I did it!

and it's over, and that's a good thing!  Ultimate Relay, man that was hard, probably the hardest race I've ever done, yes probably harder than Ironman. 12 hours and 59 minutes of long hard hot hilly work.

I don't want to give the whole report here yet because I want pics involved (yes it's going to be a looong post), and my husband used the GoPro camera the whole way so that will be way fun to put a video together of the day, but that's a while coming and I care about you all enough to give you a brief synopsis (and very long run on sentences).

1st swim was a very choppy start, really enjoyed the 1st ride but I did flat out partway through where I moved to 2nd solo woman.  Jer came quickly to my rescue though and I was back in buisness.  1st run was good, felt fast, but still controlled, made up ground on the lead lady.
2nd swim was good temp wise as I had no wetsuit, very muddy.  2nd bike had a beast of a hill up and out, 2nd run I started to bonk.  It was a flat run yes, but exposed and very hot.  I took a few white pills I found in my race belt, have no idea what they were, but I took them anyway (I'm sure they were just some electrolyte pill).

3rd swim was tricky.  Waves and wind made it difficult to swim half of it and the water was cold enough and I'd been pushing my body long enough that I was getting cold and a little concerned.  Was grateful to be out.  Took my time in that transition and changed my gameplan to complete vs compete.  My husband filled my pockets with food and pills and said to eat it all gone by the next transition.  3rd ride was long and hard.  Fierce head wind then cross wind, ran out of water and got almost desperate enough to knock on someone's door, thankfully Jer finally met me along the way and refueled me (and forced me to eat a creamie).  Finally a tail wind the last 10 or so miles of that 33.  I went into the 3rd run thinking of it as a hike.  I did run the flats and downs but the hike plan was a good one and I was fairly pleased with how it went.  Hot as snot though and very hilly.

Whew!  4th swim and I didn't trust my exhaustion so we got my wetsuit on, no questions asked.  Smart move.  Finally got through that swim too (they weren't super duper hard, I was grateful not to be as jello as I expected for them, they just seemed to be a lot of work and take forever) and hopped on the bike for the last ride.  It was a good one and although I was watching the mileage and knew exactly how much farther I had, the last mile seemed to drag on forever.  It was a lonely ride as was the last run.  I was happy to see all of my family waiting for me at transition including my parents and baby.  I didn't want to head out on that last run but of course I did, I didn't want to quit, just wanted to be done already.  It was again hilly and was lonely and dragged on endlessly.  My body was so tired and depleted and my back hurt and I've never walked so much in a race as I did in that run.

But then the finish came, it finally came!  A sweet friend, Jason, the mens solo winner and something crazy like 6th overall waited around just to watch me finish and I heard him yelling down the street.  Ran through the finish with my husband and older 3 kids and I was done!  I did it.  The finish was quiet and nothing excited which is I think why I'm not super exuberant about the whole thing right now, but I think it's also becuase I'm very drained and tired and I have nothing to compare this too because it's so unique.  I'm proud to have done it though and not have hurt myself.  I didn't want to run into any scary sinereos where I would have to consider dropping for my own safety and thankfullly I avoided that.  It was very long and hot and hilly and hard but I did it.  I talked to so many great people on the course, made a few new friends, found a few blogstalkers (who I love!) and was inspired by people.  My kids were a joy to see along the way and my husband was amazing.  He was so positive and supportive the whole way and made sure I had everything I needed.  He was such an amazing race crew.  Thanks to TriUtah for putting it on as well.  Of course there are suggestions I have for next year as this is a new race, but I think it went well overall.  More details and pics to come!  Thanks for all the congrats people have wished me already on Facebook!

My crew