Mini Mussel 2021- The Most Wonderful Thing About Tiggers

 And look at that, we have another race to report on!  Woah.  Is life  almost...normal again?  Whatever that is?  I suppose I'll leave that theoretical up for grabs, but either way, the 4th race of the season - Mini Musselman - went off full force last weekend, and of course, we have stories to tell!

Around Western NY, Musselman is really an iconic race.  It's been around since 2004 or 2005, and I popped my Half Iron distance cherry in 2008 at the race.  It's well known for its quirkiness, humor, excellent local support, and swag.  I've done the half iron distance quite a few times - 2008, 2011, 2012, 2014 and in 2019 with a giant PR - and the mini mussel - which is a sprint - twice - once in 2011 as part of double mussel and once in 2018.

The mini mussel is an in between distance - half mile swim, 18.2 mile bike and 3.1 mile run.  Ironman brand took over the half iron distance in 2020, and since I planned on doing Tremblant that year, I signed up for the mini with Greg.  

2020 happened...blah blah blah.  Here we were in 2021.  After Eagleman, I sort of forgot about this race, and to be really honest with you, went through a rough patch in terms of training.  I had conquered the bike with a crazy good result, but my run was sucking ass and I just wasn't having fun at all.  I failed a bunch of run workouts and got really grumpy with myself about everything - was it high expectations?  Lack of self confidence?  What?

I took some time to figure it out.  Bless my coach, who has the patience of the saint - he sat with me while I processed it and offered nothing but support, wisdom, bad jokes, and whatever I needed at the time.  With his help, I was able to suss it out - it was partially physical (as I adapted to aero, it was a new position that worked some under used muscles - namely my neck and glutes - that had to be strengthened).  As I got used to aero, these muscles developed and made the run easier.  It was partially mental - while I have always wanted to do well at the sport, the new world of overall podiums and World's qualifiers led me to a weird spot of placing way too much stress on myself to perform, and subsequently, wussing out and buckling under the pressure (note this was my self inflicted pressure). Lastly, the group I played with back in 2019 just wasn't the same - we are still close but everyone is in a much different spot due to pandemic, life, and injury - while it was the norm two years ago to go play at triathlon all the time....its a different period.  I spent way too much time thinking about the good ole days and looking backward, not forward.

Well, if naming the problem is a good first step, I was full speed ahead.  On my week of play I did just that - I played with some old friends, new friends, and enjoyed the hell out of every workout I did.  I went into mini mussel with no race plan at all - as a prep, I dyed my hair purple the night before, laid out my race kit, no plans to win, PR (who could at this weird distance) or do antything other than PLAY!

As life would have it, 2021 happens to be my year when shit falls apart before the race (I should stop there- I have four more tris left this year so maybe bad luck comes in 3's and I'm good to go now!) We had another family emergency that left us without child care for the race, but by the  grace of awesome friends and neighbors, we were able to go ahead - I am a lucky person to have such wonderful people in my life!!

Pre Race

Race morning dawned early at the ungodly hour of 3am - seriously - who makes a sprint start at 6:30??  Greg and I ventured out to Geneva, an hour trip, to check in and get ready to rock.  When we got there the venue was set up for the big race the next day - which means 300 bikes were racked in a transition set for 3000.  Yay for long transitions!  We scoped out the lay of the land and determined bike in/out and run in/out, set up shop, then connected with the Banter (who wasn't racing, but deigned to be our awesome photographer and sherpa), the Outlaw (who apparently has um, matured, in the past month and is unrecognizable - and now goes by Fred....or  Bob) and all of the RATs.  Once again, I got a ton of "You must be Rae Glaser!" welcomes, which makes me wonder what the hell people say about me that I'm so notorious feel like a superstar!

Pre race, Greg jumped in the water and tore a massive hole in his wetsuit right at the crotch (insert a "That's what she said" joke).  I forwent the swim warm up as we didn't have much time and lined up at the start, where athletes were let off 3 at a time, every 5 seconds.  I caught up with Kate, a fellow RAT who dusted me at Silver Serpent, and made a few jokes about pulling her on the bike if she pulled me on the run (I know - so weird to even say).  Before I knew it, we were off!

Swim: 13:23 1:40/100m

The swim was a pretty standard triangle shape - the nice thing about IM events is they definitely give you enough buoys to site off of!  For the half mile swim we had 7 buoys.  The water was murky and kind of gross but nothing crazy - at least it was nice and calm.  I swam most of the swim alone, and sighted pretty well save for the last turn coming in which veered off to the left.  I felt really comfortable and probably didn't push it enough, but given the way I set up my first race of the season with an over swim, I felt good about it.  I exited out and began the .3 mile to transition, and heard out of the crowd "You're third!" which was a nice boost - now I knew who I was chasing!

I headed into a really quiet transition and quickly donned my gear (yes, I put my helmet on the right way).  I had a moment of confusion as I debated which side to run out to bike out -- I am so not used to being in the front, so was a little disoriented.  I made a quick choice, went with it, and was off to bike!

Bike: 53:23 20.2/mph

I settled
into the bike pretty quickly, easily averaging 20-21 without much effort at all.  I passed local legend Curt Eggers a few miles in (don't worry, he passed me back at mile 16). The first half of the course seemed pretty easy - I had a little niggle in my left glute that concerned me for my run but I kept reminding myself to stay in the moment I was in and not worry about the run yet.  I put out little effort, reminding myself to save it for the run, but also kept the pace right where I wanted it.  As I remembered, the back half of the course was easier than the front half, and I figured I could average about 21 for the bike.  I was wrong.  We made a turn at mile 8, and had a nice descent (yes I rode in aero!) before a right turn along the lake to head back.  And then the headwinds hit.  Nothing scary, but going 18 with effort and thinking WTF.  This sucks. Well, the back half wasn't as easy this time!  Nothing crazy to write - I adjusted my cadence as necessary, paid little attention to power, went by feel, and finished out the ride.  As I came into T2, I took my shoes off and prepped to flying dismount, then second guessed myself at the last minute and regular dismounted.  Of course, my coach was watching - foiled by an audience!  He yelled out - you're 3rd girl! (This made sense, as I never saw another woman on the bike) and 2nd place is 30 seconds ahead!  Sweet.  LETS GO RUN!

Run: 22:48 7:17/mi

So, uh, here's where my true confessions come in.  I rarely blog about transitions because...I'm rather good at them.  HAH.  Famous last words.  I ran by bike in (thank goodness I've learned to take my shoes off on the bike as running barefoot is so much better!) and ran to rack my bike.  Wrong rack.  Crap.  I ran to the next row, and stared like an idiot looking for my run shoes.  WTF!  Where are they??  Finally a kind volunteer walked over and asked my number.  I looked at him like a total idiot then finally at my wristband.  He pointed out my spot (the NEXT rack over) and I ran my bike in, grabbed my run shoes, and exited T2 - with a time of 1:52.  WTF.  This was a rookie mistake.  And....it would cost me.  

But now was NOT the time to worry about that.  As I ran out of T2, I was smiling and determined to enjoy the run.  I saw my coach talking to Curt and he snapped a pic of me, rocking my run grin.  I then remembered I was a SERIOUS triathlete and dropped the grin, calling out something sassy to him.  I then immediately giggled and put my happy face back on.  I was determined not to look at my watch and run by feel - mile 1 felt effortless and I guessed about an 8:00 pace.  I looked down and 7:28!  Woot!  I thought about my neighbor Kelly and her well wishes before the race - to "run like a bouncing tigger!" Oh man.  And here we go!  

"The most wonderful thing about tiggers...is tiggers are wonderful things! 

 Their tops are made out of rubber!  Their bottoms are made out of springs!"

And you know the rest.  This song followed me for the rest of the race - and aside from the fact that its about 45 seconds long, it was a bouncy (uh trouncy, flouncy, pouncy) melody!  Heading into the turn around I saw Kate about a half mile ahead of me (not catchable) and Mary Eggers about 2 minutes ahead of me (well, maybe?)  when I hit the trek back, I made the rookie? mistake of looking behind me and saw two women about 15 seconds behind me.  Uh, no  I hit the gas.  Mile 2 - 7:21.  Yeah baby.  I was starting to feel it now - the hurt locker, the race, the adrenaline!

The wonderful thing about tiggers

is tiggers are wonderful chaps

they're loaded with vim and vigor!

Lets go!!  Mile 2.5, mile 3....I was almost to Mary and had no idea where the women behind me were but I was taking no chances! (Mile 3 - 7:05).  I passed the Banter/Coach and the Outlaw/Fred/Bob - one yelled out encouragement, the other something snappy and sarcastic (I'll let you decide which) and I gave it all I had!  I just missed passing Mary but held off the 3! women behind me who crossed less than 10 seconds after I did!  What a RACE!!  What a RUN!  I was ready to throw up, and also sp darned happy I was skipping.

Post Race

If we leave our hero here, its such a great ending.  Epic race to the finish - overall 3rd woman behind Mary and Kate is not a bad place to be in!  WOOT!

Uh....except that damned rolling start.  Apparently Mary had a bike penalty, which moved me up to second place.  Then...I found out all 3 women behind me started the swim after me, which moved me down to 5th.  Easy come easy go.  It was a crazy crazy race, and I would have loved to fight it out head to head.  Either way, there was less than 40 seconds between 2nd place and 5th - which - you guessed it - was my transition debacle! I can't believe such a silly mistake cost me, but it did.  I also have to laugh because overall, I was really pleased with this race and wouldn't have changed much - I probably could have biked harder, but I was so happy with my run split, and can't ruminate on my silly transition mistake.

Either way, Ironman places to five out.  Uh....in age groups.  Oddly enough, this race forewent overall placement and only did AG awards - which was weird, but par for the course with my podium luck, am I right?? I came in 2nd in my AG, losing out to first by 6 seconds - (learn to transition, Rae!) - and accepted my award with perfect professionalism and SERIOUS FACE.

Overall, a big success at Musselman - I have things to work on going into my next race, of course - which is either Summer Sizzler or Findley Lake - not sure - but I finally found my way back to smiling and playing triathlon, which is the whole point!

The day after the race, I recovered wisely by helping my buddy do his first century ride ever - I got in 82 miles with him (and he epically finished and went over to a 112 mile ride!) and it was four hours of fun. I  then came home and put on a party for nine 8 year old's.  Just another day in the life, right? :)  

Next up - some race in August.  TBD.  Time to prep for a few hilly half ironman's, including World's (OMG) and mainly - have a hell of a lot of fun along the way!

Level 8 IS GREAT!

We've been on the countdown here.  First it was seven...then seven and a half....then seven and three quarters....then it was a STRONG level seven and now its...LEVEL 8!!  ROb has officially levelled up!

....and I've finally given up on the fact that this kid refuses to stop growing.  It doesn't mean I have to like it, mind you.  But its happening.  And as time marches on, this kid gets cooler and cooler.  This year has been another big one of so many changes - loosing teeth, travelling to playdates solo via bike, a school year that was decidedly abnormal, and tons of fun, quirks, and craziness!  Every year is such a wild ride, and its so awesome to be right in the passenger seat, watching this kid navigate life (he reminds me he's halfway to really driving a car now.  Excuse me while I go have a breakdown.

Alright, I'm back!

 As always, it's a time for this mama to not only look back on the last year, but also to take a trip down memory lane to when Rob was born...One...Two...Three...Four.......five....six......seven...

And here we are, at the GREAT 8!

Size: 57 pounds, 51 inches tall. Right on par for where you should be.  I'm not surprised - you are active as all get out and love riding your bike, swimming and running (I wonder where you get that from??) and you east ALL the things .  Not just fun things like lemon cake and chocolate ice cream, which are your faces, but, like, 6 apples a day dude.  You love apples, bananas, berries, broccoli and all the healthy things too!  You can house up to 4 pieces of pizza and have such a healthy appetite!

Likes: Still a cars fan, but now you love to build them instead.  You LOVE Legos, and can build the 600 piece sets with ease.  You also love your bike (and can ride a half mile away to play with Callen too!)  Swimming, playing laser tag, Roblox, Minecraft, and Mario Kart.  You are an expert at building parkour courses and obstacle racing, and also love to play tag and Uno.  You loved your ninja warrior course and summer soccer, too!

You love your video games and really got into Minecraft this year, and the most recent obsession is Mario Kart and Smash Bros...you have a Mario costume you dress up in and go to town on your Nintendo Switch!

You still love dance parties and can really bust a move, and you're getting into strategic gaming - whether it be in real life or on the X box.  Watching your mind put moves together is just amazing, buddy - I love the way your process and the awesome conclusions you come to!

Dislikes: Bedtime and bugs.  Who likes bedtime?? (Well, Mom does but...uh...) and you hae all things bugs, especially bees.  You've changed your mind about some of last years dislikes - you are getting pretty good at drawing, and you love school now, which is AWESOME.  It's not always perfect, but your 2nd grade teacher, Miss O' Hara, was a godsend, and even though we had some bumpy times, you actually didn't want summer vacation to start!  Success.  You also might be coming around on that Biz thing....while you still remind us about the good ole days Pre Biz, you've found she's a pretty good Marco Polo player, joke cracker, ROBLOX builder, and partner in crime.  Mommy needs more Tylenol for that last one!

Sleep: You still struggle from time to time with night terrors and loud sounds, and kick like a damned donkey while sleeping diagonal when we share a bed, but you sleep through the night about 90% of the time - sweet!  You are still an early bird, and most of the time love snuggling with Mom while she sips her coffee at 530am.  I won't lie, buddy, that might just be the best part of my day - snuggling a half asleep ro-bear with my first cup of coffee in the early dawn.  Life is good. 

Eating: You still eat all the things!! You are pretty adventurous when it comes to eating and will try anything once.  You love spicy food, veggies, fruit, and all kinds of ethnic food, even TOFU!  It's pretty cool to watch,  You've gotten into cooking and love helping make dinner, whether is Taco Tuesday, Fry-day, or admittedly, when we nix cooking dinner and order your favorite pizza - bacon, ground beef and pepperoni.  YUM.

Milestones/Firsts: First Ninja Warrior class - kind of like a Tae Kwon Do meets Tough Mudder - and you LOVED IT! Earned STAR STUDENT of the month at Klem North - this was so cool to see!  You love school and have a good group of buddies, and its amazing to see a school give a damn for once - go KN STARS!  First time heading to a playdate on your own - you can ride solo down the road, which is awesome to see.  And this year you also learned to write computer code for Roblox, which is super impressive to mommy!  You still love science and math, and we cracked open the Harry Potter series for nighttime reading, which you also love.  We also started to play a new game - Wacky questions - which started out innocently enough with "What 3 things would you bring to a deserted island"?  Answer - food, water and you (Mommy) cause you'd get us off. Aww, bud.  Its cool to know you think that.  This game continues every night and is sometimes innocuous (fave holiday - Thanksgiving cause everyone's thankful) to "Mommy, if Daddy wasn't a thing, who would you marry?" (Yeah, I dodged that one!  LOL).  True to form, you are a deep thinker, dude, and I love you so much, my lil peanut! You keep learning more Spanish bit by bit and also have picked up on a new language...profanity.  Uhhh....can I blame Daddy?  No?  You're right.  I blame Mr. Senor - Matt, the school called and wants to know what you really call "Minecraft....".....

Best Moment: Probably watching you run off the steps of the bus the day you got star student.  I am ALWAYS so damned proud of you buddy, but that day you were absolutely exploding with excitement and it was infectious.  The good moments are easy, but those moments when you still run to me crying, or are scared, or Mommy's hug fixes it - are so precious to me, buddy.  I know I don't have a ton of time left where I can still "fix everything", so I take it when I can get it.  All the snuggles..  All the hugs.  All the, Mommy watch me's.....Love you buddy.  So so much. 

Looking Forward To: Soccer shots, swimming lessons, camping, and all the summer fun!  Also looking forward to the fall - you cant decide if you want to race this year, go out for lacrosse, do Karate, or take coding classes....but I'm right here for all of it.  All the jokes, the dance parties, Among Us games, Bike rides, Mommy and Rob runs....all of it.  Every singe day I am so darned grateful to be your Mommy, and it's been the most amazing ride I could have ever asked for.  I love you, dude!!

Eagleman 70.3: Two Outta Three Ain't Bad

Well, like most things, the good stuff is worth waiting for.

Not necessarily with respect to my race reports, just to be clear.  But in general, its a good phrase to live by.

Uh....or something.  As it usually goes, veni, vidi....maybe vici...then I went on to other things!  But after events I hoped to bloggy post but lamely social media'd instead....you all reminded me....I have a RESPONSIBILITY to you all.  I'm sorry.   You're right.  I'm dubious I can fit it all in to one post.  But I'm gonna try. I'm sorry in advance for your pain. 

When we last left our intrepid heroine (that's me, keep up) she learned the rookie mistake of not racing her own race.  Check.  I went through a few days of open water freak out - swimming in Lake Ontario in the mid fifty degree water - to convince myself that I could swim in open water without panicking.  Dumbass.  I can.  I just went out way the hell too fast.  Check.  It wasn't on my agenda to win Eagleman, so I'll just swim my own race and call it a day.  That's one hell of a race strategy.  My coach loved it. (Insert Sarcasm).

I travelled down to Cambridge, MD pre race Friday with my buddy Marcus, who I've known for over a decade, but sadly, spend little 1:1 time with.  Pity.  He's funny, a good road tripper, dubious but enthusiastic singer (like me) and has the same penchant for four letter words on the road.  We somehow spent 8 hours non stop chattering (most people think this guy is quiet - I digress!) and covered everything from life to work to kids to training and all the spots in between.  One of the big conversations was obviously around the race - I hadn't spent a ton of time looking at timing goals, so we worked on our race goals - after last weeks swim, I was conservative and guesstimated a 40 minute swim, 2:50 bike, and 1:45-1:50 run, and 5 minutes for transitions, leading to a 5:20-5:30 finish.  I secretly hoped to go a little faster on the bike, as I had *finally* nailed riding in aero, but had only been riding in it for abut 3 weeks (I KNOW, people, I KNOW) , so who knows.  I won't reveal Marcus's goals but the big one was to qualify for the 70.3 World Championship in St. George, Utah.  Holy goals.  He asked me if I was gonna go if I got a slot and I laughed it off.  Dream big but be realistic, people, am I right?

We got in late Friday night (Thank you Pennsylvania road work and traffic, you suck) and got up early Saturday for some course recon, packet pick up, testing out the open water and in general, pre race prep.  I was nervous as hell until a personal life bomb landed in my lap at 8am that I could do nothing about, which took away all my pre race nerves and in general killed my mojo for the race.  Annoying to vague post it, but important in the context of my mindset for the race (Note - I am working through said life hot mess and am resolving it, but being 500 miles away tabled the resolution until post race.  Good for race nerves killer, bad for eating, focusing, or, in general, giving a crap about triathlon).  Thank goodness for Marcus - he was an awesome friend and supporter - both in terms of life and fellow kick in the pants triathlete.

Enough of that.  We got our race numbers (new Ironman protocol for packet pick up made it so that we were rack buddies - this was awesome for me, at least - poor Marcus....and we added our stickers and brought our bikes to transition nice and early.  Apparently, neither of of knows how to apply stickers according to instructions, so we messed up the stem sticker.  The nice volunteer checking us in helped us fix it and the other two stickers were spot on - I joked with him that "Two Outta Three Ain't Bad" and he joked back, Well, Meatloaf thought so! (Little did I know that was a foreshadow!)

With business done, Marcus and I hopped a quick swim in the choppy choptank, grabbed an early dinner, then headed back to the hotel.  I'll admit I was a total killjoy the day before the race and Marcus was awesome, amping me up and being a great friend.  He's a true Iron-man and earned himself a little nickname along the way to boot (LOL).

Race morning dawned early, humid, but not too hot.  As it always is, the word on the street was all abuzz about the water temp, which came through at 75 degrees - wetsuit legal!  We amazingly found a parking spot, set up shop and took care of race morning business.  We joked around with our rackmates, and before we knew it, it was time to line up for our time trial start - which featured 3 athletes every five seconds!  COVID protocols banned a pre race warm up, which was fine by me, and when the gun sounded at 6:45 we were....hangin out on the beach.  Time to do the thing!

Swim: 37:30 (1:46/yd)

After last weeks hot mess of a swim at Silver Serpent, I was a admittedly a little nervous about this one.  The water looked choppy, the 2100 yd swim looked...long...hmmm.  Welp, lets do the thing! I lined up and before I knew it the volunteer gave me a GO and I dove into the drink.  The first hundred meters or so were all about acclimation and the water was definitely on the choppier side, but I found my rhythm and felt pretty good after about five minutes.  I swam from buoy to buoy without much fanfare (there were 15 total so sighting was easy peasy) and had a few encounters with some aggressive dudes who tried to swim over me and even copped a feel (WTF dude) but I maintained my open water calmness and escaped anything crazy, until about 1200 meters in when I felt a sharp pain and some throbbing on my cheek.  I brushed my face, confused, then it dawned on me that I got stung by a jellyfish!  Little sucker.  My face felt kind of sore and annoying but otherwise ok, and I feel like i earned my badass badge.  After approximately a zillion years (ok, less than 40 minutes) I saw the ramp to exit the swim and was off with a swim time that was spot on for my best goal - now it was time to run to transition and play on the bike!!

Bike: 2:38:56 (21.2 mph)

Mounting my bike out of T1 (where, yes, my helmet was on correctly this time, thank you!) I was grinning like a little kid, off to play on my bike.  I settled in pretty quickly - the first five miles or so were full of crazy turns and while i was instructed to look at my power only, I'm human and was eyeing my average pace.  My super secret goal was to average over 20 mph and it sounded ridiculous, but shoot for he stars, right??  The headwind coming out was a little gross but not too bad, and once we hit open road, I settled in and was averaging 20-21 with little effort.  I was passing people left and right and kind of giggled to myself thinking - WHO AM I?- but loving every second.  I took in Gatorade every two miles,  water every mile, stretched out into aero, and enjoyed the ride.  I hammed it up for the cameras, flashing thumbs up, shaka signs, and even a random I love you that was probably meant to be something else, but hey, what can I say.  I did love it.  I was IN LOVE.  Mile 30 and I was averaging 20.8 and I got the crazy wild idea that I might even hit 21 average.  I set the goal to be 2:40 for my bike split, which OMG who am I??  And rode the last 26 miles with that grin still all over my face.  I joked with racers I passed - got passed by Marcus at mile 50 (who got a flat at mile 2, poor dude) and aside from the zoomy disc wheelie guys that passed by me with ease, I never got passed by a woman on the bike.  Ever.  Woah.  Is Rae....a cyclist???  I dunno, but it was sure a blast!!  On the way in I got stuck behind two cars that had no idea what they were doing, which was about the most annoying thing ever, but I sat up, drank, and coasted into T2 with my sub 2:40 bike split, good for a 10 minute PR on the distance at the bike....and it was time to dance!!

Run: 1:54:06 (8:41/mi)

I zoomed out of T2 with so many dangerous thoughts.  Transitions were long due to the bid transition, distance from the water, and having to run around the outside of the whole thing to rack my bike, but going into the run, the race clock was at 3:21.  While I knew I didnt have a half marathon PR in me, I was thinking I could probably do a 1:48ish and come in at 5:10, which would have been a huge PR for me.  I sailed through mile 1 in 7:44....then totally hit a wall.  If you look back to my bike drop of and the title of this post and do a little basic math....the swim was good...the bike, epic.....well, 2 outta 3 ain't bad did not bode well for the run.  It was hot.  There was no shade.  and the way the course was mapped out gave us about 3 feet across for lanes during miles 3-10 of the run, which sucked if you got behind someone.  People were tired.  The layout of the course also featured about 15 easy turns and some pretty gross gravel and potholes in spots.  I was not impressed.  And I'm sorry to say I let the heat and my grumpiness get to me.  My neck hurt from riding in aero (Apparently, going from zero to 56 in three weeks might not be smart).  My glutes were on fire.  I just wasn;t happy.  The first loop I managed to average about an 825-8:30 split, and then the second loop...I walked.  A lot.  First through the aid stations but then the Ironman walk/run thing.  I stopped and let a super hot racer have some of my handheld (she was so grateful).  I played games with I will run until x....and then gave up.  I saw my awesome cousin who drove an hour to cheer me on and that made me happy....until I didn't see her approximately 5 seconds later.  Whomp.  I tried to take in some sugar, but it didn't terribly help.  

With 3.1 miles to go, I settled in on a sub 5:15.  I was at 4:48 for time and this was totally doable.  Yeah, no it wasn't.  I just didn't have it.  I settled in on a sub 5:19 (my old PR) and for the last mile, summoned every give a hit I had to run it in somewhat strongly, for an overall time of 5:17:44, a 90 second ish PR and a completely WTF smile on my face.  

Post race, I caught up with Marcus, who made up for his bike woes with a smokin 1:29 half marathon (Damn, he couldn't have carried me??) and an overall finish of 4:52.  He placed 10th in his AG and I came in 9th in mine, both of us in the top 10% overall for our gender.  Not too shabby for that shitty run and his crazy bike!!  We debated staying for awards but were told Marcus would find out via email and could accept a World's slot that way, so we packed it up and started the 8 hour journey home.  OOOF.

Once we finally made it home, three things happened.

The family crisis was resolved - quickly at first, then thoroughly within 48 hours. Whew.

Marcus got a slot for Worlds and is headed to St. George on September 18th!  WOOT!

And....I'll be with him.  Somehow, I managed to snag a spot as well....which was TOTALLY unplanned and I am still shaking my head in disbelief!  Thank goodness I have the best husband ever, who told me to GO FOR IT!  So I did.  UTAH HERE I COME BABY!

Stay tuned as we tap into WTF is wrong with Rae's run and how do we fix it....and for Mini Mussel on July 10th, next up on the racing docket!