What the Blue Ridge Relay Taught Me This Year

If you know me, you know that I run the Blue Ridge Relay every year with a Mixed-Masters Team.  Every year I write a recap for my neighborhood.  Here 'tis:

This year, as you know, our beloved Mixed-Masters team checked off FIVE whole years of running a successful race.  Oh, did I mention we got FIRST PLACE for Mixed Masters in the state of NC?  We’re champs again!! (Nevermind that there was only one team in that category, us.)  We really know what we’re doing at this point.  Furthermore, we have this race SO dialed in, folks should probably hire us for consulting.  I joke about that but I’m not kidding when I say that with our collective intelligence and skills, we could run a small country.

So, you know how it goes when you get too comfortable in a thing.  I mean, what’s the fun in that?  Despite our thirst for good food and drink and our penchant for lavender towels and saunas, we like to suffer.  Why else would we ever run a race that is one of the longest and most difficult overnight road relays in the country, and arguably the toughest major 200+ road relay in existence?  What weirdos WANT to not bathe, not sleep, and run over 17,000 feet in ascent and over 20,000 in descent?  Well, quite a lot.  Folks came from 38 different states and 3 different countries to participate.  The teams are capped at 200 per year, and WE - WE - had TWO of them.  

Because (drummmm roll, pls) we decided to take along a kid team this year!  I think this idea was born from a combination of getting too comfortable with how amazing we are and the fact that several of us had kids who were seniors and this would likely be their only shot doing it with us.  So it started with these seniors (and their younger siblings who wanted to run), and then we started eyeing the youth of the neighborhood at parties, like some weird voyeurs, asking them and their friends randomly if they wanted to be sweaty in vans with total strangers for several days. 

Now here’s something I’ve learned to admire about these kids: some of them really, truly, didn’t know what this race was AT ALL when they said they wanted to do it.  

If you’re old like me, let that sink in.  What would it feel like, now, with all your decades of experience, to just say yes to something that you know nearly nothing about (except you know it’s physically challenging)?  I’m truly inspired, no cap. 

Preparations for this race start many months in advance, even with people like us who know exactly what we’re doing.  First, you have to FIELD the teams.  That means getting committed bodies so you know where to place them in the puzzle of the race.  If you have fewer than 12 folks, this drastically changes the math on EVERYTHING and drastically alters your training.  

Anyway, we fielded both teams by the skin of our teeth.  (That was a roller coaster in itself!  We’re always biting knuckles until race day, hoping to go with everyone in one piece.)

I personally was looking forward to having a kid team, and I put myself in a kid van intentionally to take care of my kid (who broke her ankle so couldn’t run but who wanted to be there), and to help make sure the kids were fueling properly and knew their routes, and to get some good documentation for our social media channel.  

I also took personal responsibility for booking the vans this year.  You might recall that last year we discovered that the Chapel Hill Enterprise leaned too hard into magical thinking, and it turned out that wasn’t enough to manifest the TWO sprinter vans we needed, so one van had to sink into the Bog of Eternal Stench and use a smaller vehicle to transport themselves and all their stuff.  They were knee high in putrid clothes and yogurt cups, but because they’re true champions in life, had stellar attitudes about it.  Well, I love cult documentaries (really - I’m an expert - ask me anything) but I didn’t care to rely on magical thinking again and decided that if we were going to need FOUR sprinter vans this year, it required advanced tactics.  Namely, it meant blowing the Chapel Hill pop stand, booking two months in advance at the flagship joint in Durham, and then (because I have saucy Italian blood), alternating calling in every week or so with standing strong-legged at the desk, eyes level with the manager, and making it crystal clear that that I didn’t care if they had to knee-cap other teams to do it, we NEEDED FOUR sprinter vans on the morning of Sept. 10 - we’d accept NO less.  The Durham manager assured me that they belonged to no such cult like the crunchy Chapel Hill branch, that we were dealing with the Big Dawgs, and Big Dawgs get it done.  Thank goodness manager Nas was right and they came through for us. Which doesn’t mean we all escaped the Bog of Eternal Stench altogether, but at least we had more room for the stank.

The weeks leading up to the race, Jason did an ungodly amount of math to figure out how to get pacing right for the kid and adult team to run through the night together.  If you’ve seen his spreadsheets, they’re now a thing of legend. A few of us are fairly certain he’s really a robot in a meat sack.  My proof would be all the times I’ve seen him sit, unblinking and still, communing with excel.  I’ll go out on an errand and when I’m back, he’s in the same position.  I poke him with a stick and still, nothing.  

In the preceding weeks, Jenny put together the largest, most complete first aid kits the world has ever seen - we could put whole pharmacies to shame.  It was so much work that I’m actually SORRY now to report that we had no injuries - no broken legs or explosive diarrhea (that I know of), no snake bites or bear maulings, no tape worm and no one needing to chug a gallon of pepto bismal.  It’s disappointing, really. Maybe next year, Jenny!  

Renee made great Sour Patch Kids swag for the kid team on top of the regular kind, and Becca did all the work of coordinating SO MUCH FOOD for everyone - buying it, assembling, packing it.  We had over 200 Becca’s Balls this year, a record!  I’ve never asked her how much time it takes her to do the food because then I’ll feel like I’ll have to help.  Can’t have that. 

Look, I was doing something FAR MORE important than food prep for a grueling race, and that was worrying.  Weeks in advance, my sleep was sparse, as I played out every scenario in my mind and worried about new ones that taking kids might present.  What if something happened?  Should everyone sign liability waivers with us? What if a kid - or a few - melted down and just refused to run?  What if they got lost or encountered a bear?  What if they got injured out there and we didn’t know where they were? These kids didn’t grow up using paper atlas maps like us, and internet isn’t reliable out there and signage is bad.  How would they navigate?  What if they didn’t gel as a team and it was just murder being stuck in a van with them?  What if some kids made fun of other kids for not being as fast?  What if they all stared at their phones the whole time and were lame?

Another fear I had as the race approached was whether or not they could physically do the race.  I mean, I knew that two of the kids could do it because they were proven entities.  Every kid we asked was athletic, but two were soccer players and even though most ran cross-country, I really wasn’t sure that they had run more than a 5k…EVER.  When Jason asked everyone to submit their 10k pace times, would they know what that was?  I know soccer players run a lot but did they have experience running continuously?  Did they know how to pace at all?  Would they just blaze out for two miles and then walk for 4 miles?  And I felt pretty sure that none of them had encountered monstrous inclines like those offered by the mountains of the Blue Ridge. 

So I did what I do best: I lay awake at 3 am, mind churning.  

This particular anxiety mirrors the stage of life I’m in right now.  I’m 45, with two teenage daughters.  Despite the fact that I intentionally limit my news intake (in order to preserve my mental health), my mind still perseverates on the modern bread basket of unknowns when you’re a parent in today’s world:  what will your kids do later and how will they support themselves?  Will AI take all the jobs?  What new challenges and moral conundrums will increasing economic disparity and our political and cultural climates bestow?  Is college even worth the $ these days?  Will the kids ever learn how to do their own laundry and be on time?  Will they learn to check their email and respond appropriately? How, how, how in the world will they be functioning individuals in this rapidly-changing world, when I - who had the benefit of growing my young brain without screen addiction - can barely keep up?  Some days I despair.  Maybe it’s middle-aged hormones, maybe it’s my proclivity towards existential angst, but some days I feel down about all of it.  

To be fair to me, I’m not just simply neurotic.  As race day approached, I had SOME reasons to feel anxious.  As it turns out, I found out later that one of the soccer players didn’t know his 10k pace because he didn’t have one.  He admitted to simply googling an average pace time and submitting that as his pace!  It was clear, even as the race approached, that some of the kids really didn’t know what their legs were at all - distances or anything.  Heck, some kids didn’t even seem to know what DAY the race was, even a few days out.  They were inappropriately chill.  And - they didn’t communicate at all over our massive text thread either, so we never knew if they were paying attention to anything. 

Now, contrast this to the adult team: many of whom had been faithfully training for months, knew exactly what was coming, and were hearting or thumbing every comment and instruction on the text thread, engaging in hearty banter and reporting their training runs..  The adults were over-enthusiastic, if anything, whereas the kids could have been swallowed up in a hole and we wouldn’t have known the difference.  

The adult team, if you couldn’t tell, is SO LOCKED in I find it very hard to believe that there is a single other team out there that is more organized than us or more prepared.  We have laminated binders with page protectors for every jot and tittle of information about the race, for heaven’s sake.  Most of us know this course so well that we dream about it.  We have drivers who know to turn at the big tree near the tractor - they don’t need maps.  We have enough ibuprofen to tranquilize an elephant and we have our own custom-made eye masks with our team name on them.  We have already solved EVERY problem before they come up.

Fast-forward to the day we drive up to the majestic mountain house, our stay generously gifted every year by OG runner Liz Barber.  We ate a big meal together, got everyone situated (26 people there! A record!), had our captain’s meeting, and then…the Savior for All Generations…we played “Among Us,” a game where you lurk around the house in the dark, a few “Imposters” tapping to “kill,” and then everyone has a raucous time trying to figure out “who done it.” Well, stuff this in your hat for when you need it next: there’s just nothing like suspicious squinting in the dark, ill intent, lying, alibis, and murderous intrigue to bring folks together.  You thought it was warm food and beautiful mountain views, but it’s really cabals and conspiracy that will do it.  Humans are quite predictable that way. 

A miracle began to occur, and we all started to gel.

This has gone on too long so I’ll cut to the chase: the van I was in (with high school freshman and sophomores), that I was so worried about, turned out to be JUST FINE.  

That Thursday night before the race they stayed up late, bonding.  As we wound through the mountains Friday morning getting ready to race, I could hear excited chatter in the back seats.  It wasn’t long before they donned Star Wars helmets and a viking hat, both for the van ride AND on two runs (something adults would NOT do!).  We ate copious amounts of candy and listened to free Spotify music that was barely passable as bridging the age gaps - interrupted every 3 minutes by (of course) Shingles commercials that featured an image of a sad and droopy looking older woman wearing just a sports bra.  We enjoyed rolling up into the parking lots at midnight, music blasting, windows down, intimidating other vans with trooper helmets on.  Pranks were played and ruses about identities maintained.  We found streams and creeks to wade into.  We laughed together and found our way through the dark together.  The kids were kind to each other, even as the night wore on and we were low on sleep. They absolutely did get lost some.  And the way they ran - SO FAST!  

I had adults pull me aside later to ask, “ahh, so, did YOU have a good time?”  I really did. James, my friend who graciously drove the van and myself, we had the BEST time. 

I learned some big lessons this trip - lessons that the kids forced me to learn.  It was great timing. 

1. Maybe sometimes the problem is me. Maybe I’m inventing problems that just don’t need solving.  Maybe the way I do things isn’t the way everyone needs to do them.  Heck, maybe I need medication! (Jenny…?)
2. Maybe, just maybe, these kids are going to do things differently in life, and that’s ok.  Maybe they actually don’t need ALL the things I think they do.  Maybe they will be creative in ways I’ve never considered or dreamed of. Maybe they WILL get lost some in life, but then find their way back. Maybe they have a lay of the land that I don’t have. 
3. Maybe, maybe, maybe things are going to be ok.  Maybe we won’t be eaten alive by robots or blow ourselves up.  Maybe the kids are addicted to youtube but maybe they also have so many strengths that we haven’t adequately acknowledged and many more we have yet to see.  

I have a confession to make and it is that I have probably watched the video of the last kid coming down the finish line 50 times, sometimes tearing up.  This is the soccer player who didn’t know his 10k time.  And despite the fact that we had no idea how many miles he’d ever run consecutively, we gave him the most miles to run in Van 2. His last leg in particular was awful because not only was it LONG (and at the very end of the race, when you’re really tired), but it had about 86 turns to it.  We gave him directions in an app, but to be honest, I think we all assumed he’d get lost (as well as EVERY runner for that leg) - it was just so hard.  As it turns out, he did get lost.  I perched at a lookout so I could catch a view of him coming to the finish line and waited a long time, trying and failing to do math with my feeble sleep-deprived brain, hoping to figure out when he’d show.  The minutes ticked by and he didn’t come when I thought he would. Mom-brain activated, I worried more.  Who knows where he was?  Should I call him?  A whole forty minutes crept by, as I waited in a pine’s shade, the fracas of the Brewery in the distance. 

And all of sudden, out of nowhere, he burst on to the scene!  I could see him, galloping in the distance, sweat streaming down, a look of determination on his face, arms pumping.  I shouted out to our crew and they were there, whooping with toothy smiles and raised hands, and we all chased him to the finish line.  In the midst of hollering and high fives, I heard him mouth to James, a look of astonished bewilderment on his face,  “Dad, I ran a 7:28 pace for 10 miles!”  

Not all unexpected things that happen are terrible - some are wonderful.  

Maybe we underestimate the power of open hearts and open roads, community, and Becca’s balls.  

Maybe we are blind to the strong mettle that lies beneath the surface for each and every one of us until it is called into service. 

I’m not going to pretend like one race solves all of our problems, but this race and this long weekend is a microcosm that reflects many grand dramas that play out in everyday life.  I peered into the looking glass, fearful of what I’d find, and I was heartened by my young exuberant team.  They bolstered my resolve to be stolid and steadfast, hard-working and uncomplaining and open, even in the face of so much uncertainty.  They reminded me that I don’t have to have everything figured out and that good surprises too are yet to come.

 There’s really nothing quite like doing a long endurance race, sweating and stinking and running through the night with a van full of life-filled teens, teens who don’t know what’s going on but they are joyfully there for it - and then they (along with the muscle-crushing hills of the Blue Ridge) just blow all of your fears away.