May 16, 2016

Market to Market IOWA | 2016

Another year with this crazy crew (+1) means:

We were crazy enough to do it again
We tallied about 17.5 hours total in a vehicle
75 miles of race ground covered
Most of them were ran… I will let you ponder on that and make your own assumptions.
Our newest team mate is a bad influence. See #4
Or that’s what the rest of my team led me to believe. See #4
We love her anyways. See #5
Sunny days are better then cloudy days
Bridgette is SnapChat obsessed
I love taking selfies while running just to listen to my team bitch
Jenn changes her clothes often
Troy is the best driver, ever.
Sara doesn’t like to run but yet, she still joins us every year. That’s how cool we are.
Blair is full of the best one-liners.
Brad organizes this every year, so we really should question his ability to make life decisions.
Not sure what that says about us who join him.
Never underestimate Brian and his quietness. EVER!
With that said… pay attention to Brian. He will pull something over you. Or off him. See photo number 7 for reference.
Pay attention to the rule book. The after party tends to get moved. You’ll be incredibly disappointed when you walk to the former location.
Burgers at the end of the race is the way to go.
And Beer
And Ice Cream

Market to Market IOWA 2016 is a wrap!

May 25, 2015

Market to Market | IOWA | 2015

It takes a special kinda crazy to get your butt up at 3:30am to run a 75 mile relay race.

We are that kind.

Brian, Me, Sara, Blair, Jenn, Suzette, Brad

🙂

From Jefferson, IA to Des Moines, this crew killed some serious miles, formed new friendships, caught up on old stories, shared laughs and inside jokes, cursed miles and miles of long hills and created awesome memories.

Starting from Jefferson, IA where our first runner kicked it off at 7:30am

To staging handoffs

We ran our hearts out ❤

Saw some questionable costumes from overly confident men

Ran some more

Waited in ridiculous lines

Ran some more.

Got passed

Then decided to man up and pass him for a taste of his own medicine

Handed off sweaty trackers a total of 18 times. I mean – gross, guys.

Took photos

Took running selfies during a 4.9 miler, while texting friends and while running faster then my normal pace. Ya – I was jazzed at this point.

Let’s just say my Leg 2 of the day wasn’t near as happy. If you ran this, that word was appropriate.

I mean, really. WHO TAGGED THAT 4 MILER EASY?!?! M2M peeps… a 4 mile incline is NOT EASY!

#brutal

Anyway…. we ran some more

Exchanged some more

Celebrated with Jello Shots

And BEER!

And cheered people on

And celebrated the fact that some of us were DONE while others had to continue to run. 🙂

For a total of 11 hours and 19 minutes we ran, drove, laughed, ate, drank, walked, stood around and had the absolute BEST day.

And then we CELEBRATED!!!

Team Insanity … Team Nikkas… whatever the heck we named ourselves.

We owned that day.

Cheers to Market to Market 2016!

May 12, 2014

Market to Market Iowa 2014

Apparently I like to spend my weekends running long distances.

Who am I?

m2m

This past Saturday I added the Market to Market Iowa Relay to my list of races. M2M is a relay race between two cities, 6-8 person teams, 75 total miles, 17 exchange points and a celebrated group finish.

It. Was. Awesome.

We set up our groups into two 6-person teams so that each team had one person running every stage. Having a partner turned out to be a great idea. More time to chat and less time to focus on the rainy weather and the miles.

Meet my team:

Team Runaway Brides

And the other team

Off Like A Prom Dress

minus 1 because she was already running

Each team had a runner 1, 2, 3, etc. At each exchange point the runners would pass a timing chip off to the next group. This exchange happened for 17 stages.

6person

I was runner 3 and was teamed up with Tracy, a fellow fitness instructor.

Tracy and I found ourselves with very similar stories, which made the distances seem shorter as we had much to talk about. We also challenged each other by running at faster paces then we normally would. Our running distances weren’t bad at all, but when you combine the distances with long intervals of rest, your body tends to respond with stiffness.

Tracy and I

It took us a little over 11 hours to run the 75 miles. We managed to hit all the weather elements, minus snow. Cold, Rain, Wind, Hot. But, we had an absolute blast. I only knew four of the 12 runners so it was a perfect set-up as we had so much to talk about and learn.

Highlights from Leg One