Race Day: Saturday, September 9, 2023 – 5:15am With my pre-race routine perfectly completed, me and 150 friends shuffled through the muggy, pitch-dark early morning air towards the starting flags on County Road 7 in the outskirts of Finland, MN to start a 50 mile journey to Lutsen. I was so excited. 9 months prior, […]
Read MoreRace Date: Saturday, June 17, 2023 – 7:45am My path to Grandma’s Marathon started in a painful state on the ride home from Twin Cities Marathon 8 months prior. I finished with a personal worst of 3:47 at the marathon, unless you include winter trail versions of the race distance… in which case I finished […]
Read MoreRace Date: Saturday, May 27, 2023 – 8am What a race! I have rarely felt so underprepared in all ways, but the outcome was the opposite of my expectations. When the go-ahead was announced for the “casual roll” to begin, I expected my chain to fall off my bike. Instead, I cranked up the hill […]
Read MoreRace Date: Sunday, August 7, 2022 – 8:30am Another Brewhouse. I feel like I get pretty nervous or anxious before Brewhouse most years, almost like a dread. I was probably the least excited for the year’s Brewhouse than ever before. In the back of my mind I thought about bailing on the race altogether. I […]
Read MoreRace Date: Friday, July 15, 2022 – 8am My second year at Big Ole and fourth paddling race of all time started in a frenzy as I didn’t have a strap for my cell phone and 8 o’clock was only minutes away. I frantically searched through my car for the strap on the identical phone […]
Read MoreRace Date: Saturday, June 9, 2022 – 9am I was discouraged at the start line to see so few stand up paddleboards, but excited to try to compete and do by best. I signed up for the Vatten Paddlar 5 Mile paddle race in hopes that it’d be a fun training for the Boundary Waters […]
Read MoreRace Date: Saturday, June 18, 2022 – 6am Another one. This is such a fun race and it was highly anticipated for me. It is crazy to think that this was the first race I really signed up for way back in 2008 (for the 2009 version). I thought many times during my training cycle […]
Read MoreRace Date: Sunday, October 17, 2021 – 9:30am At the starting line of the Terribly Tough 10k, the very next morning after a solid yet taxing win at Wild Duluth 100k, I was finally sure that I would be able to make the distance. I didn’t know for sure if I’d run the whole way, […]
Read MoreRace Date: Saturday, October 16, 2021 – 6am The start line was pretty emotional. I stood there in the dark, probably the only one without sleeves. Kris gave me her jacket and I wore it for a bit, but I really wasn’t any less cold. And she was for sure more cold! As the race […]
Read MoreRace Date: Saturday, August 14, 2021 – 12 midnight The title of this race tells you everything you need to know. A day. Across Minnesota. The subtitle includes: for 240 miles of gravel road racing. I had known about this race from Nick Nygaard, who finished the race at least a couple times with his […]
Read MoreRace Date: Sunday, August 1, 2021 – 8am In the water of the first Brewhouse Triathlon in about 24 months, my last time at the race losing for the first time in 7 years or so and having not trained for triathlon hardly at all in the meantime, I was really nervous. I knew exactly […]
Read MoreRace Date: July 16, 2021 – 8am I was excited to try my shot at a second paddleboard race in as many weeks. I wondered how much differently pacing would play into a race of 17 miles versus 5. My upper back had stopped being sore a mere day earlier, and I was paddling at […]
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