Elizabeth Sasseman: A Happy 2014

It's the end of 2014! This is a glimpse at my favorite photos of my favorite weekends of the year. It's the adventures and people that make all the difference in my life.

"We do not remember days, we remember moments." --Cesare Pavese

Attempting some of my first double black diamonds in March at Crested Butte! And failing miserably because I'm such a beginner! Crested Butte is beautiful though and I'd love to go back.

Moab Behind the Rocks 50 miler and 50k plus some jeeping! Nothing beats Moab, UT. You should all check out this race for 2015: http://ultrasignup.com/register.aspx?did=26375. I will be doing the 50 miler this year!

Climbing Mt. Hood and then racing Peterson Ridge Rumble 40mi & 20mi the next day. Jam-packed weekend of craziness in April. Oregon is another world. When it's not raining, it's probably one of my favorite places. Check out Peterson Ridge Rumble for 2015! http://www.petersonridgerumble.com.

Mt. Hood from the plane

Zion Traverse in May. 50 miles across Zion National Park, UT. It was very hot but gorgeous. Went up into the 100s during the day!

Bighorn 100 mile and 50 mile in June! I wasn't very emotionally or mentally ready at the start and decided to drop at mile 50. Ryan Krol made it to mile 83 and sadly had to drop. I decided to sleep and watch my friends finish strong the next morning! Jon Clinthorne came back and finished the 100 after vomiting for 2 hours straight. Ryan Case finished 9th at the 100. And Hillary Allen won the 50 miler. Great weekend overall for everyone! I cannot wait to go back for this 100 mile finish in the future. I'd love to do the 50 miler too. The course was challenging and very scenic here in Wyoming.

Hillary, Ryan C., Ryan K., Jon, Me

Coming into an aid station. Just want to stay by the fire!

Had to go through mud and standing water in areas

Absolutely GORGEOUS course

A group of us ran King Lake trail to Devils Thumb loop up in Nederland, CO in May. Love this loop. Still a good amount of snow when we ran it.

Hiked for a week on the Colorado Trail in July and finished up in Silverton, CO, just in time to watch Hardrock 100 mile race!! Our hike was so much fun. And we were perfectly happy wasting our energy carrying a bottle of wine & whiskey.

A yurt we found!

Inside our yurt for the night

Made it to Silverton! In our clean tourist shirts we purchased.

Spent the weekend in Silverton, CO following our Colorado Trail adventure. Ran up Kendall Mountain. Watched Kilian Jornet dominate at Hardrock 100 from the top of Handie's Peak. Helped out a few runners on our way down through a hail/lightening/death storm. Silverton is a perfect little mountain town.

View from up on Kendall Mountain

Kilian heading up Handie's Peak

Before the extreme storm came in

My long lost best friend Kate Carr from back home in Indiana came to visit in July!! We rock climbed like the old days and hiked up Longs Peak :)

Me & Kate!

Tyrolean traverse

Pretending the wall is the floor and the ceiling is the wall!

Long's Peak

And then mom, dad & Mitchell came to visit!! Lots of brewery tours and some fun hikes up Hogback in N. Boulder as well as Rocky Mtn. National Park.

Me and the brother!

The mom and dad

Do you see two Mitchell's?!...

Fun climb up the third flatiron in Boulder, CO with some crazy friends in August :)

View of Boulder, CO

Paced friends Will Vickers at Leadville 100 and Matt Curtis at Wasatch 100! So happy to see Will finish his first 100 and to see Matt Curtis win the Grand Slam (Western States, Vermont, Leadville, Wasatch).

Pacing Matt during the first half of Wasatch

Saw our friend Darla dominating!!

Wamsutter (Wam) entered our family!! Can't believe how small he was. Got him in Utah. His big sister, Honey Bear is thrilled to have a little brother.

His first poo with us

Just look at Honey Bear's face

Oh yeah, another 100-mile fail. This one I'm pretty upset about! Made it to about mile 70. And I bonked! I was wearing these super comfy fuzzy gloves and neglected to take them off every half hour to eat. And because I entered the "hair" division instead of the "tortoise" division because "tortoise" was sold out, I ran out of time at an aid station because I'd been moving too slow. But I had a great time. Good practice going thru the night without a pacer, it wasn't too bad. The course was difficult but beautiful out in Steamboat Springs, CO. I'd really like to go back to this race as a "tortoise"!

Preparing for the night

The rare restful weekends of slow runs and hikes and lounging around are always good memories :)

Ptarmigan Fingers and Lambs Slide!! A couple alpine climbing weekends in the snow!

Finally recovering from iron and B12 deficiency and down at nearly sea level in Indiana, I managed a 2nd place overall women finish at Tecumseh Trail Marathon in Indiana!! I enjoyed the "rolling hills" (in comparison to the mountains) for a change.