Brazen Racing's Bear Creek, 2014

This was Emma's first trail run back in 2009, and today it was her grandpa and grandma's first trail run!  We had great weather, starting off cool and warming up.  Sophie, Myles and grandpa stuck together, Em soloed it, I hiked it with grandma Val, and Brian ran the 13.1.  As always, everything race wise was perfect, no lines or problems with anything.  Excellent shirts, medals, bibs, food, packet pick up, shirt exchange, happy volunteers, and the wonderful race direction of Sam and Jasmin. And great company, too! Here's how it went, in pictures - Starting with a peek at the cool bibs-

 Grandma and grandpa both got cool Brazen sweatshirts, it was chilly before the start.

 Dad and Sophie eating Its Its

 Waiting for Brian to finish up his 13.1

 Emma getting her 2cd place in age division medal. Myles took 3rd.

 Dad and Val, Sophie and Emma

The above pictures were from my phone, below is from my camera-

 NotTHATLucas has some new creatures on his hat, pretty cool dragon flys!

 I got to hit the switch to start the timing clock when the horn blew starting the race : )

 Half marathon start

 Dad and Val are now "Brazen" runners!

 And we're off!

 This was the only time I got to see dad, Myles and Sophie on the course, this out and back section. It's usually very hot, but thankfully we had clouds this morning.

 Here is where the course gets "dicey"...as I explained it to Val. You have lots of runners coming up from behind, on a narrow single track, with lots of poison oak along the sides.  There's lots of stopping to let runners pass....and you have to get off the trail on the right side, which goes down into a ravine and was pretty slippery with dry leaves and junk....and is where the runner below ended up.  Val and I heard something crashing through the brush and I really expected to come around the corner and see dad (he's diabetic) down in the brush....

 But instead of dad we saw this dear lady laying about half way down the side. She is Janet, 76 years young. She stepped off the side and slid about 20 feet down the hill. 2 runners tried to help her back up, but they were also slipping and sliding in the dry leaves and debris.  Val and I helped pull the 3 of them back up onto the trail, but she was bleeding a lot from both arms and down the front of both legs. She was a bit stunned loopy, but recovered well with nothing hurting and finished, we stayed right with her and helped her along and down some tricky bits.  Her 76 yr old hubby blew by us flying down the trail with 3 younger ladies trying to keep up with him. He really was flying! He ran a 1:26 10k.  It was a pleasure to meet them both, what inspirations!!

 And then Brian finished. He finished in 3:15, which was quite a bit faster then I thought he'd be. This is a tough, exposed course with over 3000 feet of climbing. Nice job, babe!

 No, he didn't wet his pants.  He was in pretty good shape afterwards.

 Mrs. NotTHATLucas also did the 13.1 and found a not comfy spot to rest.

Unlike my gals, who just use each other as pillows.

We all had a great time! I'm so glad other family members finally got to experience a Brazen race and meet Jasmin and the famous NTL and Mrs. and a few other runner friends.

Thanks Sam and Jasmin for more great Brazen memories!