The Ragnar Post

Ok, I'm finally going to write the Ragnar post. It took a while because I was a real slacker in the picture taking department, and only snapped a couple with my phone, and the lost my download cable :( so Carolyn, one of my teammates, hooked me up with her pictures. So nice of her. I wish I had pictures of the other teams and their vans. My neighbor summed it up for my husband: "your wife may think it was just hard now, but she'll look back on it and see how fun and crazy it was later" It DOES seem better and better the further away it gets.

I found my download cable! But this was the only picture I got worth saving, and even this one is kinda lame. Do you see the viking on the front of the car, and all the writing on the windows? Almost every team decorated their vehicles, and dressed up in some sort of "costume" (hence the sweatbands and tube socks for us in our team picture). There were over 1,000 (no typo --I'm serious) teams of 12 people (except for some ultra-crazies who split up the legs between only 6 people). It was a MADHOUSE. There were teams of superheroes, a "where's waldo" team, a "viagra" team (don't ask me about the stuff written on THEIR van --but it was hilarious), bunnies (they ran in full fur suits), gorillas, a devil van with lit-up traffic cone horns, and my favorite: The Bone Crushers: "Trample the Weak and Hurdle the Dead" --they played heavy metal music from loudspeakers mounted on the roof of their vans, so we always knew they were coming. A couple of their guys were really nice to us (one with a 2 foot mohawk, and the other with a couple of facial piercings).

Our team then had two vans with 6 people in each of them. The other van had the first 6 "legs" of the race, and then handed off to the first of our runners. Each van had three sets of legs for a total of around 24 hours race time. The baton is more like one of those "slap bracelets". Here I am getting the hand-off from our team captain Darelyn.

My first leg was my easy one. It was supposed to be 3.5, but was closer to 3.75 miles by the Garmin. I had a really good run (for me) since it was so hot --about an 8:29 minute mile pace.


So fast I was blurry. See Mom? It doesn't matter what you look like when you're fast enough. Nobody can see through the blur :)

Yeah --I wish this was me. It is Olivia my niece. Isn't that beautiful form? My form didn't look super great, it was more of a hobble, since my foot was of course acting up. After the first leg, when I was starting the second, I honestly didn't know if I'd make it it hurt so bad. My Dad's words " crippled for life" kept going through my head. After a mile it started loosening up, but then I got a sharp, hot pain under my heel. Uhoh I thought, that can't be good. I started doing some serious praying, and it just "went away". Whatever --I can't understand it. Before the third leg I figured out the miracle of icy hot :) It got me through at least. I'm still hobbling today.

This is me on the hill of death: The Ragnar leg. This is arguably the hardest leg in the race. 4 miles uphill. The climb is over 3,000 feet. I wasn't so fast I was blurry HERE obviously; I just wanted to make myself keep going. At this point in the race, I had already done my first leg, and an 8 mile leg at around midnight, all on a total of 1 1/2 hours of sleep. I was really hoping to do this whole hill without walking at all, but there were two times I stopped. I told our van to go halfway and see how I was doing when I got there. They went about a mile, and honestly I was doing fine until I looked at the garmin and saw we were at 1 mile instead of two. Killed me. I had a really tough pull just then, and bagged it and walked for 100 feet or so. I picked it up again, and stayed steady until about 1/4 mile from the end (I KNOW! why? when I was so close!) when there was some photographer lady sitting under her umbrella TAKING PICTURES of the runners as they came up the hill. I want a picture of myself when I look the worst I've ever looked in my whole life? I didn't ask a photographer to join me when I was in labor with my babies, so why would I want a picture now? Threw off my groove, and I took a short walking break again. As disappointed as I was, I was happy to say I "roadkilled" 5 people on that hill, four of them being men. Yay! We chalked up our kills on the side of our van just like most of the teams (except for some team that said kill counts were for communists?) . Kills are passing someone.


At the end, everyone had to take a tram or gondola up to The Canyon's Resort to meet the last runner. We all got in costume and ran in with Carolyn --our "anchorman" to cross the finish line together. "Run Sweaty Chix Run" ,our team, ROCKED the Ragnar. Out of 127 all-woman teams, we came in 25th, and 16th in our division.

Here's the fam and me at the end. Kai wouldn't face into the sun for the picture --little baby.


I took the sweatband off for the picture with Jeff --he said it was scaring him. Little baby. :)

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