More Important than a Relay? Grandbabies . . .

I've run about three of the Spokane to Sandpoint relays. It's been a hoot each time, thanks to a great bunch of teammates. We went by the team name of Velocity Deficit Disorder. While most of us were in the pokey, we're-here-to-have-fun group, a couple of the folks on the team could zip off some pretty quick miles to compensate. We were at least semi-competitive.

I'm missing this year, despite the fact that I'm finally getting back up to speed. I usually have a spot on the team because, at 3AM, I can still calculate the splits accurately. We're old-school and still do it on pen-and-paper. Pencil, actually. At 3AM, goofs can happen.

Like the exchange at a school in the middle of the night. - The teenager who was taking the next leg from me woke up about the time I hit the exchange point, flew out of the van shedding gear, grabbed the wristband, and promptly exited the parking lot - and into the woods because he was headed in completely the wrong direction 'out' of the parking lot. He did better after we got him turned around and made sure he was completely awake.

Anyhow, I won't be there this year, though I might show up for the start if there's some high school teams running. I'd love to interview them. Scott, the race director, said he'll keep me posted.

I can't commit to the whole thing, though. I have a pair of daughters, both former teammates (and hopefully again) who are both pregnant and both due in the same week. On the same day, actually.

It's bad form for the grandpa to abandon the daughters when they go into labor. We don't do much more than fetch coffee and pace hallways but we're supposed to be there. And given a choice between the two, my daughters, the new grandson, granddaughter win hands down.

I'll throw up a blog post on race day, night, day, and have the comments open. I'm not sure anybody's ever tried to live blog a relay. Might be fun to try.