Race Report: Ville-to-Ville Relay

For the 3rd year in a row, I ran on Team Quest for the Ville-to-Ville Relay, the 75-ish mile craft beer themed team relay from Asheville, NC to Greenville, SC.

This year our start time was 7:00AM, so we didn't have to leave Greenville quite as early as past years (when we had a 5:30AM start). Plus, no head lamps or lighted vests required! Bonus! :)

Team Quest at the start!

We got a team photo and hung out long enough to see Scott off on his first leg, then hopped in the van to get to the next transition zone. The mass starts were thinned out due to COVID... slightly less excitement but still so fun to be at an in-person race again. :)

Starting off at sunrise!  

This year, I had legs #2 and #8 - both of which I've done in previous years. Leg #2 is The Hillman, with the biggest hill (931 ft of elevation total) of the entire 75-mile route. I've been running Altamont once a week for the past few months in preparation, which is more specific training than I've done in past years, so I felt confident that I would beat my previous times on the climb. 

The Hillman climb

Climb times from history:
2018 = 21:21

2019 = 22:09

2021 = 21:10

It was still a really hard climb... I did not feel as strong as I thought I would after the training I'd done, but I also was holding back a bit knowing I had another run to do later in the day. I finished the leg feeling pretty good and we continued on our way from transition zone to transition zone.

We reached the first brewery transition around 9:30am and this is where the race starts to feel a little more like a party. 🥳

Kinda looks like a street festival 

Awesome breakfast burrito and a coffee blonde stout just set the right tone for the rest of the day. 

A few more legs, a few more transitions, then whatdya know it's time for me to run again! 

Scott coming in to the transition at the state line

Ready to go!

Next leg was a bit of a different flavor... similar distance, but this time aalllllll downhill. I'm talking 0ft elevation gain. 

Down the Watershed

This was a tough one. I did it in 2018 the first year, but hadn't since then. WHAT A QUAD-BUSTER. omg. You start off at the NC/SC state line and start cruising downhill and you think "oh this is nice!" and there's trees and it's pretty, there's a creek beside you, just gorgeous. And then 30 mins later you're STILL RUNNING DOWNHILL, and your quads start saying "heyyyyy this is hard!" 

But the hard effort paid off!! 10k PR!

I knew I would be close to 45 minutes by the time I saw the "1 Mile to Go" sign and checked my watch, but I couldn't let up on the gas at all as I came into the transition zone. Not sure I could have pushed that any faster but man it felt good to move that quickly!

After that, the fun of the day began (continued?) - recovery beer and more food at the next stop (the next runner had 9 miles to do, so thankfully there was plenty of time to hang out and enjoy the sunshine). Then transition at Swamp Rabbit Brewery in TR and we were getting close to the finish!

We got to the finish line and that's where the real post-race festival feel set in - SO great, the sun came out, tons of friends from the running community all around. Just a great time! 

Finish Line!!

And yes, we're already signed up for next year. :)

😊