Am I A Run-lebrity??

I had a lovely dinner with a runner friend this weekend. I'm not kidding when I say we have met MANY times, all of them unplanned and all of them during a race or post-race party. To actually be clean and sitting down and just chatting - it was wonderful. Let's do it again, Emily!! During our convos, which naturally revolved around running and our mutual love of Disney, we realized I've had more than one instance of being noticed at a race. I'm no Kara Goucher by any means, but am I accidentally a normal person celebrity runner now?? Let's dive into the past and see!

Let's go alllll the way back. Not to the beginning, but still pretty early on. August 2010 to be exact. I didn't find a photo of it quickly (which means I probably looked awful) but it happened. Solely for being runner 1069 I was called on stage for the "getting lucky" award at the Skirt Chaser 5K. Dirty! But hey, I won a gift card just for the pure luck of being #69 so I won't complain. Nothing too celebrity about it, but I did get to meet the head gal of Skirt Sports when she called me up. So just a tiny taste of runlebrity life!

Things took a BIG turn at the 2012 Tower of Terror 10 Miler!  Jessica and I put a lot of thought into our race attire and decided on Wizard of Oz! We gave ourselves the team name of Sister Witches, which I believe we made a song about during the race to the tune of Night Ranger's Sister Christian. Prior to the race we took advantage of the fun back drops of photos. Little did we expect to find this photo on the official runDisney facebook page after the race!

The Disney celebrity streak continues....

In 2013 during the Walt Disney World half marathon we ended up on TV! I could never find it online, so I can't share it. Shawn and I were running out of Cinderella's Castle, hit a photo spot, then continued on. It was then that a guy with a media badge and huge camera ran along side of us and told us to smile and keep running... so we did. Turns out family in Oregon saw us on a Fox Sports report later that day! Here is a photo moments before our run by moment of fame:

The next day we were running the Walt Disney World marathon, completely our guest to be Goofy. I'd like to note at this time you should NEVER run in cotton, especially black cotton, during ANY race - especially one that is 26.2 miles long in Florida and you have a cape. This moment of fame was smaller. We were coming up to the back cast entrance of Disney's Animal Kingdom and I heard a fellow runner say my blog name. From the back, while running, and because of this blog I was recognized?!?! CRAZY!!

Later in 2013 we ran the Prefontaine Memorail 10K, as per usual. We felt like doing costumes and just being silly. In 2014 at the race I couldn't help but notice something familiar about the official race shirt. Can I claim I inspired their design? Sure. Can I prove that? Well, no. But come on...

2013 was a big race year! In November I found myself in Arizona running the Women's Half Marathon. That race was so hot. Locals were in pants and sweatshirts prior to the race. I was comfortable in my SKIRT and short sleeve shirt. Why is SKIRT in bold? This brush of fame was because of my skirt, and I wasn't the famous one. A woman came up behind me and complimented me on my skirt. I turned around, was in awe and said, "I like yours, too!" and we both laughed... SHE and her sister are the creators of my skirts!! That was a pretty cool moment. I've seen the sisters other times as well, but this moment topped them all.

I nearly forgot about this next one! Thank you, Emily, for reminding me. Rock'n'Roll Vancouver was having a costume contest with their race since it was near Halloween. Well, gosh, if you insist! My first time in Canada meant I was going full Canadian with this one. We actually didn't run this one together, but did meet up at the last mile, which was perfect for this finish line moment! When we crossed one of the official RnR people was there with his camera and we had a spontaneous photo shoot, resulting in this promo shot they used later!

Little did we know that we would continue our celebrity streak the following month in Walt Disney World during the Wine and Dine races. We were up ridiculously early for the Jingle Jungle 5K race. And when we stepped into the bus that took us to Disney's Animal Kingdom for the race, well... we got a few looks for our fellow racers. Apparently our look was loved by runDisney, and we were their first tweet of the morning! Not only a tweet, but we made it (mostly Shawn) into their official video recap of the day's first race!

We didn't have any fame at the Wine and Dine half marathon that night really, but we did get recognized in the corral by a guy that was also at the morning 5K. That was pretty impressive considering we didn't go in makeup for the half and instead went as Pinocchio and Gepetto!

Video here!

Running had a sort of hiatus after this race weekend because creating a baby was more important! But eventually I was back racing here and there. I didn't have another brush with being famous until the 2018 Ragnar Northwest Passage. I was on my first leg of the race, and as I always do, I took a photo of the slap bracelet.  After the race Ragnar shared photos on their facebook page. What was the photo they used as their headline shot to get people to look? This one right below. MY photo! My finger tips are famous!

You'd think it would stop there, right? I didn't! One month later Lady Storm Squad was at the top of Mount Hood waiting for the start of Hood to Coast. What happened? Our whole team became famous when we ended up on the news!!

Video here!

Surely there can't be anymore, right? Well... that darn silver skirt proves to be lucky I guess. I was wearing it at the start line AND at the finish line. As it turns out that skirt is now in the official 2019 Hood to Coast race bible on page 16!! This might be THE most exciting all of of these. I mean there I am, at my bucket list dream race with the team I admire and was stalking the whole race... and now it is in print for this year's race. Pretty stinking awesome!

I swear I don't do anything to make this happen. I might dress in costumes and wear fun clothes, but I'm quite reserved and shy in race situations. These things just sort of happen! I wonder what will be next!