Let me start off by saying that Ragnar was better than I anticipated! Naturally, I was worried about being with a bunch of sleep deprived girls but everyone behaved themselves. Going into the race I knew that for me the lack of sleep was going to be harder than the actual running itself...it took me 3 days to feel normal again.
I am getting so ahead of myself, why don't I start at the beginning?
Our team name was "Tutu" Fast and consisted of 12 girls from my ward.
Our ward also had another team, the Domestic Diva's. Thursday morning we all packed up and drove to Pasadena.
Road trip!
Lucky for us, we were able to stay at Hilari's parents home (redhead) and her parents spoiled us!
After arriving and unpacking we headed to a local place, Bella's to meet up with the other team for some serious carb loading! We ate garlic bread sticks, spinach salad, pasta with a kind of spicy meat that I cannot remember (it was gooood!), and pizza. We ate so much because they would bring out our food on separate plates so we didn't realize until we needed to unbutton our pants how much we actually consumed.
After dinner we wasted no time decorating our cars (something that I thought was completely pointless) but it turned out that's the Ragnar thing to do!
One comment I have to make because you will obviously notice...aren't all these women super glam?! Don't they know that they will be running a totoal of 200 miles...crazy! But that's just how the ladies in our ward are, practically perfect!
Heading to check-in in Huntington Beach.
Race day we were pumped! Besides being cute, the tutu's helped us use our feminine whiles to get all sorts of free stuff (3 cartons of muscle milk, 5 boxes of shot blocks and countless pictures) Not to brag but we were pretty popular!
Pre-race the other thing I had not been that enthusiastic about was running in tutu's but let me tell you, people ran in much less!
Being as I was #2 runner I was in van 1 and luckily, we only had to run once in the heat. My first run was close to 11 am and it was already in the high 80's! I ran the first 2.5 miles at 6.2 min/pace but was dying of heat and my mouth was drier than the Sahara so I had to slow it down. Overall 5 miles I averaged 7.02/mile.
pretty sure this is the 1 and only picture of me actually running.
Coming in after running I was panting and warning everyone of the heat something that they didn't take to hear until they were running in it! 9 kills!
After our vans runners were done we abused Target and used their bathroom to change our clothes and freshen up. Then we had a late lunch, early dinner at Chevy's.
My second run was at night started at 8ish and I had to sign a special waiver for this particular run because it was mostly on a horse trail with uneven footing and the possibility of poison oak, rattle snakes, mosquitos, etc. What the waiver failed to mention was that there was a random cement step in the middle of nowhere without a flashing light that I and many others tripped over! After I fell I was crying and seriously didn't think that I was going to be able to run. I walked it off and went on my way. This leg was 9.4 miles and I felt awesome, I could have kept running for awhile longer bleeding knee and all. 9.4 miles with my pace being 8.02/mile...not too bad considering I walked a little while! Kills were 17!
By now, we all wanted to sleep but with less than two hours (van 2 had mostly short runs) until we had to run again we went to the hotel to shower and rest as much as possible. Surprisingly I was able to fall asleep, granted it was like for 30 minutes...I must have been really tired.
My last run was 7.4 miles beginning close to 6am. It had tons of hills. My pace was 8.32/mile with 12 kills. You are probably wondering what a kill is huh?! We didn't harm anything except for maybe a couple runners prides. When you pass a runner it is considered a kill.
When our last runner was running we got interviewed by a local channel in San Diego and even made it on the news! {I spy me!}
It was relief when our van was done running. We went and got some food at Pat&Oscars because we hadn't eaten since linner the day before at 3pm. The hard part was waiting for the second van to finish so that we could get cleaned up and back to the house.
Back in Pasadena, Hilari's parents had salads from a local favorite and cupcakes from Dots! I told you we were spoiled! We even managed some R&R in the spa before showering and crashing hard.
Ragnar was fun and I am sure to do one again however, I am not sure of when I will commit being as I could barely hobble through 3 miles 4 days after the race! I seriously felt like I was 80 years old...I am really hoping my bum knee feels better soon.
Besides running our butts off, we had fun!
I am so glad I got to know the ladies on "Tutu" fast a little better, they are all amazing women!
