Bryce Canyon

 We spent a weekend with our IFTR friends at Bryce Canyon. We were all running various distances of the Bryce Canyon Ultra on Saturday. I loved it, and I can't wait to go back for more exploring!

Pre-race Hiking Day:

We got up on Friday morning, and Steph, Georgina, Mark, and I headed into the park to be tourists, and get some pre-race hiking done.

Georgina-Steph-Tricia-Mark

Navajo & Queen's Garden Loop:

Hiking this reminded me of bringing the kids here when they were little. You see so many things on this hike in such a short distance, so it was perfect for us. This park is so cool!

Going down Wall Street.

Tricia-Georgina-Steph-Mark
Wall Street

Hole in the Wall

The Garden

Shadow people!

So pretty!

Sunrise Point

Inspiration Point:

Viewpoints:

We stopped at all the viewpoints in the park.

Natural Bridge

Ponderosa Point

Yovimpa Point

Mossy Cave:

This was one of my favorites when the kids were little, and I loved it this time too.

The pretty waterfall.

Little Windows

We ate some lunch, dropped Steph off at the hotel to rest, and Mark, Georgina, and I did one more hike that was outside of the park. 

Birdseye Trail:

We loved this one. Just as pretty as inside the park, but without all the people.

Georgina

This made us laugh right out loud.

Cute little camel!

So pretty!

It was time to head back, meet up with everyone for dinner, get our stuff ready for the race, and get to bed early.

Bryce Canyon 60K:

We signed up for this race a long time ago, and it seemed like it would never get here. Stacy, Stacey, and Georgina ran the 30K, and Amanda, Steph, Mark, and I ran the 60K. It was awesome!

At the start line!

Amanda-Tricia-Steph-Mark

We had quite a sunrise as we started.

Amanda was having some low grade nausea through most of the race, so Mark went ahead, and the two of us girls took it kind of easy.

We started getting into the red rock.

The trail started getting really cool at about mile 19.

The Thunder Mountain section was the best!

A quick clip of part of the course.

I texted Mark to see how he was doing. He was about a mile and a half ahead of us. Amanda told me to go ahead, and she would catch me on the downhill. Little did we know, there was no downhill left. Just a TON of climbing. I took off to try to catch Mark. I passed SO MANY people on the big climbs. My Idaho training shined through. I saw Mark right when he crossed the finish line. They announced my finish right after him, and he turned around and looked shocked to see me. 😂 I busted it the last 6 miles! 

Mark's longest run EVER! The course was long, so he ended up going 39 miles! Whahooo!

We all finished! It was a great day for the IFTR runners.

This was a good run for me and Amanda to see how we'll do together on Beaverhead. I'm feeling confident, but we'll have to be way faster in and out of aid stations. We lingered too long in them at this race, because we were trying to give Amanda's stomach time to settle. But if we're both feeling good, I'm getting more confident that we'll do just fine. We run good together, and we keep a good steady moving pace.

Here are our professional pictures from the race. I love them!

Results:

39 miles

Mark: 9:23:49 (85th of 256 runners)

Tricia: 9:24:19 (86th of 256 runners)