I have just experienced by far the hardest day (and a few extra hours) of my entire life.  We started the 58 mile race at 6:30 am and me and two others just finished at 12:30 pm.  30 hours of continuous movement scattered with short stops at check points to pick up more water and throw some food down.  An entire day in the Saharan heat followed by many long hours marching through the desert night.  No moon of course, except the one that I was flashing everytime I had to make a pit stop.  I spent most of the night completely alone, sometimes not even being able to spot another runner in the distance.  Scary stuff, especially at first since apparently it does indeed take a rocket scientist to figure out how to use a headlamp.  For the longest time I marched on only being able to see 2 feet in front of me.  I'm not afraid of the dark anymore.  And I do want to clarify that after the 4th day, my title as runner of this race was traded in for one that just simply wants to finish.  Half way through day 4, super, gigantic, monster blisters began to form on my heels.  Really, they're huge!  So I shuffle along as best as I can, mostly on tiptoes to avoid touching the heels.  This shuffle worked last night until about 15 miles to the finish.  This was when the pain in my heels just got to be too much and I was faced with the choice of ending my race there or getting rid of the shoes.  And since I paid Waaayyy to much money  to get here, I tied the shoes to the back of my ruck and finished the last 15 miles of the race wearing only socks.  I was overjoyed at finally being able to walk without so much pain but it took a lot of concentration to make sure that my feet missed that sharp rock that was just waiting for my already tender foot.  Whatever works!
My apologies for not blogging yesterday.  I learned a hard lesson on calorie intake, 600 calories is not enough to get you through 9.5 hours in the desert.  I "done fell out" twice.  Had to be carried into the med tent.  OOhhhh!  Drama!  I was fine as soon as I got some food in me.  Lesson learned. Well, they're shutting down the cyber tent soon.  Thanks to all of you for you comments and support.  Love you guys!  And by the way,  what's with all the wine comments?  You couldn't be talking about me now???  lol

I didn't listen to the pre-race instructions and didn't realize that today would be 44 km, just a little over a marathon.  I'm not sure if ignorance was bliss but I did end up having a pretty good day.  Lots and lots of dunes, lots of sand in my shoes.  Couldn't understand how there could be any sand left to run on when all of Sahara was in my shoes.  So of course I now have blisters in places that I didn't know you could get blisters.  And some are so big that I might have to name them.  Gladys is under my big toe and she is a bitch!  Ended up running, or rather walking with a lot of support from my trekking poles (Thank you Glen for loaning them to me!)  for about 9 1/2 hours.  It makes it a little easier when there is so much to look at.  This is definitely one of the most  beautiful places in the world.  So happy to be here but am also looking forward to normal life which I have a new appreciation for,  especially the little things...showers, a bed, and of course a nice cold glass of cheap wine. 

Oh my!  Day 2 was a bit rough.  Had some stomach trouble from the beginning which stuck with me for half the run (rather a march).  Imagine having to REALLY, REALLY use the bathroom and you are on a flat terrain, with dunes far in the distance.  Finding a good place to go would have been as easy as finding a McDonald's over the next dune.  Maybe by day 4 I will hallucinate enough to see that McDonald's and I'll just use their bathroom.  Needless to say, it took me 10 hours to finish today.  And that is all on the energy provided by half a peanut butter bar.  Not my best day but tomorrow will be better.  The heat actually isn't as bad as I thought it would be.  I've had a few days running on . St. Pete Beach that were crazy hot.  Gonna grab a bite to eat and hit the sack.  Shout out to Max.  Miss you much!  Jeff, save me a spot at Abbey Road.  And to the lovely Canadian couple, thank you so much!

Day one in the desert completed and happy to say that I have survived!  I have become well acquainted with the heat, the sand and one creepy local that I think I may be betrothed to now.   The guys in the tent say that the temp was 45 Celcius, quick, someone do the math for me.  Until then let me just say it was friggin HOT!  The terrain varied from deep sand to even deeper sand.  My dirty girl gaiters were more like bad girl gaiters.  I could have built sand castles with what I emptied out of my shoes at each checkpoint.  But I've managed to avoid any major damage to my feet....so far.  What is hard to get used to is living out of a tightly fit backpack.  I always manage to forget something and have to unpack everything to get to it.  This process happens at least 4 times and that's just me preparing to make a run to the bathroom.  It's a little more complicated than deciding which way the toilet paper should roll.   Which reminds me....note to self:  start unrolling the "camp" toilet paper before you're squatting over a hole, in a tiny tent in the dark.  It now looks like a dog chewed it.  May have to do some bargaining for some more toilet paper.  I have pop tarts, I'm sure that's worth something.   Well,  just wanted to send a shout out to everyone.  To Max:  Love you very much and can't wait to talk to you again. To my family: I'm still alive and still carzy, love you all.  Jeff and the funky bunch:  really could have used the Monkey Butt chafing powder, gee thanks Jeff.  Till tomorrow!  p.s.  Thanks for the encouragement, Liz!

Hello Everyone!

This is a second attempt at writing my blog.  With my original, which was epic in length and content, instead of hitting the submit button I accidentally  hit the "send to middle earth and start over" button.  So here goes....

On Wednesday, I ran my last training run on the sandy, hot, humid beaches of St. Pete and Pass-a-Grille, Florida.  I will truly miss the long hours trudging through the sand listening to the same 64 songs on my not-so-high tech MP3 player.  It only holds 75 songs, so I'm almost at capacity here (back in the day it was truly state of the art).  I kinda got a kick out of being that crazy lady with the backpack on the beach.  So for these last remaining days I will be working five 12 hour shifts in a row (apparently I use the same part of my brain to operate a computer as I do to schedule my work days).  My idea was to use the treadmill in between shifts but my left ankle has decided that I need a break.

My focus now has switched to packing my ruck.  How on earth does anyone get these sub 20 lb rucks???  I have spent many hours packing, weighing, cursing and repacking.  The snakebite kit was the first to go.  Guess I'll have to take care of that calamity the old fashioned, cowboy way.  I also ditched the adorable, kelly-green pill boxes which I thought were perfect.  A plastic baggie does just fine.  I have actually found myself counting safety pins to make sure that I wasn't packing any extras.  I've squeezed the extra toothpaste out of its tiny container and deemed my new travel toothbrush as too heavy (opting for a smaller one of course).  I've wandered through the grocery store looking for foods that were high in calories but low in weight.  So now I've switched out my healthy, all natural Clif bars for Pop Tarts, I will now be munching on peanut candy bars instead of Shot Bloks.  I did manage to hang on to the important things such as the electrolyte powder, Gu gels and of course my coffee. I've gotten the pack down from 22 lbs to 19.5 without water.  Still to heavy though.  I may have to feast the first night.  I'm sure I can manage to eat my way down to a respectable 18 lbs. 

All I can imagine is that in less than 3 weeks this will all be a memory, one that will last a lifetime for all involved.  And I intend to hold on to each moment....except those moments when my blisters are being popped, my ankle is being wrapped, when nature calls, my bum being exposed, my hair becoming a tangled, sweaty mess and when the wind blows just right, getting a good whiff of myself.

I'm looking forward to meeting everyone and to begin this amazing adventure.  Safe travels to all!

Tina

Just wanted to make sure I can send this blog from my ancient and very cranky computer.