Run and Tell That: April 2015

Thursday, April 30, 2015

Palmetto 200

OK. OK. OK. So the Palmetto 200 was one of the best times I’ve ever had. What an unbelievable 24 hours. Here’s a recap of what went down:

Thursday

5:30 p.m. We meet at my friend’s house to get into the van we’ve reserved for the weekend.

5:30 p.m. We get an update from Andrew who is picking up the van that the rental company doesn’t have any vans available… and apparently a rezzie doesn’t mean shit. (We are supposed to meet our other team members, van 2, at Cracker Barrel in Summerville at 6 p.m.—obviously not happening. )

6:45 p.m. The rental company tries to pass off a Ford Expedition as an acceptable form of transportation and living space for 6 people each with 3 bags, a fully stocked cooler, several blankets and towels, various running equipment and recovery items such as foam rollers and resistance stretching bands. HA. Excuse Alamo Rental, we need something much larger than that.

7:30 p.m. Andrews rolls up with a pimped out luxury van that Charles Barkley could do jumping jacks in and still not be close to hitting the ceiling. #winning

8:00 pm. We decide to get dinner at McAlister’s in Tanger. Good call. Delicious. Van 2 is already in Cola, wondering where we are so we send them this nice photo:

soooo....we're running a little late

10:00 p.m. We stock up at Bi-Lo getting bananas, granola bars, lots o’ Gatorade, water, and beer. Gotta stay hydrated.

10:30ish p.m. We arrive at our hotel in Columbia. Not even one potty break along the way. There were 3 girls in the van. #impressive

11:30 p.m. I fall asleep watching the Wofford Terriers do work in the NCAA Championship vs Arkansas. #conquerandprevail #weendeduplosing

Midnight-5:30am I got approximately 3.5 hours of restless, stuffy nosed, shut eye. I was too anxious to really sleep.

Friday

6:20 a.m.: The team meets downstairs in the lobby to get our Palmetto 200 shirts and our team shirts. Van 1 packs up our stuff and we head to the start line, Van 2 follows behind to see our first runner off.

7:00 a.m.: Our first runner, Guillermo, takes off wearing a reflective vest, a head lamp, and two “blinkies” because it’s still pretty damn dark out and he’s got a five miler through downtown Columbia. This shit just got real.

scrambled legs pre-race- G is all geared up and ready to go

7:00 a.m.—Noonish: Van 1 runs the town, covering 43 miles. Got stuck in the mud once. Danced the Bernie at a gas station (evidence below). Crushed our first leg and we are all jacked up on adrenaline and Gatorade. We hand off the baton (awesome reflective slap bracelet) to Van 2, say good luck and are off to find insane amounts of foods. #crackerbarrelforthewin #biscuitsorcornbread #whychoosesides? #both #carboload

3:00-5:00pm: Van 1 hangs out at Santee State Park, resting, rolling, stretching, until Van 2 finishes its first leg of about 30 miles, between 4 people. As we are waiting for our ridiculous amount of food at CB, we get an update from Van 2: Luke, runner 7, collapses into a ditch only minutes into his first leg. He eventually comes to and seems ok but obviously is out of the race. So Van 2 has to pick up the extra miles. We find out later that Luke has HBP and will need to see a cardiologist to determine if anything else is wrong. Scary stuff. We are keeping our fingers crossed.

5:00 p.m-11 p.m.: We run. Again. This time covering about 37 miles. I run around 9 p.m., there are no street lights and I am a moving hazard for people with epilepsy because I’m covered in reflectors and blinking lights. I make 1 kill at the end of this leg.

me adding my first kill. i was real excited #cheesin'

Saturday

Midnight-1:00am: WaffleHeezie in Moncks Corner. Van 2 is on the way to crushing 35 miles.

1:00am-4:30am: We don’t sleep. We try. We try SO SO HARD. But vans, regardless of how luxurious they are, are still not conducive to sleep, especially the sleep you need for a 24 hour race.

4:30am-10:00am: We run. Covering 33 miles. I make 2 kills. BOOM.

10:00 a.m.- 2:30: Van 2 covers the last 6 legs of the race, covering about 31 miles of Mt Pleasant, Sullivan’s Island, downtown, and back to Mt Pleasant to end at Patriots Point.

Saturday night after the celebration at Patriots Point, I came home and slept for an embarrassingly long 12 hours. The past 48 hours had been so hectic and so fun. Our van covered 111 miles in under 17 hours. This was a two day adventure I will always remember, I highly recommend to anyone who runs, and I can't wait to do it again next year.

just chillin' at McAlister's

Lauren just breakin' it down in the van

G is a phenomenal dancer

Santee State Park taken over my exhausted runners

loungin' at Santee

after we finished our night runs

trying to smoothly pass the baton to Andrew (I was not smooth)

Jamie and me right before one of my legs

i was cold

Andrew coming in hot

a little football action. we are all super athletic, obviously

like i said, we are skilled in every sport

G, Lauren, Me, James at a check-point

cracker barrel was a must. #nofoodleftbehind

this is what a smooth hand-off looks like

Jamie starting her 8 mile run like a boss

G crushing his second leg like it's nothing #areyouevenwinded?

"Screw it" became our motto after the Thursday night debacle

van 1 baby

holla from the way way back

van 1 all smiles after we finished day 1

adding my kills

DONE. #whendoirunagain?

so fun

what a beauty

scrambled legs finish photo

finish line photo- take two

just saying...

Sunday, April 12, 2015

Cruise News

Hey, remember that time I said I was going on a cruise? Like over a month ago? Yeah, well that happened. And it came and went and we're back alive. No crazy norovirus, no loss of power, no toilets backing up. Basically, it was a normal and enjoyable cruise. Five days was the perfect amount of time to be away. It was enough time to relax, read a book or two, get a short-lived tan, and then want to return to your normal routine at home.

We went on an older ship, the Carnival Fascination. But it was still really nice and it lives in Jacksonville, which was such an easy drive to make. I had no idea how close the port was. If you live in Charleston, you could decide you want to cruise on the Fascination one day and then be at the port that afternoon. Hey...anyone wanna go? Anyone?

We had two days at sea bookending two days in port. The morning of our first sea day was a little disappointing, weather wise. It rained from about 10am-noon, so we wandered the ship and played trivia. The Jones family is a hardcore trivia team. We don't play around. We take trivia very seriously and always, always walk away with at least one gold ship on a stick to prove our vast knowledge. This time, we won in "general" trivia, which means we are geniuses in a myriad of areas, including but not limited to geography, history, sports, pop culture, bad 80s music, and Disney princesses.

In Nassau, we spent the day in Atlantis. This was probably my favorite part of the trip. I knew Atlantis was going to be enormous and beautiful and fun, but it was all those things to the tenth power. Every surface was sparkling and fancy. There was a gorgeous casino and luxury shops on the main floor of the resort. Based on how gorgeous the lobby was, I can't even imagine what the rooms are like. I would have loved to get a tour of some of the suites. I did find some photos online of the grand luxury suites and they are unbelievable... and of course cost a few mortgage payments. I know that because the prices aren't listed online, which can only be bad. We spent about an hour exploring the aquarium which ran along the bottom of the hotel's lobby. There were some huge Groupers, like the size of mini horses and yellow mini sea horses the size of the banana runt. You know the candy, runts...? That's what the sea horses looked like. Atlantis is home to an unreal number of pools and water slides and we took advantage of the coolest looking slides that day. There was one that went straight down into the fiery depths of hell, I mean into a shark tank, really into a shark tank. It was called the Leap of Faith, and I'd say the name fits. The drop is terrifying and really does feel like its a 90 degree angle. You fall so fast that your back kind of comes up off the back of the slide. You fall for a second or two in an open air slide and then you get shot into a closed clear tunnel that's in the middle of a shark tank. It all happens so fast, but you can kind of see the sharks swimming around you as you zip past. And even if you can't see them, you know they're there... which might even be scarier. But really, it was awesome. My dad and I went on it three times and laughed our asses watching each other get shot out of the tunnel at the end. Good times. Just take a gander at this video and you'll get an idea of how awesome the water park is.

At Half Moon Cay, Carnival's private island, we did nothing. We laid in the sun and did nothing. And it was wonderful.

Oh yeah, I did swim once, just to say I went in the clear Bahamian waters and had silver fish darting around my knees.

The last day was another sea day, so we spent it outside enjoying the sun, catching comedy and karaoke shows, and kicking ass in trivia.

On the drive home the next day, we spent two out of the three hours planning our next cruise, because that's just what we do.

Here's the playlist of answers from the 90s music trivia game we played...and lost. You were given a snip-it of the song and then asked to identify it. It's a good list. The 90s had awesome music. There were some more songs too, but like I said, we lost.

1. I Want It That Way- BSB

2. Crossroads- Bone Thugs n Harmony

3. Hit Me Baby One More Time- Britney Spears

4. Fantasy- Mariah Carey

5. Gangsta's Paradise-

6. Say My Name- Destiny's Child

7. Never Gonna Get It-

8. Killing Me Softly- Lauren Hill

9. Iris- Goo Goo Dolls

10. MmmBop- Hanson

11. Butterfly- Crazy Town

12. Return of the Mack-Mark Morrison
13. Bitch- Alanis Morissette

Here's some more photos. Thanks, Gart.