Ragnar Relay - The Wasatch Back 2010!

I DID IT! For the last 6 years several people in my family have been running the Wasatch Back relay. It is a relay race that travels 188 miles, from Logan, UT to Park City, UT. There are two vans with 6 people in each that relay through the race, each person running 3 legs of the race, with hardly any sleep. I've always been amazed at my brothers and sisters that have participated, and didn't even bother to make it a goal of mine because I figured it would be too hard and I'd never be able to accomplish something like that. Well, all that has changed!! I've been doing a lot of running this year and figured I might actually be able to do it. I LOVED IT! This race is different than other races. Although it is very challenging, it has such a party atmosphere. Our van of 6 people was all members of my family. My sister, Esther, two brothers, Mark and Joseph, my sister in law, Angela, and my cousin Spencer. It was so much fun. I still feel like I'm on a high from it.

Here we are decorating the van, and getting ready to go! We are Team ROUS - for all those Princess Bride fans out there, they know that means, Rodents of Unusual Size, but for us, it means, "Runners of Unusual Speed." So we decorated with our favorite quotes from the movie, and we had a whole disco motif! Leave it to my sister Esther to bring a party with her. She actually brought that disco ball all the way from Seattle for the race, and all the decorations. And of course we had to have a couple good disco cds to blast loudly!


You can tell this is before we started running because we look fresh and full of energy. Van 1 started at like 5:45 Friday morning, we met up for the exchange in Huntsville area (I believe) at around 11:30 am. Then we were on. I was the second runner from our van. My first leg was 3.4 miles. Not too bad, and it was pretty flat. The hardest part about it was the heat.





Here is van one and van two - our whole team, Team ROUS!

After our whole van finished we got a good 5 hour break to get some lunch, relax and try to get a little nap. None of us really slept much though. Then we were ready for our next run. It was through the night. I had a 7 mile run and I loved it. It was actually really cool running at 11:00 at night.



We finished the second leg at I think 3:00, I was a little out of it. We then went to a middle school where we could pay a couple bucks to go sleep in the gym on the wrestling mats. It was SO worth the money. It was only a 2-3 hour nap but it totally helped boost my energy. Then I was ready for the last leg. It was 6.1 miles. It was so hard. Mainly because I was so worn out and it was hot. I ran at I think 8:00 in the morning. I couldn't get my legs to move, but I did it, and I ran the whole thing - even if sometimes I felt I could have walked faster than I ran, but in my mind I was running. f


Such a great experience and one I hope to do again!!