Then We Ran Around in Circles

Last October, you may recall I ran the Ragnar Trail Experiment and it was AWESOME! Fast forward to April, and it was time for the first ever real Ragnar Trail Race. We'd already signed up for the SoCal race when they announced the date for the Zion's race. The race was the next weekend.  Well, we thought, why not.  Three members of our SoCal team, including me, also ran the Zion race.  My advice: DON'T DO IT!  Now, first know - I loved both races, I thoroughly enjoyed my teams, I enjoyed the scenery, I enjoyed the races.  I didn't enjoy the feeling in my quads when I took off on my first leg of the race.
The way this relay works is you have 8 team members instead of 12.  There are three loops, each runner runs each loop once. Runner 1 runs 1, then runner 2 runs 2, runner 3 runs 3, runner 4 runs 1, runner 5 runs 2, runner 6 runs 3, runner 7 runs 1 and runner 8 runs 2. Runner 1 runs again, this time number 3... and the cycle continues until we all runs all three loops. And like all relays, you run through the night with your headlamp.

I didn't run the whole week between races. I felt my legs needed some recovery time.  Apparently, I am uber old now and my legs need longer than one week to recover. Now I did run 22+ miles the weekend before, and it wasn't a training run. A race is definitely run at a faster pace - you push yourself. So needless to say, I took last week and this week off. I am using the elliptical 45 minutes a day just to keep the heart rate up and ready for when I start running again next week.  Here are some of the photos.

Like our SoCal team, we had a couple people sign up and drop off. We found out last runner a couple days before the race.  But I feel again like we had a great group.

Here I go on my first leg

Here is the finish line, instead of the giant blow up orange finish line, it's a cool wood one.

Here are a couple of shots of the camp

Our camp

Two of our teammates posing in the transition tent.

Solomon is one of the sponsors of this race series. It was really cool They had a trunk show trailer full of their different hiking and running shoes. And then out front, they had a ton of shoes that we could use for the race.  By the time I learned about it, I'd already run my first leg and there were slim pickings. But I found a pair. They were great for my second run, but not so great for the third. I have a good pair of shoes though, so no need to buy anything new, but how awesome to try out a pair of running shoes by actually running a race in them.  Here is our SoCal team captain (who also ran the trail race on my team) showing off the pair she borrowed.

Our team symbol. SoCal captain designed it and made me a cool shirt too.

SoCal captain keeping cool out of the sun.

Here I am handing off to my teammate.  For the trail series, you pass along a running belt with our team number on it and a timing chip.

Here we are before the race. (My cool yellow shirt SoCal captain made for me in in my hand)

Here is a view of the whole campground and pool (minus all the cabins)

I learned my team hit the pool while I was fulfilling our volunteer shift after I was done with the race.

Can you see the writing through the dust?

This was our team banner

And finding our way to the perfect picture...

We conquered the zombies, we came out victorious... and a little tired.