{"id":327,"date":"2013-06-13T04:34:48","date_gmt":"2013-06-13T04:34:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/?p=327"},"modified":"2013-07-18T19:30:19","modified_gmt":"2013-07-18T19:30:19","slug":"hot-mess","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/?p=327","title":{"rendered":"Hot Mess"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last weekend I spent approximately 82 hours in a 15 passenger van with my Ragnar team, Hot Mess.\u00a0 We drove to Madison on Thursday, where we started a 200 mile race on Friday, ending in Chicago on Saturday evening.\u00a0 It was crazy.\u00a0 It was a hot mess.\u00a0 It was\u2026absolutely fantastic.\u00a0 So much so, that after taking our time leaving Chicago on Sunday afternoon to drive back down 55 south, we still weren\u2019t ready to part ways.\u00a0 Half of us went to Uncle Bill\u2019s Pancake House to grab dinner.\u00a0 We milked the weekend for every moment.\u00a0 I sat at Uncle Bill\u2019s nursing a lukewarm cup of coffee, with a half-eaten pancake in front of me for over half an hour, telling our waitress that I was \u201cstill working on it\u201d just to keep my teammates there a little bit longer.<\/p>\n

The basic concept of a relay is Run, Eat, Try to sleep, Laugh your ass off, Repeat.\u00a0 This was my second relay of the year but a completely different team running a completely different course means a completely different experience.\u00a0 One is not necessarily better than the other, just different.\u00a0 As a side note, my two teams have been the Smokin\u2019 Aces and the Hot Mess.\u00a0 So, when I\u2019m not with the rest of the Aces or the rest of the Mess, what am I left with?\u00a0 I\u2019m just Smokin\u2019 Hot.\u00a0 Haha.<\/p>\n

Anyway, I was saying, a different experience.\u00a0 We ran country roads, neighborhoods, trails,\u00a0city streets, you name it. This team was comprised of almost entirely St. Louis folk, with the exception of Tom, who we picked up in Madison on Friday morning.\u00a0 It was a nice balance of some friends that I know relatively well and others that I just met on this trip.\u00a0 We had quite a mix of personalities, which certainly keeps things interesting.\u00a0 I believe that people come into our lives for a reason and that we can learn something from every person who does so.\u00a0 I definitely learned some things this past weekend, and I\u2019m not just referring to the education I received on the definition of \u201cglory hole\u201d or how to jimmy-rig a Garmin strap with a safety pin or that there is a right way and a very wrong way to climb up on top of a van.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll find that on a team, there is always someone handing you a beverage at the end of your leg\u2026or I should say, almost always.\u00a0 We\u2019re still apologizing to Wes for not being out there to cheer him in at 5am. There\u2019s always someone to give you a hug when you need it or to \u201cfluff\u201d you as you get ready to run.\u00a0 Someone might even read you a bedtime story.\u00a0 \u00a0Or offer to spoon you.\u00a0 And the laughs just keep on comin\u2019.\u00a0 Especially when you run into Napoleon Dynamite on a bike.<\/p>\n

I have come to the conclusion, that no matter how different we are, people are all inherently the same on the inside.\u00a0 We all share the same basic need that comes down to being accepted.\u00a0 To know that each of us is enough\u2026just as we are.\u00a0 Even with our own hot mess going on.\u00a0 Even with our own individual quirks.\u00a0 And believe me, any time you put 11 people in a van together, you\u2019re going to discover each other\u2019s quirks. (Hopefully I didn\u2019t drive anyone too crazy with my tendency to recite movie lines incessantly) But you\u2019re also going to discover a lot of good things about each other too.<\/p>\n

You learn that people are willing to step up and take one for the team, even when they\u2019re tired or hurting.\u00a0 Like Gerry running part of Mark\u2019s leg with him in the heat of the day, after he had just finished his own leg. Like people who are willing to stay awake and drive or navigate in the wee hours of darkness.\u00a0 \u00a0Like people who are willing to run an extra leg, or maybe two.<\/p>\n

Friday afternoon, as we drove along the route, we noticed a distressed runner struggling in the heat.\u00a0 We quickly pulled over to help her.\u00a0 Despite the fact that she was stumbling along the road, she refused to give up. The heart wants what it wants and she insisted on finishing. \u00a0Also despite the fact that Dan was supposed to run the next leg, he was the first one out of the van to help her.\u00a0 Wes drove up to the next exchange to find her team.\u00a0 Kris gave her water and Gatorade, while John tried to get a cell signal to call the Ragnar folks. A few of us basically carried her along the route to where the ambulance was waiting for her because she absolutely refused to stop.\u00a0 I\u2019m glad to report we saw Angela later the next day.\u00a0 She had been released from the hospital to rejoin her team, but wasn\u2019t allowed to run anymore of the race.\u00a0 Apparently, she had not been informed that she wasn\u2019t supposed to exercise in the sun while she was on her new meds.\u00a0 It was about 80 degrees and sunny when we found her on that country road where there was no shade.\u00a0 A runner is a runner, and even though we compete against one another, we ultimately know when to put the competition on hold to help one another.<\/p>\n

Re-entering reality over the past couple days has been tough.\u00a0 I\u2019ve been in a funk since I got home late Sunday night, as I know several of my teammates have also been.\u00a0 We\u2019ve all got a bad case of the post-race blues.\u00a0 I love racing.\u00a0 But sadly, racing doesn\u2019t love me back.\u00a0 It breaks up with me every time.\u00a0 It waits until I am riding the high and then it says, \u201cLindsey, it\u2019s over between us.\u201d\u00a0 And then I find myself feeling empty and alone.\u00a0 The thing that has been my focus is now gone. It was better than I expected, but now it\u2019s behind me and I can\u2019t go back.\u00a0 For me, this was a unique experience.\u00a0 I got to run the final leg into Chicago, the city that I love and will possibly always consider home.\u00a0 I say it all the time, you can take the girl out of Chicago, but you can\u2019t take Chicago out of the girl.\u00a0 I\u2019ve been back to Chicago several times since moving to St. Louis, but this was the first time that I didn\u2019t see a single person from my life when I lived there.\u00a0 As I ran that final leg into Montrose Harbor, I listened to Fun sing through my yurbuds, \u201cMay your past be the sound of your feet upon the ground\u201d.\u00a0 Which is exactly what I was doing.\u00a0 It\u2019s time to let go of my life in Chicago.\u00a0 It\u2019s time to let go and focus on the next chapter.\u00a0 It\u2019s time to just let go\u2026<\/p>\n

And you know what they say\u2026if you love something, let it go.\u00a0 I can\u2019t go back to my life in Chicago because that\u2019s just the way it is, but I know running will come back to me, it always does.\u00a0 And I will be woo-ed to race again.\u00a0 See you soon, Racine.<\/p>\n

A final note to my Hot Mess teammates:<\/p>\n

Thank you to Shalini for having this idea.\u00a0 And for being persistent enough to follow through, no matter what!\u00a0 Thank you to Wes for immediately inviting me to be a part of this Hot Mess.<\/p>\n

Thank you to Dan, Gerry, John, John Vega, Kris, Mark, Shane and Tom for coming on board and being a part of this experience.\u00a0 I can\u2019t imagine a single second of the Ragnar Chicago weekend without any of you.<\/p>\n

Thank you to all of you for accepting this hot mess, otherwise known as Rambling Runner Girl.\u00a0 I could not be more proud to be a Hot Mess! Lots of hugs to all of you, and remember\u2026if the van\u2019s not rocking, we\u2019re probably spooning.<\/p>\n

PS-I\u2019ve noticed that my big toe on my right foot has been numb since Sunday.\u00a0 Does anyone know if this is a side effect of roofies?<\/p>\n

\"Hot<\/a>

Hot Mess, Ragnar Madison to Chicago 2013<\/p><\/div>\n

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Last weekend I spent approximately 82 hours in a 15 passenger van with my Ragnar team, Hot Mess.\u00a0 We drove to Madison on Thursday, where we started a 200 mile race on Friday, ending in Chicago on Saturday evening.\u00a0 It was crazy.\u00a0 It was a hot mess.\u00a0 It was\u2026absolutely fantastic.\u00a0 So much so, that after […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"aside","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[9,10,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-327","post","type-post","status-publish","format-aside","hentry","category-lessonsfromrunning","category-memorablerunningmoments","category-randomthoughts","post_format-post-format-aside"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4eO4v-5h","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=327"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":393,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327\/revisions\/393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ramblingrunnergirl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}