The Ragnar is a 12 person relay run. We will be participating this week in the Wasatch Back Ragnar which covers 188 miles between Logan and Park City Utah over the tops of the mountains! I will not be running - I get to have a baby this year remember!:) I am doing great, but so wishing I could participate in the fun! We have assembled two teams, one a Dixie High Cross Country & Friends team, and then a more mature team Smile-Adventures. B is leading one car (6 runners) in the Smile-Adventures group, and J the other group of six runners. C and L each have cars full in the Dixie Friends team, with drivers there being a bit of an issue. I will be driving the car with L and friends, while Coach Whitney from the HS will be driving and running in the other group. He is the only one old enough to drive in that car - problem while he is running :). We hope it is not a big deal to have others from these other cars help him out! As such, I will have my Jr team spread out between our three cars so we don't over crowd one car too much. I hope they will be good through this adventure! We have been coordinating all the details on this wiki site: smile-adventures.wetpaint.comSome of the runners we have had to push a bit to come participate. I hear myself over and over telling people how amazing it feels to have accomplished hard things, and this is one of those safe, hard, life learning tests that teaches so personally B's favorite quote:
"The human potential is the most magical but also the most elusive fact of life. Men suffer less from hunger or dread than from living under their moral capacity. The atrophy of spirit that most men know and all men fear is tied not so much to deprivation or abuse as it is to their inability to make real the best that lies within them. Defeat begins more with a blur in the vision of what is humanly possible than with the appearance of ogres in the path or a hell beyond the next turning. (Norman Cousins, Saturday Review, February 6, 1965, p. 18.)"
Ironically I have been considering this quote, and in trying to locate it on the internet, it googled me back to my own post from last year's race (linked here). This post brought tears to my eyes as I remember the tender mercies of that experience! I pray this year can be equally as touching for all involved in our two teams.
Today I was prompted to think of this as I read this blog of another runner who experienced these same feelings of awe of the human potential. I know why I love to participate in events like this, and why I seek them out to help form the character of my children! Thankful for opportunities to learn and grow.