running "away from home"

so this is my second post today... but perhaps a bit more up to date. as some of you know, i signed up to do the hood to coast relay last fall. but, due to my deployment it didn't look like that was very feasible. that's when through discussion with the team captain we decided to try and have me do it anyway, but on a treadmill over here. after some organization and the green light from my command... i set up the run of my life... so far.

the hood to coast (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hood_to_Coast) begins at mount hood and ends in seaside... hence the hood to coast title. i was on the team "truth sneakers" a christian based team. i've yet to meet any of my teammates except for paul who is the one that got me interested in doing the event. as i developed my plan... i thought it would be really cool to have my brother scott run my legs of the relay at the same time i'm running them in iraq. he's been trying to get me to do a marathon or at least a half marathon for some time now.

now that all the pieces were in place all i had to do was go running. sounds simple right? negativo! i've run 6 miles before... but i've never run six miles 3 times in less than 18 hours. and training for this was difficult since i'm still required to work 7 days a week for a minimum of 12 hours a day. so i didn't want to overdo it before the actual event. and let's not leave out the fact that until a week prior to the race, i'd never really ran on a treadmill. i like feeling the outdoors and experiencing the full run outside. on the treadmill my biggest hurdle for the race wasn't the muscle fatigue or the overworking my heart or lungs... it was the insane boredom of running on the conveyor belt. it faces a window... but to keep the place cool they put tin foil on all the windows... so no view. the army has a saying "going nowhere fast" and that's what it was. also... i get motion sick when i get/fall off the contraption. my body still wants to move forward even though my legs aren't moving. i basically look like a uo senior trying to make it home after a "fun" friday night.

to time the event with the folks in oregon... i had to call them from the land line (as cell phones are few and far between here) at the front desk of the rec center and when the runner before me/scott was about 10-20 seconds away i'd run into the exercise room and start running. my goal for times on the run was to not have any of them be more than 45 minutes total. and in the words of our president... mission accomplished!


leg -- distance -- time
1 5.67 miles 40 minutes 27 seconds
2 6.06 miles 44 minutes 56 seconds
3 5.77 miles 44 minutes 26 seconds


my assessment of the run: i'm crazy and shouldn't be allowed to go through with crazy plans like this. but, it was an awesome experience and i'm really glad i was able to do it with my brother. i'm a big bundle of exhausted skin and bones today. but surprisingly i'm not too sore. it probably helps hauling my 50-60 lbs of armor and gear everywhere to help build up the endurance i needed to do this.

several oregon tv stations and the oregonian covered the story. hopefully they got some tight shots of my nike shoes and nike will send me some new/free ones. below are some of the links to the stories.


http://www.oregonlive.com/sports/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/sports/118810957256780.xml&coll=7

http://www.kval.com/news/local/9368251.html

http://www.registerguard.com/news/2007/08/30/c1.cr.welch.0830.p1.php?section=cityregion