Wasatch Back Ragnar '12!!!

Ragnar was SO much fun!  

........I know, I know...  You're all thinking, "running 200 miles, between 12 teammates, in less than 35 hours, constantly, with no sleep and hardly any time to eat...  yeah, that sounds really fun..."  And trust me, last year, that's kind of how I felt!  But this year was a lot different for me.  It really was fun!  I was a lot more mentally and physically prepared for this year than I was last year.  Last year's Ragnar was my first race ever [other than 5K's of course] and this year I ran a half marathon a few months prior to Ragnar...  much better prepared!  As much as I love how beautiful the Wasatch Back is, I'd love to a Ragnar Relay in another state.  So, if any of you are crazy enough to try this with me, let's do it!!!

***Side Note:  it only took overnight to download the following pictures onto this blog post; hence, there are a lot of pictures.  You've been warned.

Our Van 2, of team "Gu'd 2 Go"

Time for my first leg!  Around 10:30AM, just hot enough to be uncomfortable.

Oh, and you want to know how insanely competitive [aka GOOD!] our Van 1 was??  By the time I started my first leg, our team was in 3rd place!!!  Oh, and I must say, I passed two people on this run too, so.....  I must be pretty awesome, right?  [I'll leave out the part about how our team definitely padded our time, so we were among the first [aka slowest] teams to start at 5AM... Even though our team is far from slow...  so in other words, the teams around us were pretty slow compared to our runners] But hey, I'll leave that part out!  ;)
 

Water break!

One of many examples of how FUN my family is!

Passing off to my dad!

First leg, DONE!

The man who started it all...!

ANOTHER example of how awesome my family is!

Jared gettin' ready for his first leg!

So beautiful

SLOW DOWN!

The hand-off to my bro Dave

Poor Dave's leg was STRAIGHT uphill!

Jared getting his well-deserved massage :)

Dave passing off to Heather

Finally, the pass-off to Van 1!  Now we can rest!

 ...or at least we thought we could rest!  Our Van 1 was so dang fast, we only had a few hours before we had to start running again!  We had lunch/dinner, drove to a high school to pull out our sleeping bags to rest [since we knew we'd be running until around 3-4AM], and I think we had about 30 minutes to "sleep" before our Van 1 surprised us and told us they were almost there!

Trying to pretend I'm NOT nervous for my hilly run [aka the run that destroyed my hips and knees last year]

Here goes!!!  About 6PM

Apparently I was somewhere up there on the hill

Water break and pep talk!

The beginning of the BIG dang hill!

Second leg, DONE!

Dad can't hear very well when his iPod is on...  How ridiculous!  Ha!

Creepy Kelly...

...then Heather wanted in :)

Jared's "bra" of a safety vest!

Um, yes, Kelly actually DID moon us, but because of the low lighting my camera wouldn't take a picture in time!

Night runs, DONE!

Here I am, praying that I won't throw up in front of all these people!!! Last leg, around 5:30AM.

 A huge reason that this year was so much better than last year is because of how I felt.  Last year I didn't get one single minute of sleep.  This year I got probably about 2-3 hours of sleep.  I know, still not much, but at least I didn't have the entire night to stay awake and dwell on how completely miserable and nauseous I felt.  Yes, I still woke up and felt like I was for sure going to lose it, but it only lasted about an hour instead of about 6!  What is funny is I thought for sure I'd have to walk a lot of this leg since I felt so nauseous, but as soon as I started running I felt soo much better!

My favorite picture!  How pretty is this?!

Last leg, DONE!!!

Kelly on his last leg...  The beginning of the hardest legs of Ragnar!

Jared starting the hardest "Ragnar Leg," straight up the whole way!

Crazy to think that Kelly started his leg down there, and just a few miles later, we're up here!

Story about this awesome kid below...

Funny story...  We saw that this kid was about to start the "Ragnar Leg" [the hardest leg in Ragnar because of the severe steep uphill], and joking around, my sister told him that if he passed our runner, Jared, that she'd give him $40!  He just laughed it off, but this kid was a joke!  He didn't even break a sweat, never slowed down for a second!  He looked like he was 12, no where near his actual age of 16!  But sure enough, slowly but surely, he passed one of our fastest runners!  Such a nice kid...  He was so thankful [although Heather had to convince him to take the money]!

Breakfast of champions...  Red Bull & potato chips!

The BEST Team Ever!!!  Finished #160 out of #1,092!

Seriously, we had such a blast this year!  I'm so glad this is something that is turning into somewhat of a family tradition for us.  Others' family traditions mostly include sitting around eating food...  But I am SO, so thankful to be part of such a fit and active family!  And I definitely look forward to many more races with them...  and we'll start with the Timpanogos Half the end of July and the Mount Nebo Half in September!  BRING IT!