Team Lazy And Guilted

In the middle of living the very sedentary lifestyle of the NICU, Ahna and I had an idea to help us be motivated to move more once we were no longer there all the time: to run in the Colfax Marathon…and since taking a couple of people who generally try to avoid running distances over a few feet towards running a full marathon is a feat that even NASA couldn’t accomplish in just a few weeks, we opted to sign up for the marathon relay.

This of course posed problem number 2: getting others to do it with us. We solved this problem in the only way that seemed reasonable at the time; no, not by graciously asking people that we thought would be natural fits, but by telling people that we thought would be more like our lack-of-running-selves. Interestingly enough, we were able to find a few other couples to fill out two teams, and the folks jumped right on being apart of the relay. When we had our team lunch/party, we came up with a name that we all thought suited the style of running and overall motivation: Team Lazy And Guilted.

We signed up as two teams of five people, so each person could run with their partner (there were three couples, one mother and daughter, and one set of friends that was due to one of the guys getting hurt just a few days prior to the race) and dedicated our monies towards The Children’s Hospital Foundation in memory of Liam. Whatever training could be done was, and each of us braced ourselves for our 10K or 5K leg of the race. It’s a great run because it goes right through downtown Denver and back creating a lot of things to look at…but I suppose that no matter where you go, if you go 26+ miles, you bound to have a lot of things to look at.

This past Sunday morning was the race, and Tracy and Olivia kicked it off nice and early in the cold and mist. Ahna and I followed with leg 2, a 10K run through downtown Denver and through several miles of cold and rain. We passed off to Jay and Karen who ran a mostly uphill leg out towards Edgewater, and they met up with Tallie and Melissa who came hauling back to Invesco Field. Mark and Kendra got the joy of finishing the race back into City Park, and we all met with them just before the finish line to run across together.

We did learn a few things from the race: cold and wet means cold and wet, but it’s not bad running weather. No matter your previous running experience, you can push through either a 5 or 10K when you set your mind to it. Running through a city is a lot better than running on a treadmill. You can still be super sore two plus days after the event. A long run in the early morning equals a nice nap in the afternoon. The first few sips of a free beer are awesome, the remaining amount is disgusting. The combination of lime Gatorade and banana is surprisingly awful. Finishing your leg of a larger race is extremely rewarding. Running a combined 52.4 miles in memory of Liam is stunningly emotional. And finally, running it all with some great friends is an unbelievable experience.

We’re all (except for Tracy and Olivia that are moving) are in for next year. We are going to be looking for a couple of new folks, and maybe if there is enough interest, we can do another team. A big thanks to Adam, who after tearing his quad muscle in a house fire earlier in the week, was able to come out and be our official team photographer.