For the 6th year (of 7), I trekked up to the mountain country to run the Tahoe Relays with my (former) Davis running Club. Running Tahoe Relays is not unlike Jimmy Stewart, except each leg is twice as long, the elevation is a mile higher, and it takes all day (even if you’re fast).
As in past years, I ran with the “D” team. Our “A” team was trying to win the co-ed title for the 7th year in a row! (and thus I should be on the “D” team) The race consists of 7 legs (8.8 – 12.4 miles each) running counter-clockwise around Lake Tahoe, beginning at 7am, with a time-limit of 13.5 hours. My goal at Tahoe Relays is to run every leg once.
Last year, I ran Leg 2 (the shortest leg), which concludes with 600’ of elevation gain over 3 miles (not easy at altitude!). This year, I took on Leg 6, which concludes with 600’ of elevation gain over 1.5 miles! The two legs I have not run are rolling hills, so I am getting the worst ones out of the way.
I flew up Friday night, hoping to find a ride with a team member (as usual, no one makes plans more than 1-2 days in advance). By 4pm, I had figured out a ride, and I waited for her to get off work. On the ride up, I tried to get her to talk about triathlons (she has won her age division at Hawaii Ironman the past two years), because I didn’t want her to be annoyed with me if I repeated past conversations. (You know me!)
Since we had 5 teams, we were spread out among several cabins. I would (hopefully) meet the rest of my team Saturday morning.
I slept very little Saturday night, as I was worried about waking up in time. I got up at 5am to lather myself with sunscreen and get dressed. Unlike past years, it was not miserably cold out, which maybe was a harbinger of doom! Like Jimmy Stewart Relay, Tahoe Relays tend to be “hurry-up-and-wait!” Since I was running Leg 6, I had 5 people running 50 miles before me!
The description of the race is not terribly exciting. For the first few legs, you have a beautiful view of the lake. If you are not running, you are either taxiing the next runner to the transition or assisting your own runner (“sagging”). I began re-realizing the elevation when I would breathe heavily after running 20-30 yards passing a water bottle to a teammate.
I bided my time, stayed out of the sun, and awaited my leg, knowing it was going to be very difficult! I had the added pressure of our team being in 15th place overall, knowing that we might plaque (since they don’t give out medals, I guess we “plaque!”).
Leg 6 has really very little view of the lake and zero shade. Also, at this point, you have virtually no contact with other teams.
Just imagine running along the street, with occasional cars zipping by, beautiful nature, and your team shouting your name as they screech to a stop, hop out and give you cold water or Gatorade!
Within a half-mile of the transition, I was passed by a college team. I knew that the “C” team (yep, we passed them) was close behind, because their sag squad passed and were mistakenly cheering his name for me. “Go Armand… er… Emmett!”
By the time I reached the last mile-and-a-half, I was walking up the hill and breathing heavily. Running would have only decreased my speed, contrary to what my teammates said!
Finally, I spotted the top, and while still uphill, I was able to stride it out to the transition area.
I handed off to the last teammate, and then we made our way to the finish to greet our team and find out how the others did.
The co-ed team won their division for the 8th year in a row. The Masters men took 3rd in theirs. The “C” team passed us and took 3rd. We had to drop out from Mixed (3 females, 4 males) to Open Men (5 males+), but we still ended up in 4th! There was still one team left out there – our all-women team – and they hadn’t reached the Leg 7 transition. So, we all went back and showered and then returned to see them finish 2 hours later.
This is a great event, in a beautiful setting, so I’m hoping that maybe AREC will have a team for next year!