More pics, courtesy of Melissa: http://picasaweb.google.com/nannburke/AmericanOdysseyRelayRunAdventure?feat=email#
And Tracy: http://picasaweb.google.com/tracyangelo/AmericanOdysseyRelay?feat=email#
A week ago today I was running around, packing t-shirts, picking up the team van, picking up some of the team, and getting us off to Gettysburg.
It’s amazing how quickly a week can go, especially when you were awake for two solid days of it!
Like I wrote in my last post, the Odyssey was incredible. I don’t think it’s anything that I could have prepared for, and I don’t think I can hope to recreate the experience. Ok, I could have prepared a little better in the running department! I had one of the easiest difficulties on my legs, and I think I met running expectations. But of course, competitive me, I wish I could have done just a little bit better!
But we’d have a hard time recreating the energy of our team, and especially of our van. (In case I haven’t said this yet: we were a team of 12, with six runners in each of two minivans. Each runner had three legs to complete, ranging in distance from just over three miles to almost 9 miles. My total mileage was just about 14-15 miles.)
The vans overlapped a few times, like at each transition between runner 6 and 7 and runners 12 and back to 1. But the course was also set up that besides these quick transitions, two spots were set up where we could meet up for a bit longer. It was interesting to me how, even during these longer transition spots, we pretty much kept to our vans. I think we were all taken aback by the immediate bonding that happened in our physical push and exhaustion.
And, the awesome shirts (really, wardrobes!) that Keith got us all helped with the cohesion, too!
Tracy, a family friend of Mike’s, was in my van. So Mike, Mike’s mom, Tracy’s mom and Tracy’s daughter joined us at the start in Gettysburg. I was runner two and Tracy was runner three, so they followed us in their own van during those first three legs. That worked out great because they got to truly see how we stopped along the road to cheer a runner on, how the transitions worked, jumping back into the van all sweaty… which helped since on Saturday and Sunday we talked incessantly about the two days!
Our van did an incredible job (I think) of supporting the runners while they were out on the road. We stopped several times along their route to cheer and offer water. There were only 104 teams in the race, and the start times were spread out over several hours – so when Keith, our first runner, started at 11:30 a.m. on Friday, he started with about 6 or 7 other runners. So when you were running, you were never running in close proximity to someone else, and infrequently even saw other runners on the road. So the van stopping to cheer really helped.
I was surprised at how fast the first six hours went. Because we followed our runner so closely, when we were in the van, no one ever opened up a magazine or a book or really even held conversations. We were focused on finding the next turn on the road and jumping out to make sure our runner made the turn (yes, the race set up signs, but not all were very well marked, and you couldn’t see the ones at night -- more on night running in a bit – so each runner was responsible for carrying a set of turn-by-turn instructions in their hand and following them. That’s really tough, so our van would sit at each turn and make sure the runner made it.).
In fact, at about hour five, I realized we hadn’t even turned on the radio, we were that focused.
Once our sixth runner (after a grueling seven mile hill) transitioned to the seventh runner (the first runner of the second van), we went in search of dinner. We had approximately 5 -6 hours off here, but this, too, went quick. We followed the course through all the back roads so we could see the legs the other runners would be on (and we had not other option!), so that was slow driving. We had a nice hour or so dinner. We made some phone calls. We drove to the next transition spot (where van #2’s last runner would hand off back to our first), and we probably only waited there about 45 minutes for that hand off.
I don’t remember exactly, but I think that happened around 9:30 p.m. So our van started our second legs in the dark. We were outfitted beautifully by our team captain, Melissa. There’s a really funny picture that we took of Keith from the van, behind him. When the flash went off, it lit up all his reflective gear and he looks like a Christmas tree!
That night running was pretty scary. These were back roads, so there was no sidewalk or shoulder, so once or twice when a car came towards you, you would literally have to jump into the grass, just to feel safe.
We really tried to follow the night runners even more. In fact, for most of our night runners, the van didn’t let them out of its sight. Keith got hurt on his night run, when he was blinded by a car coming towards him and tripped in a pot hole. Since he transitioned to me, I didn’t know that happened until after my run. Evidently, when he stopped running, he had bloody hands and a bloody knee and a monstrously swollen ankle. Lucky for him he was immediately surrounded by four girls (I was off running!) who wanted to take care of him!
But that didn’t last long, mostly because I was out running. All five of us girls will say it – thank goodness for Keith in our van! He had that van on top of us during the night running and we all felt much safer for it. I was lucky, too, because there was a runner about a half mile ahead of me with a blinking light on her back. We stayed the same distance apart the entire run, and I couldn’t see her body at all. But I could at least focus on that blinking light and see when it would disappear (knowing there was a downhill coming up) or seeing her turn. But, man! Was it dark!
Our most intense time was this night running. Even though by the time I handed off to Tracy it was after 11 p.m., we were all incredibly alert. Tracy lost her directions and depended wholly on the van to tell her when to turn. But her leg ended (this is going to get confusing!) at a high school. The race coordinators set up with this high school that there would actually be FOUR transitions there. They did this so a transition would happen between vans (allowing us to see the other teammates) but also because the high school opened up its locker facilities to us. So the idea was that when the runners went off, the rest of the team would hand back and relax.
Dude! It was pitch black out! We couldn’t leave our runners! But, with this huge transition area, it was also a mad house, and really hard to find where the transitions would all be. We ended up making a large number of split second decisions, that all thankfully worked out. While Tracy was running, we actually dropped two of our other runners (Keith and Laura) off at a really hard turn to make sure Tracy made it. Then I drove the van ahead and got Melissa as close to the transition point as I could so she’d be there when Tracy arrived. Quickly found and picked Laura and Keith back up, then practically threw Angelica and Laura out of the van back at the high school with blankets and water to find Tracy in the mass of people and vans so Keith and I could get back on the road and find Melissa running. It all worked out because of the night runs, Melissa had the “easiest” – it was out and back on one major road, where she was on a sidewalk or shoulder with street lights the whole time. Still scary, but if we had to be late following one running leg, that would be it.
Completely different from Angelica’s! She ran through a residential area where the houses were set way back from the road and acres apart from each other. I didn’t know it could get that dark anywhere.
We were also thankful to have a man in our van when the night running was over and we drove to the next spot where Keith would pick up from the second van. We parked in a parking lot in Antietam and tried to sleep for about an hour and a half. I know all of us, and all of our husbands, felt much better having him there!
We got what shut eye we could before having to start the third grueling leg. There was a lot of pandemonium while we waited for Keith to start running. His ankle was about the size of a watermelon, and there were no facilities to be found. Many hysterical (in hindsight) stories not exactly appropriate for the blog ensued. Let’s just say we didn’t help keep our parklands clean that morning.
The third leg was brutal because of how exhausted we were. We had dinner the night before, but really weren’t eating properly. Hadn’t slept. Were exhausted. And the day quickly became hot.
It was also a bit of a bummer because the van could follow Keith and I on our third legs, but then Tracy, Melissa, Angelica and Laura all ran along the C&O canal – so the car couldn’t follow. Good for them because they were a bit shaded, and there were no turns to make at all. But lonely! And lonely for the van, too. It made the waiting for them much, much harder!
We finally finished our legs and headed to Alexandria. Mike got our bathrooms prepped with towels and shampoo and soap and we all got to take a shower!!! Then we headed to the Mall, to wait for the second van to finish their run.
We had lots of support there, with Jenelle joining in on the cheering. Our last runner, Amanda, pulled up around 5:45 p.m. or so, and we all got to run the last 100 yards together to the finish line.
Of course, I cried. I tend to be an emotional runner.
Afterwards, Debbie (Keith’s wife) threw the mother of all after parties at their suite at the Ritz. Too bad more of the team couldn’t join us! We devoured food, had a few glasses of wine, and I just might have been asleep before we even finished driving home!
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