Hood to Coast 2017

As far as I know Hood to Coast is the original relay of its kind. I've heard Ragnar got the idea for their relays from Hood to Coast and having run both, I can say they are very similar (almost identical). I'm sure they both have copied ideas from each other over the years. There are Hood to Coast relays in other places which just doesn't make sense to me because Oregon was the original and you literally run from Mt. Hood to the Coast. 

Hood to Coast is extremely popular in Oregon and I don't think you can say you are an Oregon runner until you have run it. I didn't get to run it our first summer here, so I was extremely excited to score a place on a team this year. 

The second counselor in the Sunnyside bishopric (Josh Din) started with leg 1 and is working his way through the legs until he has run all of them, so he can say he ran from Mt. Hood to the Coast. He organized the team and then Jake Egbert took over as the captain since he'd been captain before. I was a backup and got a place on the team right around the time we were moved into the Happy Valley ward. Fortunately there was already one team member in the Happy Valley ward (Angel Nielsen), so I wasn't the only one. And her son (Nick) ended up filling in at the last minute, so there were 3 of us from the Happy Valley ward and 9 from the Sunnyside ward.

I volunteered to design t-shirts for the team since I've done it twice before. Our team name was Kicking Assets which is funny considering we're a bunch of Mormons. There was quite a spirited debate about how we should have Assets on the shirts. I figured (and Jake agreed) if we were going to have that name, we should own it, so I originally designed the shirt as Kicking ASSets. Some weren't very happy with that, so I made a Kicking Assets version and a Kicking A$$ets version. 

Kicking A$$ets won the vote, so that's what we ended up going with. I had them printed through Custom Ink again and we were happy with them. Although I wished I had ordered an XS since my S was a little big.

I also cut out vinyl for the two vans.

I was supposed to be in van 2 until just a couple weeks before the race, one of the members of van 2 dropped out and Nick stepped in. Angel wanted to be in the same van as her son, so I volunteered to switch vans. One of the legs I was originally supposed to be running looked harder than I wanted to do and van 1 seemed like a more fun van, so I wasn't too sad to switch to what looked like an easier set of legs and the fun van.

We started at 5:15 am which meant we had to leave my house (we used our van, so we all met here) at like 3:45 am. I was in charge of a Relief Society activity the night before and hadn't packed beforehand, so I didn't get to bed until after 11:00 pm and had a hard time falling asleep. So I figure I got about 3 hours of sleep. Starting a relay like this with little sleep is definitely not something I recommend! Both Ragnars I did, I got at least 7 hours of sleep to start and that was much better! 

We were all tired and already laughing so much on the way up to the top of Mt. Hood.

Van 1 - Jackson Packham, Jason Packham, Jake Egbert, Josh Din, Lindsi Din, and me. All the guys' names started with J which was definitely confusing at times - especially being so sleep deprived and not knowing them super well before the race.

Jason started us off and then passed off to me.

Since we started at 5:15 am and we were up on a mountain it was pretty cold. I debated about if I should wear my ear muffs and my gloves. Ultimately I decided not to wear my ear muffs, but I did wear my gloves and I felt like that was the perfect compromise.

Jason and I were both literally running down Mt. Hood, so it was all downhill. I hadn't planned on an all downhill leg and after the downhill part killed me on my marathon, I was super nervous. I did some last minute downhill training and hoped for the best. It turned out to be super easy and possibly my favorite leg (although my 3rd leg was pretty great too). 

They had a timing app that you'd swipe each time a runner handed off to the next runner. It was great when you had service, but could get messed up super easily when you didn't have service and you didn't do it exactly right. Our van had it figured out, but van 2 struggled a little! It automatically took a picture and included the stats for that leg which is what you're seeing above. They had the distance set a little higher than what my Garmin calculated which made my pace look even better than it actually was! (See below.)

I passed off to Josh who passed off to Lindsi.

Lindsi passed off to Jackson who passed off to Jake and then our van was done with our first legs.

I took this picture and everyone agreed it was one of the best action shots of the race.

Jake came in super mad from his leg because his water stop was out of water. Apparently this was the first year they offered water stops and they hadn't worked out all the kinks. Luckily I didn't have any problems with the water stops on my legs and I was super grateful to have them. I hate carrying water!

We were pretty close to our houses, so we went home for a shower and a very short nap. Then we ate at Biscuits Cafe before heading into the heart of Portland to meet van 2 to start our second legs. I'd never eaten at Biscuits Cafe before and it was delicious! I couldn't eat my whole meal though because I knew I was going to be running pretty soon and I didn't want to be sick for my run!

I knew my second leg was going to be hot and I was dreading it! It was also my longest run (although not by very much) and definitely the hardest uphill. I lucked out and had more shade than I had anticipated (since it was getting later in the day - It was 5:30 pm by the time I ran). Otherwise, I wouldn't have made it! 

After we all finished our second legs we were able to go to a nearby lake house that Andrew Quiroz (in the other van) was selling. (He's a realtor and got permission from his client to have us sleep there.) It was a terrible windy road down to the lake house and I got so carsick. I was also deliriously tired and pretty much just wanted to die. I took a quick shower and then got a few hours of sleep. I slept terribly because my head was slightly sunburnt and I kept waking up feeling hot, but cold at the same time. Finally I got up and ate an apple because I was feeling shaky and weird. That helped and I got a little more sleep before it was time to get up and run again.

My third leg was a lot of uphill and downhill. It was the darkest of my runs although the sun was coming up as I ran. It was really foggy and I felt like I was sweating a lot (mostly just the moisture from the air though). The traffic was crazy backed up at the exchange and I passed my van waiting in line to get into the parking lot when I had about a mile left. So I finished and then had to wait 10-15 minutes for them to get to me! Despite being so tired, I felt awesome while I was running and was on a major runner's high. Then I crashed hard when I finally got back into the van!

When Jake (our final runner) got to the exchange after his run, van 2 was nowhere to be found! They had gotten stuck in traffic getting to us. That's one thing about Hood to Coast - it's much bigger than Ragnar, so traffic is a problem particularly at the end because you're on the one lane highways that lead to the coast.

We ate lunch at a place in Astoria that I did not enjoy. I wasn't feeling up to eating any of the food on the menu and didn't want to spend a lot on a meal I didn't know if I'd eat. So I ordered a salad and the waitress took pity on me and also brought me some bread. 

After lunch we finished driving to Seaside and most of us took showers at the local middle school. (You had to pay, but it was so worth it!) One of the big inside jokes from the relay came when I asked if anyone wanted to go shower with me. Since all (but one) of them were guys I obviously didn't mean actually shower with me. I just didn't want to walk over to the building where they had the showers alone. They made fun of me endlessly for that! 

Van 2 had a lot of our slower runners in it and we had to wait forever for them to get to the coast. They finally arrived and around 5:00 pm we crossed the finish line. It took us almost exactly 36 hours which is by far the longest relay I've participated in.

The whole team in the order we ran (starting with 12 and going down to 1) - Andrew Quiroz, Angel Nielsen, Jenn Quiroz, Jenny White, Debbie Quiroz, Jake Egbert, Jackson Packham, Lindsi Din, Josh Din, me, and Jason Packham. 

I didn't take many pictures on my phone and we didn't really share too many pictures after the relay. I figured we would - especially since our captain, Jake, is a professional photographer and he was endlessly taking pictures of us on his phone and with his fancy camera. He got a Go Pro right before the race and we were also endlessly taking videos on that, but we have yet to see any of those videos. Part of me is happy about that because I'm sure I made a fool of myself repeatedly on the videos, but I really would have liked to have more pictures!

This was the first relay I've done without Rog and it really wasn't the same without him. He stayed home with the kids and I was so grateful he'd do that and let me run. I told the team he'd run with them next year (because I will hopefully be pregnant and not be able to run), but the year after that we are doing it together!