Did the Ragnar Wasatch Back relay. There's a lot I want to say about this race, but I'll probably save it for a post on my personal blog. I was on an ultra team with a few out of towners. It was fun hanging out with them and hearing about their different adventures. Three of them come from the triathlon world so their experience is much different than mine. We also had a former CEO of Ragnar on our team. He was definitely an asset since he knew about every leg of the course and was able to give us some insider info.
About two days before the race we picked up a sixth runner that contacted the captain. She said she was ready for the distance and had run a 3:47 marathon last year. So we had a very strong team... Or so it appeared. Our sixth runner showed up and looked like she hadn't run a day since that marathon last year. Then on her first leg (4 miles) she ended up run-walking it and said she couldn't do the second leg. Since she was the runner before me I picked it up, then ran my two legs immediately following. So three legs in a row! Good times.
My second run was 17 miles starting at about 4:00 am. It was mentally tough since I hadn't slept up to that point, but I was able to make it through and finished just as the sun was coming up. Then I drove for awhile since everyone was asleep in the van. Didn't end up falling asleep til about noon-thirty on Saturday, and that was only for 45 minutes.
My "final" leg was a 7 mile grunt up Guardsman. 3,000 feet of climb. This was the whole reason I chose to be runner #5. Passed probably 60 or 70 people on the climb and only got passed twice near the finish, by two runners who did not run the first leg of the climb. So I was pretty happy about that. Our captain had dead quads after the 2,000 foot descent on leg 35, so he wasn't able to run the final leg. So who did it? You guessed it... me.
So at the end of the day I ran 8 legs for a total of 42 miles. I slept for 45 minutes during the race and consumed as much food as possible. It was a fun experience, but I'm not sure if I'll do an ultra distance relay again. Maybe with some ultra friends next time?
6:17:28
3,922' vert | 