after a slain Albany police officer — has received a $75,000 grant which will help finance studies of local police departments’ use of force and how they investigate violent crimes.
Lawyers for the pioneering chess champion Nona Gaprindashvili filed papers in federal court suggesting they had settled her defamation lawsuit against Netflix over what they called a “devastating falsehood” about her in “The Queen’s Gambit.”
Juul Labs, fighting for its survival in the United States, has tentatively agreed to pay $438.5 million to settle an investigation by nearly three dozen states over marketing and sales practices that they contend set off the nation’s teenage vaping crisis.
The leak that delayed NASA’s latest attempt to blast off its moon rocket over the weekend was tied to the agency’s use of liquid hydrogen, a fuel some space companies have chosen not to use as they develop new engines for their own large rockets.
