Sleet in May?

Brad and I went on a date in January and picked up some desert at our local Panera Bread.  I saw a flier on the tack board and it was an advertisement for a running race.  Its a Ragnar style race, what is Ragnar?  It's what crazy people do, its a team relay race that is 200 MILES long.  Yes you read that right, 200 miles and no there are not 200 people on a team, only 12 at the most.  So each person takes a turn running and then you do it all over again, and again.  Three legs of running for each person, so you end up running anywhere from 13-20 miles depending on which runner you are.  Some of the legs are "easy" and others are "hard".  Lets be honest you are running 200 miles straight through the night with about 5 hours of breaks between your legs, none of it is really gonna be easy.  So what did I do?  I ran back to my table and told my husband how we should "totally do it!"  He looked at me and smiled, and said, "Uh, no YOU should totally do it, I'll watch the kids."
        So the next few days I thought about it and decided I'd put out the idea to a few ladies I only knew of, 3 or 4 others that would actually run that much and be crazy enough to go on this adventure anyway.  I put out a message at 9:00 and by the end of the day we had 12 women who were on the team, a team captain, and throwing around ideas of what our name should be.  So then I realized I should probably start running, I had 5 months to prepare and I hadn't gotten off my butt to exercise in over a year!  Having a baby really set me back on the exercise routine.  So I started running more and at first it was hard and I thought I had bit off more than I could chew but I stopped feeling like I was going to die after each run and could stand up straight with out toppling over which is always a good sign right?
        It was cold but each day warming up a bit more, I get cold easily so I would 4 layers of clothes in 40 degree weather and barely break a sweat I kept telling myself it's in May so the weather will be warmer......

     The week the race was we saw that there was going to be rain on the day it started great I thought running in rain will be miserable at least I am going to have a van of 5 ladies driving past me every mile ( we have a van following you for support) so I will keep going.  Then each day would past and the temperature was dropping and the night before we were to leave they had snow in the forecast, in May!   Seriously?  In May?  Crazy race, Crazy weather!  This is our first runner, Debbie who was amazing, the road was so slick I was praying she wasn't going to fall coming down the hill, and can you see the snow!?!  Crazy huh?

 Getting ready to run, not sure if I wanted to but I was standing there I was freezing, so I went and started my first leg.

 It started sleeting again and I was running into it so the van came by and asked if I was OK, I told them yes it just hurt my eyes cause I was running into the wind/rain/sleet.  So they pulled ahead and someone came out with some sweet sunglasses!  I ran with them to protect my eyes the rest of the way.  Really who does this for recreation?

When I ended my first leg I saw this view which was pretty awesome!  The Ozarks I could see could potentially be very pretty, so I decided to relax and have fun with my friends the rest of the race!

These ladies and I spent the race in the same van, while the other six were in the other van.  We had such fun times together!  You really get to know a person when you are stuck with them for 36 hours straight, and are pushing yourselves to the limit on no sleep!  

The rest of the group all together!

There were some crazy stories that I could share but I would end up righting a book so lets just say it was fun, but exhausting and I am so glad that I did it.  I am trying to convince some others to join us again next year!