Hey Folks,

I will be traveling and away from the computer most of today. I am heading to the cold mountains of Northern California for my third marathon.  My goal this time is simply survival.  I set my personal record (PR) at my last marathon which took place in Tucson, Arizona. I finished Tucson in 3 hours - 22 minutes.   The first marathon I ran was in San Diego and had nearly 18,000 participants.  My time there was 3 hours - 39 minutes.  I truly don’t expect to PR this race at all.

Many people often ask me how far a marathon is when the topic is at hand.  There are several different legnths but the standard distance, and the one I always run, is 26.2 miles.  There are half marathons (13.1 miles - tricky math) and super marathons that can extend all the way up to 100 miles.  Those are rare and the people who attempt them are half robot.

I do plan to blog as much as I can for the next few days before the race on Sunday, as I will have a good bit of down time and resting before hand.  But I wanted to be sure to let you know that I have hired a really talented blogger to help out at the Shack while I am gone and from time to time.  Her name is Rita Pereira and you will really love her work. She is extremely talented, snarky, and foreign (don’t worry she is not French).

If all goes well with Senorita Pereira I might look into hiring some additional writers here at BS as we look to continue to grow.  If anyone is interested then feel free to email me at Bumpshack@gmail.com.  If you want to include a resume or writing samples then please do.

We have had amazing growth here at Bumpshack over the past four years.  We hit 20 million hits earlier this year and expect to have that many in 2009 alone.  BS has been featured on several news outlets including MSNBC, Fox News and tabloids throughout the world.  BS covered the first Presidential encounter back in August between Barack Obama and John McCain.  I am currently working on several projects and with a handful of celebrities, behind the scenes, on some upcoming projects to be announced later this year.

I appreciate your dedicated support to BS and passing the word to your family, friends and co-workers over the past four years.  I am always open to new ideas and how to keep the site fresh and ever evolving.  If you have any ideas you want to share, then please send them to me at the email address I mentioned two paragraphs ago. Also, don’t hesitate to let me know what you think about the job Rita does on Bump as she helps out from time-to-time.

Thanks,

Joshua Holmes
Bumpshack.com