I support the charity Hope So Bright because children are of the utmost important. Children are the future of our planet. They all deserve to learn, be happy and thrive in a beautiful environment, whether they are totally functional and healthy or if they are disadvantaged, at risk or have a disability such as ADHD. Hope So Bright raises global awareness and strives for proper diagnosis for ADHD. All children deserve a fair chance in life. Hope So Bright makes this dream a reality for many children around the world.

All it takes to make me happy is one word: RUN. There is nothing better than the feeling of being in the mountains, perhaps running a new trail, running on a curvy singletrack, fresh air, lungs and legs screaming…pushing my body to go faster and further than before.
Challenging myself makes me tick. The mystery and unknown of how my body will respond to a certain amount of miles in a race or a long training run is fun for me.

Running is a beautifully simple sport. Slip on your favorite shoes and go!

Physically preparing /training is about putting in quality miles/no junk. You want to train hard, but also smart.

You need to bleed and suffer in training (from time to time), if you want to win because if you dont give your all, someone else will and you will lose. You cant win Ultras on luck. The harder you train, the more fun the race is. I am not a fan of tapering, so when I need to allow my legs to rest, I typically swim at my pool and spin the legs on the bike.

Physically preparing is the easy part. Since I love to run trails and mountains, I adjust my training according to my next “A” race. For example, my last race was Badwater Salton Sea. 81 miles across the Anza Borrego desert. I had to ‘up’ my mileage hardcore. I bumped up from 60 miles per week to 80 to 100 to 120 and eventually topping out at 150 mile/240k weeks. I felt great, my body adjusted fine to the bigger volume, but it left me no time to swim or mountain bike (which I love). In the end it paid off because we ran a 17:02, placed 3rd overall, 1st mixed team and I broke the Badwater Salton Sea female course record by 3 hrs 18 minutes.

From my personal experience in 15 yrs of running, I always do best when I am confident at the start line, thats how I have a successful finish. I usually like to go out hard and hold pace.

Mentally, especially at the start line you have to commit to finishing. Be confident and know the physical pain will come and go and move around, but as long as you stay positive and keep moving forward. Take care of your nutrition, hydration & electrolytes. Dont let it slip or else it will be too late to play catch up. I use Vitargo and SaltStick when I race. I like to go light and keep it simple. I recover with Vitargo-POST and foam rolling, gym work, mountain biking & swimming.

I have been coaching running since 2005-2007 for laguna beach high school cross country and also private coaching since 2008 for all types of runners, ultrarunners & also triathletes, if you are interested, I occasionally have an opening to take on a new client ! 🙂