Call it quarantine, call it bad idea Friday, call it whatever, but a few months ago Bob came to me and said he wanted to put together a half marathon for all of the runners who were unable to run due to races being cancelled. Bob decided it was his time to shine and from start to blasted finished ran his own covert half marathon.....but I'll let him tell you about it.
I made this race HARD... On purpose... Because suffering is fun!
Bethany let me take over the blog to recount the race we did during the quarantine due to Covid-19
Over the past few months Joe and Kirk had been teaching me the trail system around Hawes and it's brutal.
We started scouting routes and found a way to get over 3,000 feet of climbing in 13.1 miles (turned out to be closer to 13.8, but whose counting).
That's half the Grand Canyon, and 2,000 feet of the climbing comes between mile 7 and mile 14.
We all metup in the parking lot of Walgreens. 15 of us attempted the race and 8 finished! Like I said, it was hard!
Bethany was doing her own journey with Jen and Russ who did a hike on the last half of the half.
We took off pretty quick and I found out I'd have no hope of keeping up with Kirk and the former ASU cross country champ who has 95% calfs by body weight. So, Gabe and I battled it out for an honorable 3rd place!
The race finished on top of EJ Peak, so people had to run past the car, beer, and shade in the parking lot to head uphill for another 1.5 miles to finish up on top then hike down.
It took legit courage to leave the last checkpoint and head uphill!
At this point, we were all in and safe. We had tracked everyone who dropped out and where they exited the course for the safety of water and houses.
Bethany, Jen, and Russ were still on the course and making their way up the final peak.
They rocked it and learned the number 1 lesson of distance, just keep moving.
Ellie puppy was a little hot after the run, and she was really happy to be back in the shade!
All in all, it was a great day with tons of awesome runners! It's going to be an annual event!
Here's to 2021 and making this a full marathon of suffering!
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