Hood to Coast

I feel like I've already written about H2C. But this is the post-race entry!

IT WAS AMAZING.

Seriously, so much more fun than I ever would have imagined. I'm DEFINITELY applying to do it again next year - the applications are due in mid-October. Who wants to be on my team? So far I "allegedly" have Geoff, Eric, Addy, Patrick, and Christine. We'll see who else joins. My big thing this year is going to be working on my speed so I can try to get down to 9:30 mile times! I have a year - it should be doable.

My first leg was leg 12, I ran it around 10 PM. It was SO fun running up 39th street in SE Portland, people were sitting outside their houses cheering us all on, they had written on the sidewalks things like "just one more hill" "lean forward on this hill" "keep going", etc. So fun! Then I turned left onto Hawthorne and got to run through a really fun part of town with lots of bars... everyone cheered and said encouraging things, and once you get to the Safeway - it's all downhill! :) It was a great run, and it was fun running and seeing my entire team at the end of the run (since it was one of the van to van exchanges!)

The second leg was 24 - flat, short, and boring. It was a 5 miler, I ran around 8 AM so it was light out but still cool... perfect! Each mile seemed to take FOREVER, but I was making good time (around 10:30 miles, good for me). When I got in, the other guy wasn't there so I had to wait for 6 minutes (seemed like eternity) for him to come take the baton. Darn! But he came and then I got to eat and pretend to sleep.

The last leg was 36 - last leg of the race! The first 1.25 miles were uphill... I wanted to walk but my van hadn't passed by me yet so I couldn't. ;-) (there is a joke at H2C that says "no walkin' 'til the van passes" - you don't want to look bad in front of your team, so you have to at LEAST run until your van goes by). Well, the van hadn't come by and I was finally at the top of the hill! Woo hoo! Then it was a pretty steep downhill for 1.5 miles... that was okay. I like downhills. But I had to hold back a little because I knew I still had 2.5 miles to go after that! So I got to the bottom of the downhill, and ran a boring run through town... it was HARD and I wanted to talk so badly. I just kept thinking "our team has run 195 miles and no one has walked yet, why would you start now?!". I also thought "don't you want to be able to say you RAN the entire time on H2C?" So somehow I miraculously finished without walking! WOO HOO!

Near the finish line I could see Geoff and Eric there cheering me on - that was awesome! Then I saw and heard my team... once I passed the real finish line, I waited for my team to join me, and we ran across the big finish banner finish line together and had our team name announced (The Pinheads, we came in around 821st place). Then I picked up all of the finshers medals for the team and we had our team picture taken. After that I got to see Geoff... he hugged me even though I was all sweaty and gross! I teared up a little bit because I was tired, dizzy, and overwhelmed. But I was mostly okay. We went to get some food... Geoff said I had to eat so I got a piece of pizza which I ate approximately 3 bites of before I gave it to him. Then we walked to Jake (Geoff and Eric brought me my car!) and drove to the van to unload it and get my things, and then Geoff took me to McDonalds because I was STARVING by that point. Then I passed out in the back seat and slept all the way back to Portland.

SO MUCH FUN. CAN'T WAIT FOR NEXT YEAR!

Notable moments:
- our van getting yelled at by a cop to "SLOW DOWN"
- me failing in my navagation skills and going 4 miles out of the way while our faster runner was running (that was the same leg we got yelled at on, imagine that)
- the 4 ugliest blisters of all time merging into one giant blister on leg 36
- waiting for 20 minutes for Shannon at one place, then finally going on and seeing her up ahead... how does she run faster than we drive?!
- team 963 always being right in front of us, team 693 - slightly confusing!