I Probably Should Make My Blog Public again

There was some snow on the ground.  I planned on 5.  At about 2.25, I twisted my foot when I stepped on something (a pile of dirt, maybe?).  It hurt like a son of a b.  I thought about calling Chuck to get me, but he and the kids were at Mass.  So I walked for about 5 minutes until it didn't hurt much, then ran home. 

It'll be fine, but I'm going to be a little cautious.  I'm icing now.  It does hurt a bit.  It's also, of course, the same foot that already hurts mysteriously.  Again, I'll be fine.

I suppose I should make this entry.

I flew out to AZ on Thursday and stayed with my cousin until I rolled out of bed at 2:45 to get ready for a 3 a.m. pick up time.  Then at 3, Burt texted me to tell me that whoopsie, he meant 3:30.  But he came and got me first so that was good.  After picking up the rest of our van mates, we got to the start.  Burt, a true gentleman, warmed up the porta potty that I used.  We watched an awesome video about safety, and then cut out before it was over because we needed to get a picture of Burt starting.

There were several dumb things that happened early on.  The only one that I remember was what Burt already recounted, which was Mike telling us that we didn't have a slap bracelet, and us deciding to go back to get one.  We left Burt, thinking he'd be okay on his own.  He didn't know what happened.  After we passed him we all realized that we should have looked at his wrist.  Turns out he had one.

Then it was a bunch of sleeping and bonding until my first run.  My watch, which I knew was on the fritz, decided that it didn't want to work, so I borrowed Mike's.  My first run was hot and flat.  I didn't check my overall pace when I was done, but I know that my first two miles were way too fast (a little over 8 min pace).  I do remember one being 9:44, which included a minute of walking and drinking.  After that run, I decided that I didn't really care about pace.  Continued later.

Except this thing is demanding a time, and I don't have one, so I'm just guessing.

My second run was pretty super awesome.  I started just after midnight.  All the silly Arizonians were bundled up, but I asked Burt before if I was crazy for just wanting to run in a t-shirt and shorts.  He suggested I was not, and I'm glad I didn't wear more.

I didn't have a watch, so I have no idea how fast it was.  I do know that I forgot to turn on my borrowed-from-Kristie LED blinker at the start.  Because we already had two safety violations, I was paranoid, didn't stop running while turning it on, and it fell.  Batteries, cover and everything went flying and 2 people passed me while I was messing with it and calling Burt.  It still was blinking, but Glen gave me another just in case.  I ended up carrying it.

I ended up passing about 5 people on the run, including both guys who passed me.  One of the guys ended up running with me for about 3 miles, and we pushed each other on the pace.  I could tell he was getting competitive, and I was too.  We didn't talk at all, just kept trying to pass each other.  The end was a slight uphill, and then we headed into the finish...where there was no one for me to pass off to.  We high fived and all that, but we had to wait for a few minutes for runner #7.

My second run was again hot.  And it was uphill for the first half.  No lies, I walked a few of the bigger uphills, but nothing more than a minute or so at a time.  Downhill was a different story.  See, I was supposed to run through the exchange to add on one mile.  I had no watch, and I was out of water about halfway through.  Mentally, I was struggling.  I walked a few small stretches in the second half, and I am not ashamed to say that I ran/walked about the last mile.  Well, maybe I'm a little ashamed.  My elevation climb was nothing compared to Burt's first leg.

When I got to the exhange, I was both relieved and angry that Glen was prepared to take on the mile that I was supposed to do.  But I handed off that slap bracelet like a hot potato.

So that's pretty much it.  The experience was pretty awesome.  I'd do another.

One of my favorite parts of the whole thing was getting to meet Burt's Emily.  She's pretty awesome.  I got to be part of her pit crew while we were waiting for our last runner and the end of our race.  She treated me like I was a long time pal, and that was pretty cool.