Ragnar Relay-6 Idiots, 201.3 Miles

Ragnar Relay is supposed to be for teams of 12, but they do have an Ultra Division for us Crazies! The best part was getting different t-shirts that say Ultra Runner on the back (obviously the back cause not only do we run double, we are faster)!! This 2 day experience was a blast. Gabi Keri and John Pyle spent all of Thursday morning trying to get ahold of me at school to find out if I would replace some "leeker" that dropped out. With 18 hours notice to the start, I said sure! So along with John, Gabi and I, there was Katie Waters, Andy Berster and Michele Proch. I got the 5th stage, which was an exact Half Marathon in Clermont. Anywhere else in the State of Florida would have been pancake flat, but no, not Clermont. I got all 3 hills on the entire course. I went out in about 8:30 pace cause it just felt good. I loved the hills and broke 2 hours for the section. My next segment started around 10 PM and I think ended around 2 AM. I am not sure, it was a complete debacle. We had a problem with an exchange and instead of just running 6 miles, I started the next leg of 4 miles. I bonked at about 8.5 miles. We thought we had the exchange all worked out for the next checkpoint but we screwed that up too. After about a 40 minute delay I went on for the next 3 miles. I was destroyed, running about 15 minute miles. Somehow, I got to the next checkpoint and handed off to John and went and died in the van. 26 miles in 2 segments and I thought I was done. Somehow I recovered enough to run the 2nd to last leg of 7 miles in 9:30 pace and handed off to Katie to bring it home. We all decided to run the last mile together (in our ultra shirts and John carrying Old Glory). After 200 miles, we were able to bang out a sub 9 minute mile. That entire trip was amazing. These people are awesome! After we got our medals and picture taken, we plowed thru 2 large pizzas and headed home! Also gotta thank Michele's boyfriend Jim for driving the Van the entire way from Clearwater to Daytona!

50 Miles-Check!

John Pyle has been planning some all night runs as he trains for his 100M debut at Ancient Oaks. I offered to join him and we planned on Tuesday because I was off school on Wednesday for Veterans Day! We left the Y around 8PM last night, lights already on, pockets full of GU (Blueberry Roctane is my favorite!), and water bottles full! John was awesome and provided the NUUN, cause I am still new about what I need. We cruised out along Long Boat Key, refilling at all of our stops. No real problems at all as we cruised out onto the Anna Maria Pier in 5:15. The site of the skyway bridge at night was just amazing. The trip back was going smooth until we hit Long Boat Key again. We ran into a driving force rain. We put our heads down and actually ran those 3 miles back to the 7-11 in under 27 minutes. We just wanted to get out of the rain. After that, the sky was clear but the legs were like concrete. We slowed a bit to the finish and the total time on our feet was 11:05. All I can say is that was an amazing experience. I am so glad to have met John and that he has taken me under his wing. He his a wealth of knowledge and just a damn awesome guy to hang with.