Wasatch Back Relay (Read 598 times)

First—I think this race is an absolute blast. For those not familiar with it, it is a 12-person relay that runs 181 miles from Logan, Utah to Park City, up and over the Wasatch Mountains. There are two vans per team, with 6 runners in each van. Van #1 starts and runs the first 6 legs, then Van #2 takes over for the next 6, then Van #1 again, etc. This was my second year, and it was even better than the first. Our team (Sin City Saints) started gathering at the LV airport Thursday morning for our flight to SLC. Nine of us flew up together (the other 3 had already left for Utah the day before) and the flight attendants announced our team and race over the intercom. When we arrived in SLC, our advance party already had our rental vans decorated and ready to go. We loaded up and headed for my home in Providence, about 3-4 miles from the start in Merlin Olsen Park (Logan, UT). We carbo-loaded that evening (for whatever little good it actually does for a race like this, but it’s kind of traditional, isn’t it?), and had our final team meeting sitting out on the deck watching the sunset. At some point that night, we actually went to bed. Up the next morning and down to the starting line about 9:30 (although we didn’t start until 11:00). Our team captain was dressed as Elvis, and he ended up being interviewed at length by the group that was putting together the official video for the relay. Also had a number of female runners ask to have their picture taken with him. Finally, our start time arrived and we were off. I was in Van 2, and ran legs 9, 21, and 33. This was a break from last year when I ran 4 legs, including Leg 34 (Ragnar). I started my first leg at about 5:30pm. I had been waiting around all day, and was anxious to get going. Leg 9 was an easy 3.5 miler. The first half of this leg is slightly down, and the second half is slightly up. One thing I noticed right away was that the weather was fantastic. I normally run in LV at 5:30pm, but the temps are in the high 90’s low 100’s. The cooler temps up at Huntsville (near Ogden, UT) were great. I managed four “roadkills” (runners I picked off during my leg). However, I was passed by two runners that started after me. Did ok on this leg, with an average pace of 7:38. I was not going to race this (or any) leg, since that wasn’t the team goal. Just having a good time was what it was all about (ok, and maybe the occasional roadkill). When I got to the next exchange point, my teammate was just coming out of the POP and almost didn’t get the handoff. Oh—and the practice for our van was to drive ahead ½ mile and wait for our runner. If we needed something, great. If not, we just waved the van on to the next ½ mile point. This way, you always knew you were only a ½ mile from water, etc, had a cheering section along the course, and also had a target you were running for. I didn’t start my next leg until about 2am. You’d think I would have been able to get a little sleep until then, but that wasn’t going to happen. Our van was running from midnight to about 5am, so there wasn’t going to be much sleep during those hours for sure. We tried sleeping at exchange point 18, but the volunteers directing traffic yelled the entire time we were there (“Hey, you can’t park there!” “Stop that van!” “Squeeze them in! There’s too much room between vans!” Yeah, but dude, we’ve got to be able to open our doors, eh? It was like listening to the Soup Nazi from Seinfeld). Between them, and a couple of people in our van complaining about how loud the volunteers were, I got maybe 30 minutes of sleep. At any rate, as I mentioned, I started leg 21 at about 2am. I didn’t mind running in the dark at all, although it really wasn’t all that dark with a full moon. Leg 21 is a little over 6 miles, with a slight elevation gain. Temp was about 41. Managed 10 roadkills on this leg, and a 7:40 pace. My last leg was Leg 33—right before Ragnar. Last year, I was excited to run Ragnar—because I really didn’t know what I was getting into. Ragnar is a 1,678ft climb in over 4 miles. This year, although I wasn’t running Ragnar, I knew what Leg 33 was like, and for excitement—well, not so much. It’s a 1,500 ft elevation gain in 3½ miles. Still, I really did enjoy the climb, and managed 4-5 roadkills. My pace, however? Oh, I don’t know—something around 11-12 minutes a mile. I didn’t bother looking at my Garmin much, because I really didn’t want to know how slow I was going, or how far I still had to go. There were portions of the road where I was just running on my toes because of the incline, and not very fast at that. On my earlier legs, I didn’t take any water/Gatorade when it was offered by my support vehicle. On this one, I didn’t start running until about 11:15am, it was starting to warm up, and I drank something every half mile. There was another support van on the road, and every time they saw me, they wanted to spray me down with water. That was ok, I suppose, except they would spray my face, and then I’d spend the next while wiping the sweat & water out of my eyes. I finally had to tell them that I appreciated the gesture, but I was ok without it. Our final time was 27:31 (uh, 27 hours and 31 minutes). Our primary goal was just to have fun, and have fun we did. We had some fast runners, and we had some slow runners. None of that mattered to us. We knew we weren’t going to win anything, so just enjoy the experience. What were our thoughts when we finished? Well, we’ve already signed up for next year. If you ever get the chance to do a relay like this, take it.

Hey there Don...Haven't seen you post in awhile! Your knee must be better to get those times in the wee hours of the morning. We have a 10-person realy that sounds a bit like yours...lots of fun...lots of buddy time and lots of exhaustion. Your hills sound very intense and at those early morning times maybe its nice not to see what's ahead. Sherry