Got the phonecall from Van 2 at around 3:10am that they were on their last runner, so a quick scramble to wake up, redress, load the truck and drive the short distance to the start. Just in time but some confusion at the start.....got there with literally no time to warm up, which was probably a good thing since I was tired and half-asleep, so I couldn't really grasp how tired I really was. I heard someone say that two runners were coming in and thought I heard that ours was the second. The first came in and blew by me, followed shortly by Andy saying "There's Dave" or something similar, and sure enough Dave turned around and I managed to snap out of my stupor and took off. I heard the exchange volunteer someone say "blah blah turn left blah" so I did, and got about three steps before a chorus of voices shouted "Wrong Way!!!". I was clearly not thinking well and missed the part about running on the left side of the road and turning left at the *next* left up the hill! So I lost a few seconds but finally got started. Again, Garmin struggles.....this time with the short time to get ready, I'd forgotten to set it up so a longer struggle a bit later down the road to get something started on it. Probably just as well because I knew it was 7.8 miles, I was tired, didn't bother relooking my projection so I could just concentrate on enduring as much pain for as much speed as possible this leg. My goal: Leave everything I had on the road this leg. A fairly brutal leg that had a few hundred feet of rolling elevation gain, some nice downhills, followed by a significant 200+' uphill for the final mile. Things I remember about this leg include passing several runners, it being very dark and desolate, the power lines literally humming and crackling (presumably with the dew from the night air), my legs feeling better than leg 13-14 but being more drained, and feeling like I was crawling up the hills. When I finally got to the 1 mile left mark at the base of the final climb, I knew it would hurt but also that my team was waiting and I had to put that hill behind me as quickly as possible. Developed the wheeze in my breathing that has only happened a few times while running, always previously in a marathon when the end is near (both the race and my ability to run!). Managed a feeble kick at the end and finished 8 seconds over my projection (53:27 versus 53:19). My body promptly quit, legs stiffened substantially and I couldn't go at faster than a slow jog for the remainder of the race, so I guess my timing was great. ***Relooking the times, I finished in 53:28 so I was 9 seconds slow. But I was 98 seconds fast overall....pretty darned close estimating, I'd say!***
The rest of our guys ran their remaining legs well. Aaron and Matt both smoked their sections, Matt surprised us all into thinking he'd be a couple minutes behind his projection on his hilly leg only to appear while Cody was still getting ready to take the handoff (and under his projection on a killer leg!), and Cody hammered his to finish us out. Then Cody hopped into Van 2 to run a 5th leg as a Van 2 runner to help carry some of the burden they were enduring....amazing! The remaining 4 in our van selfishly ate some crappy breakfast and showered at the exchange, drove to the finish and ate some excellent breakfast at a local diner before meeting our Van 2 teammates to run across the finish line in 20:31:02. We knew we'd definitely beaten every team except the ultra team that started at 3:30pm, so we planned to wait an hour and a half to see if we'd won. An hour and a quarter later, the ultra team arrived indicating their last runner was about a mile away. Sure enough, they beat us by a measley 6 minutes! Nonetheless, we were able to claim the course record for a little over an hour and had a blast doing it! Overall, I was happy that I managed to beat my total time projection even with the extra leg, and with our 2nd place overall (1st in the Open category) finish. I had a great time, managing to make it home to collapse for 10 hours of sleep at about 7pm last evening. I saw my last teammate, Matt, off to the airport early this morning, and the glow of a great race and a grand time is still in full effect today. I really liked the relay experience, got to meet some great runners (yes, I'm still in absolute awe of Cody's running form.....nothing moves except his legs and they're a blur at full speed), and felt like I'm getting back near the top of my previous highest fitness level. A great way to spend a weekend! Adrenaline 8 - 365.04 miles. | 