It all began the night before when we camped at Longview. I was soooo excited to be camping once again after a 5 year hiatus but was told quickly by a team mate, "this isn't camping! We're in a playground!"
He was right. We were camping in a playground area next to the start line. But that doesn't mean it didn't feel a bit like camping, and nothing could dim my excitement/nerves over Saturday's race.
Many of you may remember that the only relay I've done has been the 500k relay for three years in a row, but that is my only relay experience. Having now completed the K-100, I will still call the 500k my favourite (although the K-100 is arguably much prettier)! But a relay is a relay is a relay. And relays are pretty awesome!
While we didn't have a "team theme", we did have a team name. I was super excited when my suggestion - Wile E Coyote - was chosen. I don't know if everyone else got the joke behind it (hint: who does Wile E Coyote chase?), but maybe they did.
Location schmocation. I'm sleeping in a tent, ergo, it's camping!
Leg 8 was 15.9k and it said it had an overall elevation loss. Sounds good, right? It is! Except for the uphills at the end of the section...but we'll get to that.
I knew I would have a forced start at 4.15pm if my team mates weren't able to tag me off before that. Based on my team mates' calculations of their estimated finish times, there was a 50% chance this would happen. So selfishly, I was keeping fingers crossed that they would finish faster than their projected time so that I would NOT have a forced start! And of course, bonus to team mates who ran faster than they had predicted as well! We were slotted into the first wave of runners leaving at 6am, due to our projected teams. Wave 2 and 3 left at 7am and 8am respectively, as they would be much faster.
Since I had time to kill, I volunteered to be the support vehicle for the first and third legs. In 500k relay terms, this is like being the water truck according to Canadian weather.
In Canada, runners ran on the shoulder facing traffic, rather than with traffic, so no follow vehicle was required. We had about 3 cars from Calgary. Generally, one car would be responsible for the runner, pulling over to provide water as requested and take heaps of photos. Most people requested water every 3k, although some went as long as 5k without water. (This IS Canadian weather after all!). The other cars would come along and we'd form a Team 237 convoy, stopping together so we could get out and cheer for the runner as a team. It worked quite smoothly by the end, although the first bit had a few wrinkles and one particular speed bump, which I'll get to shortly!
Enjoying the views along the Highwood Pass.
Fellow team mates showing off my sexy decked-out support vehicle.
Here come the runners!
Flooded areas off the side of the Highway.
Due to a surprising lack of interest, our team leader had to recruit 4 of our 10 runners from his home town of Edmonton, 3 hours north of Calgary. The runners from Edmonton had planned to drive in to Calgary the night before and would meet us at the start of Leg 4 of the race, when the first Edmontonian was scheduled to run.
So we left our Leg 3 runner chipping along at about 3k out from the finish to meet up with the Edmontonians. But the only problem was...they weren't there! Having been asked to arrive an hour ahead of our projected arrival time, this was a very unexpected speed bump in what had been up until this point a fairly smooth ride.
A typical transition cone, equipped with water, sports drink, pylons, and... port-o-potties! I love you, race organizers! No "facilitrees" for me today.
The well-organized race had volunteers at the 1-mile out station, who would radio in the team number of the runner who had just crossed the line for 1-mile out. This had the benefit of letting those in the transition area know a) how they were ranked against the 105 teams entered, b) when you had approximately 10minutes to get your butt to the tag line if you were running next.
And as they radioed in our team number with 1-mile out - and no sign of the Edmonton crew - we were all getting a little concerned! And because we had all felt secure in the knowledge that they would be there, we had no contingency plan for If They Didn't Show Up. So the only ones at the transition zone who were in their running clothes were those that had already run legs 1 and 2! Asking someone to run a second time after they've given it their all just a couple hours before seems sort of cruel. So we asked our leg 10 runner to gear up super fast and run leg 4 instead. He did, but not before our poor leg 3 runner finished his race...and then had to stand around and wait for someone to tag!
Mass chaos and frustration ensued, so let me just give you the outline:
-Leg 3 runner finished, but Leg 4 runner had not shown up
-Leg 10 runner was speedily trying to get geared up to run Leg 4
-just as Leg 10 runner jogged off to replace Leg 4, we heard that Leg 1 runner (also our organizer) had gotten tired of waiting and started off, with the plan that he would be replaced ASAP into the run by Leg 10 runner.
-2 minutes after Leg 1 runner started off on Leg 4, our Edmonton contingency (including Leg 4 runner) showed up.
We quickly bundled Leg 4 runner into one of the cars and zipped off to replace him with our Leg 1 runner, about 2k down the road. Phew!
In the end, it hadn't been a case of "something bad happened" to the Edmontonians but rather an unapologetic "oh, we just left later than we planned. No biggie.". I will not speak for my fellow Calgarian team mates, but I know I was super frustrated about the lassez-faire attitude. I love running. I love running in groups. And I LOOOOOVVVVEEEE relay runs.
But sometimes, I don't love all of my fellow relay team mates. Sometimes I remember why it is so nice that running is mostly an individual sport.
Yet despite this small (but frustrating) hiccup in the first part of our relay, everyone was running faster than their projected times and I realized at the end of Leg 5 that I would be tagged off! No forced start for me! I was super stoked...this is what I had been training for! Or rather, this is what I should have been training for...
(To be continued).
No comments:
Post a Comment