One for the books...

Another triathlon has come and gone. I loved it! It was the hardest I've done thus far. The bike portion was KILLER. The first seven miles felt good...then came the hill of all hills. I looked up ahead and thought, "Surely we're turning off before we have to go up that whole thing!" Oh, not so. Not only did I have to go up that crazy hill, that was just the beginning. It would flatten out for just a bit and then I would look up and see that there was another 1/4 mile or so of craziness up ahead. The course description said that there was a 500 ft. elevation gain during the bike course. What it didn't say is that there was a 500 ft. elevation gain within about a mile and a half. Ugh! I kept hearing Ty's voice, "Dig deep, Dana, you can do it!" I was almost in tears when finally the thing came to an end. I felt really good on the run, which is encouraging to me for the half-marathon that I'll be doing in October. If I can feel good running after swimming and then riding the bike course of death, then I think I'll be alright.

You see the guy finishing just behind me? Well, I have a little story to share. I was coming to the last portion of the race and way ahead I saw this guy walking. My first thought was, "Good. Someone to pass." I'm kind of competitive but not super fast, so when I see that I can pass someone, that gives me a little adrenaline kick and some sort of thrill. I know, not very nice. There was another group of girls that were running slower and I had just passed them. We were coming into the home stretch. I was coming up on this guy who I had seen walking for quite some time and just as I passed him I touched his arm and said, "Run!" I don't know what surprised me more - that I said it or that he actually responded. He immediately started running alongside me. As we were running I said, "You push me and I'll push you." He sounded desperate and on the verge of tears and said, "I'm trying!" "You're doing great! Just keep going," I said. I have to tell you that I felt electrified from my head to my toes. Literally. It was physical. I felt so proud of this man I did not know. I was pulling for him and suddenly didn't care about my own race anymore. I wanted him to feel great about his finish. I was on the verge of tears myself, but for a different reason. The end of a race always feels emotional to me and this was adding a different element to that emotion. He gasped, "How much longer?!" I told him that we were almost there, it couldn't be more than .2 miles. Suddenly we came around a corner and there was the finish line, lined with people. I said, "Come on!" and we kicked it up and ran our hearts out to the finish. I heard his wife or some lady cheering for him as we were reaching the finish line. He and I didn't talk afterward - I don't think he could talk at that point. But it was a really cool experience for me. All I could think about for the rest of the day was how good it felt to help someone else to the finish line. It was a different kind of feeling at the finish than I've ever had before. I'm tearing up just typing this out and thinking about it. For the rest of the day I was also drawing parallels to the Gospel of Jesus Christ - to our life here on earth and how we must endure it well - to how we must look for those who feel like they can't go any farther and how sometimes we are the person that can't go any farther and hopefully someone will be there to grab our arm and encourage us a little bit farther. It might sound a little cheesy here, but it was one of those moments...you know, those moments where eternal principles come into play in our everyday lives in a powerful way. It felt incredible. I really felt that Heavenly Father reached down and gave me that experience. Maybe that guy didn't really need my help, but I needed - and appreciated - that little lesson from above.


Some post-race family shots. I especially love the one of Ty and Max walking with the bike. Love my boys. Max was so proud of us and kept asking, "Did you have a good run, Mom?", "Was it a good race, Mom?" We took a great babysitter with us - Jessica Kennedy. Max loves her and she is so great with both of the kids. She spent the night on Friday since we had to leave our house by 5:00 a.m. So nice to not have to worry about the kiddos while we raced.

...and if you don't want to smother these adorable faces with kisses then there

must be something wrong with you. :)