HMRRC Winter Marathon Relay race report.

So, what do you do on a Sunday morning when the temperature is hovering just above 30 and the wind is a biting one, whipping from the WNW with gusts reaching 41 mph? (Yes, 41.)

Run a marathon relay, of course!

Friends, Sunday was windy and cold and, honestly, if two other runners weren't relying on me to run my leg of the relay, I might not have raced. It was just so flippin' windy. But race I did and I'm so glad.

It was a great time! Sure, our team placed 58th out of 59 teams. Who cares? We just had a good time.

Here's our team before the race:

Pink ladies! Suzy, Amanda, me.

The race was split into three legs: 9.2m, 5.7m and 11.3m. Suzy ran the first leg, I ran the second and Amanda (who is running a half-marathon in two weeks) ran the third. As Suzy warmed up and then took her place at the starting line, Amanda and I hung out on the sidelines and cheered the runners on when they took off.

Here's Suzy, looking ready to run even though she had been battling a stomach bug, at the start:


Note the nutty people wearing shorts:


Yikes! Anyway, after the start, we headed inside to get out of the wind and figure out how to prepare for our legs. I ate a banana and had some water and coffee. And then we just hung out and chatted, which was cool because we got to know each other a little more. We decided to make our way to the relay exchange a little too early so we ended up standing around for almost a half hour. At about 1:37 into the race, Suzy ran in to the exchange and off I went!

Running a relay is very different from all other races. For starters, you can't be exactly sure when you are going to run so warming up and fueling is slightly off. When you do start, you start alone. To me, that was the weirdest part. I ran alone for most of the race. There were many super fast guys who passed me along the way and I passed a few people (none of the fast guys) but, overall, I was running alone.

I settled into what felt like a decent pace and just ran. There were stretches when I felt good and others, when the wind was strong enough to screw up my breathing, when I didn't. Unfortunately, the last 1.5 miles were straight into the wind and I felt like I was pushing and pushing and hardly moving.

But I finished in 50:25 and handed off to Amanda.

Suzy and I booked it inside where I cooled (ha!) down and fueled up. After changing into dry clothes, it was time to go cheer for Amanda at the turn around:


We cheered loud and hard and then booked it inside again and I headed straight to the massage table. My massage felt awesome!

With the massage done, I decided to eat some soup and stretch a little more. Suzy and I hung out and then made our way to the finish line to see Amanda come across at 4:22:59. She ran 1:53 for her leg, which was well under the 10:30 pace she thought she might run! Just awesome!!!

Here we are after the race (happy to be done!):

Suzy, Amanda, me.

Overall, it was just a GREAT experience. Running on a team like that is a much different experience than just running a race on your own. I loved the feeling and I'm so happy that I met these two women through the blogging world and we've become running buddies. We plan to run together again -- hopefully in better weather!

Race stats:

Total for relay: 4:22:59
My leg, 5.7m: 50:25 (8:51/m pace)

Yay!!!

If you haven't run a relay before, I highly recommend it! They are lots of fun.

Happy Monday, everyone!

~ Felice

PS: New -- yummy -- giveaway over here.