One thing I am loving about making this movie is that I am doing a lot of training runs with some amazing people.  This morning training run started at 8am at a favorite training location near my house...Rancho San Antonio up in Los Altos Hills, California.  

Rich, Chantelle Wilder, Christine Kennedy, and me before doing 4.8 miles through the hills.  Christine has had an amazing year.  She is one of the top 50 plus runners in the country.  In 2011 she won the Jessie Owens Award as the number one overall master runner in the US.  Rich ran to the farm and back with us. He didn't mention his calf which is good...

Joining us was 26-year-old Chantelle Wilder.  She is the co-founder of the Runners Feed.  She is currently running 80 miles a week.  In 2010 she placed 5th at the Canadian Half Marathon Championships.  In 2011 she ran a 1:16 half in New York.  She offered to pace me in one of my upcoming races. That would be great!

Mike got some good footage of us running through the hills.  He was on the bicycle right in front of us.   Christine talked about her store Athletic Performance in Los Gatos, shoes in general, her running and her take on my challenge.  We could have easily have run much further than 4.8 miles.  On Tuesday we are going to meet up (without the film crew) and get in 8-10 miles.

Christine and Chantelle shared some good advice on running up hills.  I handle the downhills well but I need to run uphills better.  Their advice is going to help.  Rich doing some filming on the top of this hill with the GoPro.

Rancho San Antonio is such a beautiful place to run.

We pass by this farm at about the one mile mark.

The trials here are just amazing and there are so many of them.  I have been running here since the early 80's.

Mike shot mostly with the GoPro this morning.  It is amazing what this little camera can do.

Mike wrapping it up with Waitman who rounded out the crew this morning.  My next race (number 12) is the Juana 8k Run on Saturday.  Photos by Waitman and me

I would be interested in hearing Christine and Chantelle's advice on running up hills... Are you going to post an interview with them?
Shari Mernett 3/11/12 1:53 pm

We will be posting an interview with Christine and Dr JoAnn soon. And Chantelle has a lot to share too!
Bob Anderson 3/11/12 6:28 pm

Perfect!! I am looking forward to reading it!
Shari Mernett 3/11/12 8:47 pm

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I run so much better when it it cooler...but that's nothing new.  It was also windy in Cancun on Saturday.  I was there for our Ujena Jam event (a model and photographer search) and we do the Bob Anderson 15k Challenge as part of our event.  Ujena's models and photographers are required to run/walk the 5k.  For the 15k we run 10k at 7:30am and then 5k at 9:00am.  Times are added together for scoring. 

Start of the 10k.  The winner is number 1096 (Benard), I am number 1071, Jodi is 1060 and Crystal is 1063.  Photos by Steve Manente Ujena Fit Club

It was great training with Jodi, one of our Ujena models who I have known for over 20 years, all week.  The first few days were really tough but it did get easier. 

Jodi and I warming up with David from Mexico City.  This is David's fifth Ujena race and he has ran in all three cities where we hold our races - Cancun, Puerto Vallarata and Cabo.

After finishing the 10k in 44:50.  We got a logt of media attention.  Everyone lost at least a minute because of the wind. 

This couple (John and Brandi) was in Cancun on their honeymoon.  They wore their running bibs when they got married after running a four mile race.   They are from New York.  They both ran the 15k Challenge.  I caught John at about the five mile mark. 

It was nice to have Televisa at our event.

Crystal, from Baltimore, is one of our top Ujena swimwear model.  She had not run a race nor included running in her workout routine until she ran the Ujena 5k five years ago.  Now she loves it and runs at least four times per week.    She is finishing the 10k here.  30 minutes later she ran and walked the 5k with her husband Kevin.

Some of our Ujena swimwear models on hand to give out the cash prizes.  We awarded $1700 cash to our winners in different age groups.  All of these models also ran the Ujena 5k...it is required.  I ran 21:57 for the 5k and finished first 60 plus...4th overall in the Bob Anderson 15k Challenge.  All photos by Steve Manente Ujena Fit Club

Adding to the challenge in Cancun was that I had taken over 27,000 images of our models wearing Ujena swimwear the five days before the races.  I have taken well over one million images of Ujena swimwear on over 500 models since 1984.  Photography is something else I love.  About 70% of the images you see on our Ujena.com website are taken by me.  I am the current CEO and founder of Ujena.  It is a family business and we mostly sell over the internet.  Keeps us busy.  Photo by Steve Manente at Ujena Jam photo tour number four.