Mountains to the Sound Relay

At the request of a coworker I participated in the road bike leg of the mountains to the sound relay To say things didn't start well would be an understatement. The first leg is the mountain bike leg that starts at Hyak and goes to a park a bit south of North Bend where the road bike leg takes over and goes to Redmond near Marymoor. I was suppose to meet the rest of the team at Hyak to pick up my packet at 7:15 where the mountain bike leg started at 8:00 am. Just before Cle Elum the car started vibrating, when I stopped to take a look I noticed the tread on the rear driver's side had completely separated. No problem, yank the spare, slap it on and Cory and I will be on our way. One problem, the spare that was taken from my old civic had a different hole configuration than the new Civic. So, we make our way to Cle Elum where we find a gas station to replace the tire. In the mean time I can't call any of my team members because as some of you know I ran over my cell phone while riding my bike and shattered the screen. Therefore I can't see any of the numbers. Not only did I not make 7:15, it was going on 8:00 before I got a hold of anyone to let them know what was happening. Our mountain biker started not knowing whether or not I was going to be at the transition. Finally, the tire got replaced and I made my way to Hyak to grab my packet. Following packet pick up I zipped to North Bend where as I was getting my bike ready as road cyclists began going by after the transition. So much for a warm up. I quickly made it to the transition where I hung out less than 5 minutes before our mt. biker came in. Once on the road I settled in and had a great ride to Redmond. The race finishes with a 10 mile kayak, 13.5 mile run, and 6 mile "sprint" run ending at Golden Gardens. Our team finished 7th in our category and 40something over all out of 168. And the best part, while panic dialing numbers I thought I knew I accidentally called the head of the school psychology program Cory is going through. She politely explained that her crazy husband was randomly panic dialing numbers, he seemed to understand. A lot of lessons learned on this trip, I have not actually adressed any of them yet, but some day.