The CIM (California International Marathon) was held this past Sunday. I participated as part of a four person relay team this time. The weather was a mess but the race was a lot of fun. If you haven't been out running in the rain I recommend you try it. Some of my favorite training runs in the past have been done in the rain and the race was even more fun. I ran a seven mile stretch of the 26.2 mile course and my team finished in 5 hours, 34 minutes. We Rocked It!
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| Zachary, Nancy, me, Rebecca, Janice (David had to leave) |
Organizing the relay team was more of a roller coaster ride than I was expecting. It all started after last year's CIM. I was sitting around my table chatting with my sister and my friend, David. (David ran the CIM about four years ago and he ran part of it with me last year as a supporting cheerleader.) We decided we would run the relay. As 2012 moved along I started talking to other runners about the relay hoping to find a fourth person. My sister-in-law, Rebecca said she wanted be our fourth runner. Yay! But then more people said they wanted to run the relay too so I organized a second team. This team took a little bit longer to fill up but eventually we got four runners.
Not long after everyone was registered (and paid for) someone on team 2 needed to drop out. Then another person. Then we replaced one, but she dropped out too. Then someone got sick. Someone couldn't make it into town. Another replacement got injured. In total, there were eight people who had to drop and one of those people dropped twice. In fact, there wasn't a single original person on team 2 who ran on race day. Fortunately we were able to pull things together.
Team 2 didn't have a person for the first leg so Rebecca ran with the timing chips for both teams. My team, team 1, didn't have a person for the last leg of the relay. I was ready to run both my leg and the final leg but once my socks were fully saturated and bunching under my toes I realized that running another five miles would be harder than I anticipated Thankfully I came up with a plan. I sent a text to Zachary, the leg 4 runner for team 2, and asked (begged) if he would take both timing chips if I got to the relay exchange before his team member. He was more than willing to help out and it gave me the motivation I needed to keep my pace up. I had to beat Janice to the exchange!
Everything worked out. I got to the exchange before the team 2 runner so after my seven miles I was done. We all got our medals and had a great time! Both teams were a runner short but we made it work :o) A big THANK YOU to my teammates, Rebecca, David, Nancy, Janice and Zachary! Who's excited for next year?!?!
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