RAGNAR SOCAL PREVIEW

Team logo created by our very own Dean!

This will be fairly brief as I have a lot of stuff to do before leaving for the airport tomorrow morning. My flight is at 7:00am, which means I should leave my house around 5:15, which means I need to get up around 4:45... ugh.

If you are wondering what the hell this is and who the hell I am doing it with, let me explain. Ragnar is basically the same thing as Hood To Coast; a twelve person, two van relay over about 200 miles in 30 hours or so. Hood To Coast might have been the original relay to blow up back in the 1980s, but now there are many others and Ragnar is a popular company that puts on about a dozen or so each year.

My teammates are a bunch of people I have never met in person! I started reading Katie's blog, Runs For Cookies, because Laurel mentioned she really liked it. Katie was starting to train for her first marathon, and as a newbie runner myself with aspirations of a full marathon some day, I went along for the journey. I lived vicariously through Katie's training, knowing I would have to do these crazy long runs some day. Turns out she is a really inspiring person too and super down to earth on her blog.

So I started commenting a little, and as one of the few male readers who actually interacted with the blog, I guess I stuck out. So she started to comment on my blog a little and then sometime last fall she asked if I would do this relay with her. I immediately said yes! The rest of my teammates are other fellow readers of her, and our other captain, John's blog. I've gotten to know them on Facebook over the last six months and can't wait to meet them in person. I feel like I know them already. Our team name is "Strangers to Sole Mates."

The course is from Huntington Beach, CA to San Diego, CA. I have the hardest legs of any of the runners and it's going to be a huge challenge. As the fastest runner though, I feel it is my duty to tackle them and am actually looking forward to the challenge. My only concern is my butt muscle strain. It's still feeling iffy and I hope that doesn't slow me down too much or act up further.

Leg One (5.9 miles, "Hard"): The easiest of the legs. Wish it would be the last leg, but oh well. Pretty much all along the beach in Huntington Beach and super flat. I should fly and it should be really pretty (although, now that I think about it, it's going to be dark). Only issue is this will be at 5am as the gun for the relay goes off. I am our first runner and we have to be at the start line an hour early. Ugh.

Leg Thirteen (11.90 miles, "Very Hard"): My second leg and the "Leg of Death." Includes a 250 foot hill in the middle of the leg. Shouldn't be too big of an issue as I am used to hills. Distance is the problem here, considering I have another long leg coming up. I'll just take it easy and not kill myself. I'll be running this about 5pm, so it could be a little warm.

Leg Twenty Five (8.10 miles, "Very Hard"): My third and final leg! This will start around 2:30am in Carlsbad. Looks like I go uphill a little and then get a nice downhill for about a mile. Last six miles are pretty flat and the last four look to be along the beach (again, in the dark). The wildcard this leg is how I am feeling due to the lack of sleep and nearly 18 miles to this point. Goal is to survive.

Overall, I'd like to average my marathon pace. So 7:55-8:00/mile. The first leg I'll probably shoot for 7:30s, the second leg 8:15s, and the final leg like 8:00s. We'll see. Our team doesn't care about time, so whatever I do will be fine. Don't want to kill myself and injure something for Vancouver. Altogether I am running almost a full marathon, 25.9 miles!

Anyways, I'll be back with a report next week! Until then!