Christmas Surprise for Josh! Last Running Party of 2013!

I have been running consistently for 3 years now.  Josh Hansen is a friend I met a few months after I started going to races and meeting people.  Turns out he loves races and running with people probably as much as I do.  He has quite a phenomenal story he shares about losing 180 pounds and has a goal of running 180 half marathons or bigger distances before he turns 40.  His blog is pretty cool.  

Anyway, we kept finding over the months that we were running a lot of the same races together so eventually we just started planning to meet on the morning of and at least starting our runs together.  We didn't always run the same paces so it was very unlikely that we stayed together.  I think it's sort of an unwritten understanding that runners have with each other.  "You try your best and I'll try mine and we'll see each other along the journey, if not, then at the finish line."

  Sometimes, you don't necessarily have a goal and you are just out there to run for fun, and so you stick together.  I have a run a few races like that with Josh and along the way we have met some awesome and wonderful people.  

One of the friends along the way Josh met is Becca Wood.  A little before Christmas she had this brilliant idea to get Josh a present.  She wanted to find him something to hang his medals on.  He had commented to her how he just has them draped over a lamp?  He has run over 50 races so I'm not sure how that lamp is holding them all up.  So she approached me and asked if I wanted to go in on getting something like this for him.

 I had already asked Santa (AKA-My dear hubby) a few months ago if he would be willing to design and create a rack for my medals.  Mine have been getting shoved into a cupboard in my headboard.  So when Becca asked me about a rack for Josh I told her I would just have Mark make him one too.  We had already ordered all the pegs and had numerous ones left over and so after Mark created and figured out my 10 foot long rack, (yes, I wanted and needed one this big) he created one for Josh with the remainder pegs we had available.  I think it was about 49 pegs.  

On December 28th we had another big running party with our RA Facebook friends and so this is when Becca and I presented our Christmas present to Josh.  He was so excited, probably as much as we were.

Becca and I signed the back and wrapped a big bow around it and gave it to him in the parking lot.  He was so thrilled as you can see in his face.  It was absolutely awesome!

Now he can hang his medals with pride and his poor lamp can have a rest hopefully.

Merry Christmas my running buddy!

The running party we were having then continued at the outdoor track at the Orem Fitness Center.  

What a great group of people to hang out with on a early, cold Saturday morning after Christmas.

Cory Skinner, Kevin (Papa-our leader) Elise Kunz, Christy Heinecke, Monte Riding, Janet Huffman, Robert Merriman, London Riding, Josh Hansen, Becca Wood, Jonathan Crampton, Vince Massa, Susette, Ty Hansen, Gay Tregaskis, Cyndy Hills, Monnica Skinner.  

The track we chose to run on was exactly 1 mile around and so it was perfect for stopping to visit and snack and drink hot chocolate.  Gay brought her propane and stove and others brought some amazing deliciousness.   

This guy is a crack up. Ty Hansen.  We keep a tally on our FB page where we enter our mileage or any other exercise we are doing.  Since signing up for a 100 mile race in February I have really had to ramp up the mileage with my training.  One day he wrote on his mileage  Can't.....Catch.....Susette.....!  The mileage is NOT meant as a competition but as a place to be accountable for our workouts.  But man!  When somebody puts a little itch under me I can put a little competitive spirit out there and so I stayed ever so faithful to my mileage for the month.  I told him to try again in January to catch me.  Hee hee!    

After running and stopping, running and stopping the group was about done for the morning.  I think I had put in about 12 here at the track. My training called for a 28 mile run for the day so somebody said this photo looks like I am contemplating my remaining mileage (or contemplating not wanting to run my remaining mileage).  I ended up going home to my warm basement and finishing up there while watching a Christmas movie.

I sure love running with this bunch of friends.  We missed getting a photo with our other friend Mike Talbot who had to get the dog home and then go skiing.  What a rough life.