Strike Out ALS Boston - HUGE Success

Saturday evening marked the beginning of Hurricane Irene and the end of Strike Out ALS Boston!

Thanks to the wonderful friends that came out on that crappy rainy day I was able to raise $949 for the cause, bumping my total up to $3,149 which puts me that much closer to my end goal of $5,000 for the year.

Papagayo was our gracious host for the evening, after an endless supply of chips, salsa and made to order guac guests settled into the cocktail rails for raffle time. Lots of people won with Cal and Zak and Ash and Den being clear lucky ducks. Mr. Abreu walked away with the muich coveted prize of beer for a year!

Below are some pre photos of the decor, it was a baseball theme to go along with Lou Gherig, Strike Out and  one of my Grandpa's favorite pastimes. He loved his Red Sox!

Sunday morning I woke to find my car covered with a ....

Lucky with only some body damage the weekend was sheer success! Because in addition to the awesome fundraiser I also jumped up to 6th place in my fantasy soccer league, take that boys!

Thank you to everyone that came out and supported the cause and helped raise a really awesome $949 dollars!

Wall Warrior calendars are still for sale from now until year end, $15 each if you didn't buy one the other night and/or won't be in attendance at the October Fundraiser.

I would also like to thank all my summer donators at this time, thanks to each of you I am over the 1/2 way mark and primed to reach or exceed my goal by year end.

A HUGE thank you to:

Uncle Jim & Aunt Rosalie

Aunt Barbara & Pat

Chip & Carol Hudson

Zak Fjeldheim

Donald & Nancy Small

Grandma Hudson

And Kobe (via Dad & Mum)

Check back mid September to see details of the scariest race I have to date and see where I'm at for a fundraising total going into my last 4 months of the year.

Enjoy the waning days of summer.

Boom ... Fiyah-Powah

Saturday the 20th was a HOT and MUGGY day. After a delicious carb-loading lunch at Antico Forno in the North End we hopped in the car and headed out to Westford, MA at the Puma headquarters. We checked-in under the tent and headed directly to the sample sale they were having across the parking lot. T's and shorts for $5, Pants for $10 and Sneakers for $25!!! Needless to say Lauren and I both walked away with a few items.

After our mini shopping spree we headed over to the car to get sneaked up and to commence some stretching. After work Lauren arrived we made a trip to the potties and then grabbed out spot in line.

Here are a few pre-run shots:

This was Puma's 1st Annual race, therefore my suggestions for them are many!

1. It's great that hint water sponsored your run, however plain ole water water is all that people want after running 5 miles in upper 80/lower 90 degree heat.

2. Are you serious with ONE water stop on the whole course? Dude, its August, you should have had a water stop at every single mile!

3. Pay a stipend to the two amazing women who stood in their front lawn and hosed us off as we ran by, your lack of water stops made those women my two favorite people that Saturday evening.

Those criticisms aside the race was a great time, the course was hilly but doable, challenging but enjoyable and the after party was a lot of fun, especially the conga line guy.

Lauren came in at a really impressive 54 minutes and something, I came in at a less impressive 58:49 (not even close to my May 5 Miler of 51:57) and work Lauren came in just after me. After we plopped ourselves on the ground for a few solid minutes of wheezing and sweat production we managed to get off our butts and snap a few post race shots to relay the level of exhaust we were feeling:

Then Lauren got a second wind:

After changing out of sneaks and into wonderful, amazing, beautiful flipflops we headed over to the beer tent. The announcement was made that the winner ran it in just over 24 minutes which I didn't even think was humanly possible! To celebrate his success we sauntered up to the beer tent and grabbed some brews to congratulate ourselves on making it in that heat!

With the 5 Miler behind me, crazy training time starts for the September Rugged Maniac. This race has not scared me in the least up until very recently. As of today I have exactly 30 days to whip my butt into shape to be able to scale a cargo net, climb barricades, army crawl through the mud under barbed wire and through tunnels and in the meantime be completing a 5K course. Should be interesting, I am forgoing putting a goal time on this one, just being able to finish is going to be my goal and finishing safely without injury at that!

Some housekeeping notes:

1. This Saturday is the Strike Out ALS Fundraiser in Boston at Papagayo on Summer Street from 1-5pm. Come out and enter to win some great raffle prizes. I'm getting it in just before Hurricane Irene terrorized the East Coast ... Bring it Irene!

2. I have officially signed up for my October race ... which has turned into race(s). I will be running on October 23rd in the Witch City 5K in Salem, MA. What would be my normal run is now become a training run because the following weekend I will be running the Devil's Chase in Salem, MA which is a 6.66 mile run along the Salem waterfront. Both should be a lot of fun!

3. In honor of the final month of my commitment, in honor of my Grandfather's 1 year passing and what would have been his next birthday and honor of my family who had been extremely supportive throughout this process; I have decided to run a race each weekend of the month up until Christmas Eve in December. This will be 3 races in 3 weeks all Christmas related runs in and around the area and if I could find a Christmas eve run I'd be doing that as well.

4. I am hovering at $2,400 in donations to date. After this weekend I hope to bump that up but at least $1,000 if not more. That being said that still puts me $1,600 away from my end goal. Between my fundraiser at home in October and the fundraising push over the next few months I hope to reach my goal of $5,000 by December 31st, please visit the fund page by clicking on the link to the right if you haven't donated already and would like to help me reach that goal on time.

Thanks for reading, be sure to check in after Labor Day for a training update and a preview of the course I'm looking at on September 24th!

Quick like a .... Puma

Tomorrow is the Puma 5 Miler out in Westford. Lauren called me yesterday to say, "I don't know if I can do this, I just ran 3 miles and wanted to die." To which I responded, I haven't run 3 miles since July 28th, I think you're gonna do just fine!"

Moral of the story is, once you get in the crowd, around the people and pop those earbuds in, its very different than hopping off the couch to go run by yourself. The motivation a crowd supplies is priceless for a fairweather runner like myself haha.

We're hitting Antico Forno for lunch to do some carb and protein loading before the race. Then we'll head out to Westford to register and hang out at Puma HQ until race time (5pm). My last 5 miler took me 51:57 so the goal here is to beat that time, which is approximately a 10:32 mile. This course will certainly be more hilly that flat as a pancake South Boston waterfront. I have my work cut out for me! We're hoping the weather holds out for us for at least the 60 minutes or less that we're running.

Checkout my 5 Miler playlist and feel free to snag it for yourself. She's a good one for a Saturday evening in the summer that will hopefully be sunny or at least dry-ish!

We Speak No Americano - Yolanda Be Cool & DCup

Barbara Streisand - Duck Sauce

Lights On - Katy B ft. Ms. Dynamite

The Time (Dirty Bit)  - BEP

Meet Me Halfway - BEP

Just Can't Get Enough - BEP

Knee Deep - Zac Brown & Jimmy Buffet

F'in Perfect - Pink

Felt Good on My Lips - Tim McGraw

I Need A Dollar - Aloe Blacc

Are You Gonna Kiss Me or Not - Thompson Square

Up Up Up - Givers

Country Girl - Luke Bryan

A Little Bit Stronger - Sara Evans

Am I the Only One - Dierks Bentley

Love Done Gone - Billy Currington

Just Got Started Lovin' You - James Otto

S&M - Rhianna

Right There - Nicole S.....

Super Bass - Nicki Minaj

You and Tequila - Kenny & Grace

Barefoot Blue Jean Night - Jake Owen

Check back in on Monday for my time, photos of the race and what I'm sure will be a handful of funny stories, because two Hudson's doing physical activity is always a recipe for hilarity

Camp Harborthon ... more like Hilly Harborthon

We could not have asked for a better race evening last Thursday the 28th, what amazing weather. We started out by missing our 4:50pm boat by 4 minutes, luckily the staff did not care at all and since the boats were running so far behind schedule most people were not on the ferry they signed up for. So after a leisurely boat ride across the bay we landed at Long Island and were greeted by swarms of local campers cheering us on and thanking us for running and for raising money. It was really cute!

This was our view of the city skyline from the island:

The island itself is absolutely beautiful, I wish I could go to camp there! We heard tell of some people that came over on shuttles from Marina Bay that the route was extremely hilly but we ignore it and chalked it up to talk. Well friend, it was the hilliest course I have experienced thus far! No sooner had you come off the base of hill you were staring another one down. And the entire run back though not as up and down was a 1.5 mile gradual incline that made me wish for the up and down I had been clamoring about the 1.5 mile beforehand.

Here are some pre-race shots:

Lauren and I on arrival:

The huge lawn, there were 1200 runners:

Denis and Greg all ready to go:

Needless to say it was the toughest course I have done and I did not beat my last race time of 34:22, I came in at 35:04 which was shattered by Denis who came in at just over 22 minutes, show off. The course winner was a guy from Tufts who ran it in just over 15 minutes .... a 5 MINUTE MILE! He is bionic and I think he should have been disqualified for not being human.

After we all crossed the finish line there was a huge picnic style dinner setup with burgers and dogs, macaroni salad, potato salad, grilled corn on the cob and all kinds of yummy goodies. And to quench your thirst wonderful Sam Adams beer to go around. The 4 beer tickets each runner received when checking in was a great bonus to this race in addition to the awesome cause, beautiful location and delicious post race spread.

Some post race shots of us being lazy and enjoying some brews:

And as soon as the sun was going down the view became that much more amazing from where we sat. The skyline looked beautiful and reminded this non-city city girl why she loves to live here.

After the award ceremony for the bionic man from Tufts the 80's cover band Rubix Cube came on on the main stage. Now I am not a lover of 80's music and even I thought this band rocked. They dressed like crazy people and sang crazy 80's songs and I am currently attempting to get Denis and Ashley to agree to change their wedding band ... negotiations are ongoing.

After a little whip it we decided to head back to the dock and grab a ferry back to the mainland. It was an amazing race and I look forward to participating next year!

August is another 5 Miler month and since my 5K time this go round wasn't where I wanted it to be I have 3 weeks of solid training to commit to. My last 5 Miler time was 51:57:00 and so I'll be looking to get 51:56:00 or less to count it as a personal success. In theory this should be getting easier right???? So check back in the coming weeks for training updates, the week before the race I'll have the usual playlist post so you can steal my tunes. I'll also have some updates and info on the August 27th Boston Fundraiser as well as the announcement of the October 16th Worcester Fundraiser!

If you haven't lately or haven't yet; don't forget to visit the community fund page and make a donation! I've got 5 months to go and around $2600 left to raise so help me get there by December 31st, 2011 by making a donation today!

Thanks for reading!