Notes
Got mega lost, not fun
Edit: What a horrible two hours for me. Started out getting the exchange a few minutes in front of Cobert and really wanted to maintain the gap. Kelsey got lost allowing us to make up ground on Team 1. This leg was very sandy and it was hot out by the time we were running (around 3). I took the first couple miles around 6:20 pace at which point I made my first wrong turn. Some dude told me right away I was going the wrong way so I turned around and followed him but I was already off my bearings. We continued straight for a little while before we ran into some lady running concurrently who said we were going the wrong way, so we turned around. We went down a Y at which point four very fast people passed us (one was a girl who was crazy fast). We followed them but I had a hard time keeping up because they were cruising (and steadily taking us the wrong direction). We crossed the street again at which point I thought I was fucked. I had been running about 5 miles at this point and was starting to get worn down from the pace and sand. I made my way back to the road at which point those guys all left me in the dust. I stayed on the road and flagged down a car who told me to go due south and head left at a stop sign. So I did that, except the stop sign did not yield a trail. It was at this point where I started getting really nervous. I began running slowly with the people around me (two girls and a guy with a garmin, initially). We kept running back and forth and steadily accumulated more and more people. At one point we had 20-30 people milling about in a clearing trying to get directions. Everyone had an idea but no one was correct. Finally at some point, some one came by and told us the actual path. This was after I ran into Scott Dvorak (M10) and ran with him for a bit. When we finally found the trail I was 8 miles in and thought I had two to go. It turned out I had around 4 left and every time we hit what I thought was a checkpoint but it happened to be a different checkpoint I was further disheartened. I ran with some kid for the majority of the rest of the way, but for the last mile I was too tired to even run with him (some kid I could have burned on a normal day). I made it to the checkpoint after 11.85 miles of running and 1:45 of time.
This is the most tired I have been by the end of the run. The sandy path and the heat just sapped all energy I had until I just struggled around 7:45 pace the rest of the way in. This leg makes me not want to do GLR again because it wasn't worth this. I wanted to go home.