The entire time that our van was on for the second leg, I was very nauseous. I wasn’t sure if it was because I was so tired or if I was just getting car sick. It was probably a combination of the two. Every time that we would stop to support a runner, I would get out and walk around to see if I could shake the nausea but it didn’t seem to help. My second leg started at 1:15 a.m. and I wasn’t sure what to expect. It was 4.6 miles and had a net elevation gain of 112 feet (dropped 200 feet and climbed 312 feet). I took off a couple of seconds after another fastish runner. This turned out to be a good thing because my GPS didn’t grab a signal so I was able to use the other runner to push the pace. He would gap me during the slight down grades and I was able to gain on him during the uphill sections. We played this game for the first 2 miles until I was able to finally move past him. I used the fear of him passing me as motivation to maintain a decent pace for the entire run. I was able to estimate my distance based on my time and picked it up for the last mile. I ran this leg in 30:15 which was 1 minute faster than I predicted (passed 7 runners during this leg – the competition was really thinning out at this point). We were lucky enough to spend our downtime between legs 2 and 3 at a cabin in Midway. I was able to get 2 hours of solid sleep until it was time to head to the final major exchange. Saw Logan and Adam here and was able to get an update on the FRB teams.
My last leg started at the top of Ragnar and was 6.9 miles of mostly downhill. The first mile had a slight elevation gain and I thought that the rest of the run was all downhill. My only goal for this leg was to avoid being passed by the FRB. I knew our projected finish times were close (even though they started 6.5 hours later) and I thought that they would catch us during the last 2 legs. Our runners that had to run up Guardsman Pass (legs 33 and 34) were incredible. In fact, they were too fast because as we were approaching the top of Ragnar, I knew that if I waited in the van I wasn’t going to have enough time to take care of business. I got out of the van and ran the last 1/4 mile to the exchange so I could spend some quality time in the Honey Bucket. As I exited the Honey Bucket, I could see Cal approaching the exchange. I ran down to get the bracelet and took off. I felt bad for blowing this exchange after Cal worked so hard powering up Ragnar. There was a decent climb to start and I was immediately at puke pace. This was way too early to feel this way. I was able to hold it off and was relieved to hit the downhill. As I started running downhill I was hit with a nasty side stitch from all of the jarring. This lasted until the 2 mile marker and was very frustrating because I could never get in a groove. Hit a good uphill section at mile 2.75 which I didn’t expect. It was very difficult to transition from the severe downhill to the steep uphill. I got nauseous as soon as the uphill started and wasn’t able to shake the feeling until I started going downhill again. My downhill pace wasn’t as fast as I hoped. At 3.5 miles I about died when I saw the hill that I had to climb. Once again I struggled with the transition from downhill to uphill running. I crested the last hill at mile 4 (picked off 2 runners during the climb) and was pretty sure that the rest was all downhill. I could see one runner a little ways ahead of me but wasn’t sure if I could catch him. I decided to use this as motivation to push the pace. Once I saw the 1 mile to go sign, I finally was able to open it up. I was closing the gap on the runner ahead but thought I was going to run out of road. Eventually got past him and kept the hammer down so he wouldn’t pass me again. Ran the last mile in 5:45. Unfortunately, the other 6 miles were quite a bit slower than I planned. Total time for the 6.9 miles (Garmin measured 7.1) was 45:39 which was 5 minutes slower than projected. I think that the projection was a little too aggressive and didn’t take into account the fatigue factor due to sleep deprivation. I had a really good time and the team I was on was a lot of fun but I'm not sure that I really enjoy relays. After the Northwest Passage relay next month, I'm not sure if I will do another. The first FRB team came in just a few minutes after us and the second team was coming in as we were leaving and I'm glad I was able to see them finish.
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