Wasatch Back Relay

Oh I am so behind on blogging but here we go.  I did the Wasatch Back on June 18th and 19th and it was a total blast. Our team name was the StoneCreek Stoners. The lady that put our team together husband owns a cement business called StoneCreek and they really are or were hippies and they paid for most of the race for us so that is where the name came front. We started at 8:15 a.m. which means that we had to leave at around 5 a.m. It was early considering Sam slept terrible the night before and I got like 3 hours of sleep.

Here we are at the starting line chipper and ready to get started.  We had a great van, I loved it. It was quite chilly at the starting line but I never put those sweats on after my first run b/c the weather was amazing.  Here I am waiting for my first leg. It was a pretty easy 5.5 miler. 

My running times could not have been better.  I ran my first leg around 10:30. It was getting warm but I like a little heat so I was loving it. My second leg I started at around 8:30 at night. My absolute favorite run. My stomach didn't hurt at all and I felt awesome. Weather was perfect, it was just wonderful. My third run started at about 9 a.m. in the morning. I mean my times were just awesome. No middle of the night or super hot runs.

The hard part about putting your camera in other peoples hands is that you usually don't end up with a ton of great pictures of yourself. Oh well, I guess I should just be grateful that I have any pictures. This was the end of my 1st run.

Here we are waiting for our van to start running again. Our 2nd van wasn't very fast so we waited and waited and waited and waited. Kind of frustrating but we survived. The hardest part about this race for me is fueling myself. I'm always afraid I'll eat too much before my next run but I worry that I won't eat enough and won't have the energy I need to run. This year went pretty good. We brought subways and they tasted amazing after we finished our runs.  My 2nd run was an easy 5 miles. Like I said previously my stomach didn't hurt at all. This is amazing for me. Whenever I run in races my stomach hurts. Don't ask me why I haven't been able to figure it out.  I ate a half of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich about 2 hours before my 2nd run so I thought that was the trick but I tried that again before my 3rd leg and my stomach hurt so I still don't know Our last runner finished her leg at around midnight and then we were off to a high school to sleep. Because our 2nd van was so slow we were able to get a lot of sleep, it was great. One of the ladies in our car can sleep anywhere so she fell asleep in the car and got about 6 hours of sleep total. I got about 4 hours and that is a lot of sleep for this race. I was pretty worried about my last leg. It was an 8 miler up some pretty long steep hills. There was a lame headwind so that made going up the hills even harder.  I could not believe how many people were running up all the hills I couldn't believe it. I thought for sure there would be more people walking. I am so competitive that I would not allow myself to walk unless somebody else stopped to walk. It was a good motivation to run up most the hills. I did stop and walk a little bit but I finished my 8 miler in about an hour and 8 minutes so I was close to keeping my 8 min. a mile pace.  I was very proud of this b/c of the hills. I ran all my other legs at  

about 8 min. mile pace. 

Here I am at the finish of my last leg. I cannot tell you how happy I was to be done. 18.5 miles and I was pooped!

Notice how happy we all are. That's because we are all done with our leg and our second to last person is on her way in. Almost time to get in some normal clothes and eat some good food without having to worry that it will affect our runs. Yippee!!!

See, I told you our team captain was a hippy. This is there sweet van that they had at one of the transitions. Her husband was in charge of this transition so he brought their sweet van up. All of us are so glad that we are done and we can relax! Such a great feeling. 

I was so happy I ran in to some of my friends at the last big exchange.  It's always nice to see familiar faces when there are thousands of people all around. I'm pretty sure these guys all did awesome on there runs as well. We didn't really see our 2nd van much. Nobody really sees their other van much so we didn't really get to close to them.  I had a great time and felt like I ran well but I have to admit  that it isn't as much fun now that I have a child. I get anxiety when I am away from Sam too long so when we were sitting at the finish line waiting for our 2nd van to come in so we could cross the finish line I was dying. They were taking forever and I really was going crazy.  Like serious anxiety in the chest, it's a problem.  I hope that it is a first child thing and that it will get better as we have more kids. The finish line was an absolute mess so I told Dan not to come up.  Dan was going to come up with Sam but there were so many people and it was pure chaos so I told him not to come. So glad I did. I enjoyed myself some delicious breadsticks and pizza for dinner that night. A great end to a long, great weekend.  

A huge THANK YOU to my mom for watching Sam all day Friday while Dan was at work.  Thanks mom!! And a huge thank you to Mom and Dad S who entertained Sam and Dan while I was gone. I hate to brag but Dan doesn't know what to do without me. :-) I can hardly blame him, I'm pretty fun to have around. All kidding aside THANK YOU to all my family who helped out so I could run this race and know that Sam was in good hands. Thanks Danny!!