Jr. Ridge to River

SPEEDY CHEETAHS & RUNNING LIMA BEANS

Ridge to River is a very big deal for our little town. People flock from all over (Seattle and even Canada) to be apart of the Ridge to River race. It consists of a six legged race that begins with downhill skiing, then run, then bike, then kayak, then sprint to finish....It's a big deal. Anyway they have created a Jr. Ridge to River for kids to participate in. We put together two teams this year with five kids in each team. It starts with a run, a kayak, bike then ends with an obstacle course. It is very very fun for all the kiddo's. The boys team were The Running Lima Beans, and Jessica The Speeding Cheetah's...I made their t-shirts...well I made Jessica's team and Hunter's evolved to the making his to the Lima Beans...it's a long story.

Anyway we met at Walla Walla park with hundreds of other people and their kids and tried to organize the two teams. We went over and over all the technicals to make sure everyone knew what they were to do and when. We suited the team up with their time chips etc.. and promptly at 11:00am to all their posts. We waited and waited for Hunter and Carson our team runner to come down the race so they could tag our kayakers...all was well until......

I shouted to our paddler Alexis, "okay RUN RUN RUN!"

Before I could clarify that he need to run to his post and wait to be tagged...he ran down to the water and jumped in a kayak and started before Hunter had a chance to even tag him, he then went on to tag Hayden...you get the idea... oops!

According to them they came in first...(in actuality they should of been disqualified for starting before being tagged, but they don't officially disqualify children in these sort of things...thank goodness!) We chatted the whole way home about what went wrong and thought, "oh well the kids had a great time that is all the matters right?"....until....

We got a phone call later in the day from the race officials asking why our kids team came in four minutes before they even started...hmm...they noticed? Well they totally understood but explained that the newspaper wanted to print their picture tomorrow and they may print the mishap and that they were disqualified...not only was it their first official disqualification it was going to published...oh dear. Oh well.

RESULTS out of 44 teams in there age group:

RUNNING LIMA BEANS: Even with the 5 minutes penalty they came in 4th

SPEEDY CHEETAHS: 20th (not bad!)

FYI: Hunter and his team are completely unaware of any of this race drama, according to him, they came in first and they may put their picture in the paper tomorrow...let's just keep it that way for now.