Dress up night on the cruise

I am not a huge fan of the pictures on the cruise ship as they cost a ton of money...but Kristen wanted it as it turned out ok for the number of people in the shot.  I have to say, I feel a bit under-dressed as compared to everyone else...and the photographer made me lean in and I feel like I am doing a hunch-back thing because of it...but oh well :)  A great memory for time well spent catching up with everyone on the ship.

Jude's first martial arts tournament

Yesterday was Jude's first opportunity to participate in a tournament since he started American Kenpo Karate in January.  It was a fairly long afternoon after church first thing in the morning as we sat in the Whitinsville YMCA awaiting Jude's slots to come up to perform.

First up, Jude was competing in Traditional Self-Defense.   Dad was supposed to attack and Jude had to show the various moves that were responses to these given attacks:

And the result?

Then he went to do Forms:

And the result?

Ragnar - the end

So, final count:
The best team on the course ran it in 20:53:57.2
The best team in our category ran it in 22:28:47.6
We placed 73rd and ran it in 30:04:47.3:

Ragnar - end of leg 2 through leg 3

We completed those late night legs for our team in the early morning hours...to be honest, I have no idea what time it was.  We felt like we had done pretty well (we didn't even get lost in the van during leg 2) and now needed to rest up again before leg 3.  We were also pretty low on food and water and such, so...off we headed to the store and the final transition point.

We crashed in another high school gym and got several hours of sleep and then were up again for our final legs.

Jaden's third leg was a relatively short leg:

Jaden, decided that with the short leg and it going somewhat downhill...and it being his last leg, he would go ahead and see if he could go even faster.

With that, he took the bracelet from Garrett and took off.  The support van was waiting for someone to finish in the bathroom and then we got in the van to follow.  Now, granted, it was a short route and the van couldn't drive very fast as there were increasing numbers of runners on the road as we got closer to the finish...but Jaden beat us to the next transition point!  He ran the last 2+ miles in 6:32 pace and was waiting for me to jump out of the van to get the bracelet.

Worse, now I had to run back up some of the decline he had just run down:

I despite how I appreciated relying on the course's notes from my run the previous night...I do NOT think this was easy despite it only being 3.3 miles...that hill at the 2.5 miles was horrible!

And while we still needed to support our runners, Jaden and I were done...or so I thought :)

Jaden decided to support his friend Alex, who had a 9 mile leg at the very end by running part of it with him...so, he hopped out of the van and ran another ~3 miles with him to complete the race.

Ragnar - through leg 2

Well after finishing leg 1, we needed to get rest...so we decided to crash at the ice rink that was housing runners to eat some food and sleep on the concrete floor of the rink.

It was raining and we wanted to crash...so, we did.  We laid on the HARD HARD floor for about an hour and then the fire alarm went off and we were ushered out into the rain!  So, utterly exhausted we drove to the next transition point and got about an hour of sleep and then got up ready for leg 2:

I think Jaden was running around 1am?  Here was his route:

Jaden and his buddies have already been going at each other about their paces and times and such and were certainly getting a little competitive...

Jaden pushed this leg harder than leg 1 and ran a 6:50 pace for the 5 and a half miles and then transitioned it to me:

All I have to say is...it says it was a HARD leg, and I felt like a did pretty well for running around 2am or so.  I had no music, and no GPS tracker on me, but I felt like I had a decent time.  So, we are just going to go with that :)

Ragnar - Start through Leg 1

Van 2 got to start later in the day so, we didn't have to be down in the Cape until early afternoon...Garrett, our first runner took of for his run at 1:51pm.

Jaden's first leg was a short 4.86 mile jaunt, uphill:

  Jaden, while supposedly taking it easy crushed the first leg, running this nearly 5 mile trek in a 7:16/mile pace...and then passed the bracelet on to me:

My first leg was 4.7 miles...and while it says it was overall slightly downhill, with all the ups and downs throughout...it didn't feel like it!

I won't say I was "taking it easy"...I also did not run sub 8...actually, I didn't run sub 9 min miles, but I did finish :)

The Ragnar Relay Race

The 2016 Ragnar Relay Race - 192.3 Miles from Hull to Provincetown.  Jaden got it in his head that he wanted to do this with a couple friends, and then roped me into doing it with him.  To say this is a bit daunting is an understatment, but I imagine it will be a memory.

More to come on this, I am sure :)

Trying again

Time does seem to spiral out of control, doesn't it?  It has been nearly 2 years since I really posted here, but I am going to try again.  No pressure, but at the same time, I know Kristen and the boys have all said they wanted me to do this so that we have little tidbits of history to read.  So, going to do my best.