Cancer, We're Coming to Get You!

A few friends, from the Better Halves Club, I hang out with on a regular basis invited me to run the Race for Life 5k (3.1 miles) with them this past Sunday for cancer research. We were told there were over 3,500 women signed up.  There were two different races, so we're assuming that number was for both races.  Either way...there was a lot of women out running and walking in support to cancer research.  I ran the race in memory of my Papaw Hedges, who lost the fight to cancer a little over a year ago.

We got there pretty early, and just chatted until the race started. It sprinkled a little before the race, but cleared up and became muggy.  At that point, we felt we were in Indiana with the sticky summer conditions.  Immediately after the race, the crazy England weather graced us with a few sprinkles, but quickly went away.  It was a great event, and the entire park was filled with pink in support.  They had a few pieces of entertainment before the race started.

Sarah, me, & Jo. 

So sad to see Sarah leave the UK in a few weeks and head back to the US for good. She will be missed! 

Jeff and another Rolls-Royce husband stood on the sidelines (women only race) to cheer us on and snap photos.  Not much to say about the race, other than it was more hilly than we anticipated.  We chatted and enjoyed one another's company, rather than racing to beat a personal best. We finished the race, and went to enjoy a pint together at a local pub.  All-in-all it was a fun experience, and hopefully more are in my future.

Celebratory pint after our run!

A big THANKS to Jeff Hansen and Sarah Henkle for snapping most of these photos and sharing them with me!

Centre Court Bound: Wimbledon 2014

It would be pretty funny to be a fly on the wall in our house the Sunday before heading to Wimbledon on Tuesday (June 24th). We really wanted Centre Court tickets so we would be able to see the "big names" play.  Jeff definitely did his research on the topic of getting tickets. Our original plan was to stand in "The Queue" which is basically like camping in a large line for tickets.  I was not really feeling this idea considering right after Wimbledon we're heading for the United States for 2-weeks. There was just a lot going on. Because of Jeff's researching skills, he thought we may have a chance to get tickets from Ticketmaster.com but we'd have to be prepared and ready to buy them when the chance came.  Come 9:00 on Sunday morning, it was our practice round to get tickets from Ticketmaster.  I say practice round because these tickets would be for Monday, and we were planning on going on Tuesday.  We both had our computers out with the website up (2 tabs each), and when 9:00 came and the tickets were available Jeff and I kept typing information in and clicking refresh.  About 10 minutes into doing this, it wasn't looking too promising until I got 2 tickets! We obviously didn't buy them, but we now knew what to expect for when our Tuesday tickets became available jn a few hours from that point.  When noon came around, we had the same process.  We were really hoping we could get lucky as we didn't want to camp out the night before Wimbledon. Same thing on this one...around 16 minutes later Jeff got us 2 tickets! We were so excited and bought them right away.  We felt so lucky, and didn't have to leave for Wimbledon until 5:00 in the morning. What a relief!

And off to Wimbledon...

We were able to watch quite a few matches during our day of tennis.  When they opened the courts, we went to a smaller court because there were open seats. You can get general admission to watch courts 3-18 and watch the big matches on The Hill. We went to Court 16 to watch an Australian Vs. French guy. I don't remember their names, but we rooted for the French guy because he seemed to be older and more confident.  As we were sitting there we enjoyed the surroundings, especially all of the wealthy people dressed all fancy.  They were up on a balcony level, drinking & carrying on. We watched a few sets, and then headed to eat our sack lunches on The Hill to watch Federer.  It was packed with people cheering, drinking, and enjoying the beautiful day.

 Court 16 fun! You can also see the balcony area that the fancy people get to hang out on above Jeff's head. 

 

I was laughing pretty hard at this picture because I thought it looked like the Umpire was floating. So. Much. Green. 

We were the only ones rooting against this guy. We wanted the French guy to win, and apparently no one in England wanted that to happen. The Australian won. 

The Hill 

Another part that was fun to watch was the organization and repetition of the line judges and ball-people.  They had a system they followed throughout each point, game, and set.  They would rotate around the courts and do the same moves to let the professional player know they had a ball.  I enjoyed that part a little too much, I think. Had I been thinking about it...I would have video taped them. 

We ended our day watching Nadal, Serena, and one other match on Centre Court.  Our seats were on the top row, but since the facility was smaller, the top seats were still good seats! I had a nice view of the Royal section, but no one that I recognized was in that section.  Although, they did receive the "Royal Treatment" when the sun rotated and was in their face.  A guard came out with hats to give each one of them. I'm still waiting on my hat...

 

If you look closely, the Royal Section is to the right in the picture with the wooden barrier around them. 

Representin' Row ZF

We enjoyed the matches, and even took a break to get a Pimm's (Liquor with fruit in it) and strawberries & cream (strawberries with a liquefied cream drizzled on top). They were both great and a Wimbledon specialty.  While looking for a description to link on strawberries & cream, I found this list of how much Wimbledon has to provide in terms of food. The numbers are pretty crazy!

Jeff holding his Pimm's while sitting on The Hill watching Federer! 

Strawberries & Cream. I think we got one of the last batches before they made new ones...ours didn't look quite as creamy as others. 

We enjoyed one last match on Centre Court before we headed back to the hotel around 8:00 PM to get ready for our big trip home to the U.S.A. Woot Woot!

We moved down a little closer for the "no name" match. You can see the crowds dispersed once Serena was done playing.