Relay Iowa is a relay race that runs from Sioux City, IA to Dubuque, IA, crossing the wonderful (and sometimes desolate) state of Iowa. This past year, that route included 341 miles of hills, flat lands, thunderstorms, and wild critters. The race starts in the mornings with a staggered start line and runs continuously through the night. You and your teammates, (at most 11 other runners), take off and switch at whatever intervals you decide. Thats what makes this race so different than other relays. Instead of being told that you are going to run a set interval at so-and-so time, you and your team break up the challenge as you please. There was one group that did 1 mile intervals through the entire race, and others that break the race into much larger chunks.

One of the nice things from this race is about every 30 miles, there is a checkpoint in a predetermined town. At these spots, there was a park or a school or something where you could get out of the car and stretch your legs or nap, or even sometimes shower (which let me tell you, was one of the nicest things even when the water was below 20 degrees). There were also preset locations where food was given. At the second checkpoint on the first day, we had a spaghetti dinner. A few checkpoints after that was a pancake breakfast, and so forth. There was also at these dinners a massage therapist who was more than happy to massage and take care of the runners.

I will say one of the toughest things about this race was the first day and a half. During this time, you were really running by yourself and relied heavily for your team giving you the support. With a staggered start, they want everyone to finish around the same time, but it makes the first half of the race fairly lonely. After this time, you were able to see other runners ahead and behind you, giving you that extra push to keep on trucking.

I would highly encourage anyone to do this race. Get some friends and some cars, come up with a goofy team name, (like: this sounded like a good idea in February, or WTF wheres the finish. These are both team names used last year). And go run across the beautiful state of Iowa.

Check out more information and pictures on my blog: http://theracecritic.blogspot.com/2015/06/relay-iowa-2015.html