52.4 miles in his honor

Tonight, Lisa Hallett will run an ultra marathon to honor her husband CPT John Hallett.

Starting at midnight she will start at the Golden Gate National Cemetery in San Bruno and run 26.2 miles to the start of the San Francisco Marathon where she will run another 26.2 miles.

52.4 miles in honor of her husband CPT John Hallett.

 

Lisa’s courage, strength and powerful way to honor her husband is so inspiring to me.

 

Running was my way to cope with deployment and now I run to honor her, her husband and all our Fallen Soldiers and their families who have made the ultimate sacrifice.

Our Fallen Soldiers are not just a casualty number. They are husbands and wives, sons and daughters. They are mothers and fathers who will never get to hug or tuck their children in at night.

 

Click on the links below to read two powerful articles about Lisa’s ultra marathon journey.

http://www.contracostatimes.com/other-sports/ci_18561038?IADID=Search-www.contracostatimes.com-www.contracostatimes.com

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=%2Fc%2Fa%2F2011%2F07%2F24%2FMN8L1KCHD1.DTL

To learn more about Wear Blue Run to Remember click HERE

You don’t have to be part of the group to support them. All you have to do is want to remember and honor the Service and Sacrifice of the American Military.

This weekend, put on a blue shirt and run or walk any distance in honor of our heroes.

Fallen but not Forgotten

RLRF and decisions…

I finally was able to finish up my book Run Less Run Faster on my camping trip last week.

It really is a great book and I learned a lot from it. I wasn’t planning on doing a review cause I’m not really great at that sort of thing but if you anyone does want an overview of it let me know and I’ll try my best to make a post about the main points.

I have loosely been following the plan because I hadn’t decided what race I should run using the RLRF plan.

After running a PR of 1:53 at the See Jane Run Half Marathon I know I am capable of running faster. That pace felt good and I was able to pull off sub 8:30 the last 4 miles with mile 13 at an 8:05 pace. I have the confidence in myself and my abilities but the problem lies somewhere else….

You know how some people have a little angle and or devil on each side of their shoulders telling them what they should or shouldn’t do… well I have a little runner girl on my shoulder telling me. “Run another marathon. You know you want too!”

I kind of wanted to run one more this year. The only one I could run this fall is on Sept 4th. (Gene and I are running the City of Trees Half Marathon together and I want to run every step with him so that’s why I decided not to run the full for that one this year.) But at the same time I want to focus just on half marathons this fall so that I can get faster.

On my previous Run Less Run Faster post Alma from The Average Woman’s Running Blog had this to say about the plan….

That looks like some awesome results! That’s why I want to give the RLRF a full chance and follow it’s 18 week training plan to see how much I improve. I still have the little runner girl on my shoulder telling me to run the Sept full marathon, but as of right now I have decided to use the RLRF to train for the Las Vegas Half Marathon on Dec 4th.

I made a tab for my workout schedule you can find above. It starts next week. I hope to post weekly workout recaps to hold myself accountable for the workouts but also to be able to look back at my improvement throughout the 18 weeks. I only posted the City of Trees race on the schedule but I actually have a couple of other races I plan to do within the next few months. I know the running part won’t be a problem it’s the cross training that I slack on. I have 3 days of cross training on the schedule and one rest day but I know one of the days will be more of a strength training day (which I can do at home) and the other may be an easy or recovery run day.

I’m really excited to “officially” start training next week! This week I’m playing catch up on my miles for the month. I have hit at least 100 miles every month since Feb and I don’t want to stop the streak now! I’m almost at 700 miles for the year. That means only 300 more to go for my 1000 miles in 2011 goal!

 

How are you doing on your yearly mileage??

Any fun races you are excited to start training for?

Too legit to quit

 

Friday we celebrated my sister Crystal’s 30th birthday. I bought an outfit for the event the night before we left camping. Her theme for the girls was black and white dressy attire. This was my outfit…

Don’t mind the look on my face, it’s my semi pissed off and I’m not ready to take a picture yet look

We started with dinner at The Matador. I’m not much of a tequila drinker but Gene decided to try out the Tequila Flight taster (1 oz each of 3 different kinds of tequilas). Instead of lime they came with an orange slice with cinnamon on it.

She had mostly close friends attend her party but I was most excited to be able to hang out with her and my brother Jojo.

After everyone was done eating we sang happy birthday :)

After dinner we decided to walk downtown and have some drinks. As I was walking out I caught a glimpse of Santa on vacation. I only was able to take a picture of him as he walked away. He seriously had the beard, hat and looked just like him!

We decided to take a quick picture as we left The Matador. My brother is a year younger than me (I’m the middle child) but he is taller as you can see so we don’t call him little brother anymore :)

We headed to a place called The Lobby. The walls going to the bathroom were all chalk board so I wrote a message to my sister

This of course called for another sibling picture :)

After one drink we decided to head to another place called Montego Bay. At this place she got a VIP table and a VIP gift card for drinks!

We ran into our uncle there which was nice cause I haven't seen him in 2 years I think.

We ended the night with some dancing! I think she had a great birthday overall. Living in WA the last few years I’ve missed some birthdays and holidays with the family so I’m glad I was able to spend her 30th birthday with her :)

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The fun didn’t end that night though! The next day we headed over to the Boise Music Festival where we met her and some friends there.

It was an awesome event that had a couple of stages with different bands playing

But it was HOT out so I stayed cool by drinking an iced tea.

Little man decided to have an Italian ice cream to keep cool.

We also decided it was a perfect time to have an ice cream potato… yummy….

But the real reason I was there is to see me some MC Hammer!

“Too legit... Too legit to quit (hey…hey…)”

“U can't touch this
(Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh) Stop Hammer time”

Bet I just brought back some memories huh

Anybody every own a pair of parachute pants?

Did you know you can still buy them online?

I can honestly say I never owned a pair, I was only about 7 when U Can’t Touch This came out. I was still into all pink outfits (literally pink head to toe, it was not pretty haha).

Getting a fish hook in your arm isn’t fun!

So Wednesday after working 10 hours I went home, packed up my bag and we were off on the 2 hour drive to our camp site (Gene packed the rest of our things earlier that day).

Our neighbors had a reserved campsite, they had been there since Monday. We set up the tent, sat around the fire for about an hour then headed to bed. I was exhausted from a busy day!

The next morning was much better. I was up early and ready to start the fun day! But not without brushing my teeth of course…

My little man was already up and fishing

It was a cold morning.

Gene made us a yummy breakfast.

My handsome boys

Our beautiful view from the campsite

Doesn’t everyone look like this when they sleep on their hammock?

Hanging out with Dash

Reading my magazine… Runner’s World of course!

Gene wanted a turn too

This camping trip was one to remember for my little man. Before we left he had cut his finger with his first pocket knife he had just got earlier that day (he was trying to break into his piggy bang, which he knows the combination too!)

The next day he was fishing with the boys and got a fish hook stuck in his arm! He handled it really well and it wasn’t in too deep so they yanked it out with some pliers. This is him showing off his battle wound.

Later that day he was riding a razor scooter down a paved hill and crashed with only inches of his face hitting the cement. He scrapped up his legs and arms but nothing too bad. I think he was the only one to use the first aid kit this weekend.

After a long day of, well of doing nothing I decided to wait my turn on the hammock again.

I have my pillow, book, magazine and PowerAde zero. Gene even made a little canopy for me.

Later that night it was time for some smores!! I know it doesn’t look dark enough for it but it was already about 9 or 9:30 pm.

Dash was one sleep little guy. He also was very traumatized. I had to wrap him up in the blanket and hold him for a long while cause he was extremely afraid of any bugs flying in the air. I think a bug must have bit him. I don’t blame him for being afraid of them, they were practically as big as him! (Don’t mind the tired look on my face, I just need a few more hours of sleep)

Lilly on the other hand loved every minute of being outdoors. We unfortunately had to have the bigger dogs tied up cause the camp post guy was a jerk and strictly enforces rules. Even though our dogs were very well behaved.

Our friend Rob getting some kisses from his dog Tika

The next morning it was time to pack up and go so we decided to do some walking around the campsite.

It was so beautiful and peaceful

On the ride back home both my boys were tired and decided to use me as a pillow

We had such a great time. I really love making these memories with my family. Especially with my son. I want him to remember the summers we went camping when he gets older. It’s such a great way to just unplug yourself from the world, no phones, tv or video games. Just quality time with each other.

Hopefully we will get to go one more time before school starts next month.

 

 

I’ll post pictures tomorrow of my sister’s 30th birthday!

Gone camping, be back soon!

Going camping right after work today!

Will be back just in time to celebrate my big sisters 30th birthday!!

One of the best parts of camping is eating smores!

I'll be back this weekend to post some pictures of camping, playing dress up for my sisters party and from another run with Gene... I'm calling it "Our piles of miles together"

Our first of many miles together

Yesterday Gene and I went on our longest run to date together, 8 miles.

Saturday’s are Wear Blue: Run to Remember’s group run days (in Dupont, WA) so we wore our shirts for our run.

We started at about 10 am and it was already HOT outside! We ran along the Boise Greenbelt which helped keep us cool when we were along the river for the first 2 and last 2 miles of the course. The in between miles were the hardest cause they were in direct sunlight along a golf course with little shade.

At the turn around point Gene said his ankle was hurting. I think it was more due to the shoes but could have been cause of the mileage increase. He is following a Runner’s World training plan which made his first long run 8 miles. This is actually a big jump for his first week of training since he hasn’t ran in about a year. I should have paid attention to this before hand but we are going to look over the training plan and adjust the long runs to something that suits his better right now.

I knew his ankle was really bothering him at about mile 6. I felt bad cause he is relying on me to help him with his training. He is stubborn and if his training would have put him at a 13 mile run he would have done it and finished it even if he was hurt. He tries to compete with himself and wants to have the endurance and speed he had 2 years ago before he had deployed. When he was in Afghanistan he didn’t have much time to run or workout. But I know at the end of this training cycle he is going to be running circles around me again. That’s ok, he may have the speed waiting to be unleashed but I have the endurance :)

After the run we took a few pics as we cooled off. It was hot and I really was contemplating jumping in the river to cool off!

I had so much fun. And he admitted that he did too! This was of course a few minutes after the run. During the run I think he may have secretly been cursing me haha.

I can’t wait to do it again! What’s even more exciting is that we plan to try out some new trails I haven’t been too.

Do you run with your significant other?