Missing John Alley was Found

Thank you for all the support that we have received. We have had a lot of help from a lot of people. John was found and there is an investigation going on, so I can't say much more than that.

Here is the article from the Pensacola News Journal.

Police have found a body believed to be that of John Alley, a pilot who had been missing since Saturday.

Alley’s 1996 green Toyota Corolla was found wrecked off of Scenic Highway near Summit Boulevard.

The body was found in the water along the edge of Escambia Bay, about a quarter of a mile northeast of the crash site, said Police Sgt. Mike Simmons.

“I can confirm we have located a body and I am about 99 percent sure it is Mr. Alley,” Pensacola Police Assistant Chief Chip Simmons.

Police detective Mike Reese said a 16-year-old boy was fishing and walking along the shoreline when he saw the body. The teen then notified some nearby searchers.

“We are still working on the crime scene investigation and we have not gotten a positive identification from the family yet. But he was last seen wearing a flight suit and the body found was wearing a flight suit.”

“It’s very difficult to say where he entered the water,” Simmons said. “We are doing our best to answer those questions, primarily how he ended up in the water to begin with.”

Alley, 26, a U.S. Air Force pilot from Milton, was a newlywed, a soon-to-be father and a former missionary.

“It’s a sad situation and we’ve been in contact with the family and the base command,” Simmons said.

An autopsy will be done this week to determine positive identification and cause of death, Simmons said.

Police initially were notified of the crash at about 5:30 a.m. Saturday after Alley’s locked car was found abandoned on Scenic Highway.

Alley is believed to have been southbound on Scenic when the car crossed the center line and hit a guardrail.

Police and search teams had been looking since Saturday for Alley, a 2nd Lieutenant stationed with the Air Force at Whiting Field.

John Alley Missing

I have a friend here in Florida that has disappeared. Nobody knows where he is. Friday (May 23, 2008) he was in class from seven till three in the afternoon. After that no one has seen him. 2nd LT John Alley is an Air Force officer in pilot training. After searching all night Friday, police found his car totaled at about five Saturday (May 24th) morning. There was no sign of John though. There was no blood at the scene. John obviously walked away from the accident. He left his keys, wallet and cell phone in the car. Search dogs were called to the scene but the trail led nowhere which leads people to suspect that he was picked up by someone. It is possible that because of the wreck, he is disoriented and can not remember who he is. Please, for my friends sake forward this message to people. He might still be in the Pensacola area, but he also might be traveling somewhere. If he was really disoriented, he might not remember that he lives in Florida and thinks he lives in Colorado which is where he is from. This is a good standing member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day saints which means that it was very, very, very unlikely that alcohol was involved.

If you have any information regarding this go to the web site that has been set up for him. www.helpfindjohn.inf0 Today hundreds of people were out putting up fliers in local businesses and on street corners.

Long Runs

I like my weekend long runs. Today I decided to get up early and do the same run I did two weeks ago. I left the house before 4:30 this morning to try to beat the heat. I did beat it. It was very comfortable for my whole run. It was 68 degrees when I left and by the time I got back it was 80. Just within that last hour though the temps went from 75 up to 80. I was feeling so good that when I was a mile from home, I decided to run an extra 1.7 mile loop. So, instead of 26.5 I ran 28.2. It was a great run today. I'm only a little tired right now from getting up so early. Maybe I'll take a nap, who knows.

This last week I hit a couple of milestones. as of today I have ran 542 miles this year. I have run 173 so far this month. Since I started logging my runs on the runners world website, I have ran 791 miles. That is from the end of September of last year. This last week I ran 57 miles. I feel great.

So, instead of just reading about all of the running that I do, you should go out and try it. Even if it is just a mile. It doesn't have to be much, just get out there and be active. In fact, you don't even have to run, you can swim, bike, walk or any number of other activities. Anyway, I think I'll go run now.

Running

In case any of you don't know, I love to run. Why? you may ask. There are a lot of reasons. I just enjoy it. It is something I can go to that will relieve stress and give me a break from everything else. I can forget about life, or I can think about life while I am running. A lot of the time I listen to my favorite music. Sometimes I will think of nothing but the next mile or half mile and how fast I should run it. Running is also very healthy. My heart and lungs are in good shape.

Yesterday I decided to do a tempo run. For those who don't know that is a run anywhere from three or four miles up to 10 miles or longer that is a quicker pace than a normal easy jog, but not quite as fast as you would run a race. It had been three or four weeks since I had done one of these tempo runs and my body needed the speed. After the first mile I decided to do the next three or four miles at a sub-8 pace. The next four miles ranged from 7:44 to 7:13. My legs felt fatigued after mile three. I realized that my legs were still trying to recover from last weeks 54 miles and last Saturday's 26.5 miles. I also did eight miles on Monday. I guess my legs just wanted a rest. I think today will be a short easy run. I will probably only do five miles at a nine minute per mile pace.

It is funny to look back at my running log over the last six or seven months. Last summer I barely ran at all. It wasn't until October when I started running again seriously. At that time it was a chore to run three miles. I notice in my log that I even called a five mile run a "long" run. That is pretty funny considering the fact that I have now been calling my ten mile runs "easy" as apposed to "long." If you click here you can see a graph of my runs over the last eight months. It is pretty cool to see the progress I've made. I think maybe it is time for me to stop building miles for now. I'll try to maintain 50-55 miles per week with the long run of 26miles, for at least a few weeks. I'll work on doing more speed stuff. I'll probably just do a tempo run. Maybe I should do some hills in there too. Maybe in three or four weeks I'll start building mile by mile to 31 miles. My plan is to run 31 miles on July 5th. The 50 miler being three weeks later on July 26th.

All this talk about running makes me want to go running.

26.2 Miles

Today I decided to go and run a full marathon. I had been feeling good this week, so I went for it. I took it easy and walked quite a bit on the second half. It was really hot out today. I was well prepared for it. I had three energy gels, two granola bars, and enough money to buy three bottles of Gatorade along the way. I also drank four of my water bottles full of water. I actually drove the route after I ran it just to make sure of the distance and it turns out that instead of 13.1 miles to the turn around point it was almost 13.3 so I actually ran more than a marathon.
As I was running today I just kept thinking that the heat was good training for the Badwater Ultramarathon. That is a 135 mile race that I would like to do. It runs through Death Valley and ends up at the foothills of Mount Whitney 135 miles away. It is run in July when the average high is 117 degrees and highs often reach the upper 120's. At night the average low's are in the high 80's. Everyone thinks I'm crazy for wanting to do it, but I think it sounds fun.
I'm a bit tired now, so that's it for now.
Happy Running.

I Ran 146 Miles in April!!!

With the White River 50 Miler to look forward to, I have stepped up my training. I've consistantly run more than 30 miles each week for the last five weeks or so. With something to look forward to, I stay more focussed and run better. By the end of this week I will top 400 miles for the year. That is pretty good for me. I've been feeling pretty good. My right shin still acts up a little bit, but for the most part it behaves itself. 146 mile is pretty good, but it is nothing like Anton over at Riding the Wind. He averages more than 170 per week. But then again I'm a back of the pack guy, he's an elite, usually winning the races he enters.

I think I will start making my easy runs 6 or 7 miles. Right now they are usually five. Just another mile or two each run will help increase my mileage for the week. This week I'll do 45 miles. I'll probably stop building weekly mileage when I get to 50 or 60. Then I'll shorten my weekday runs, and keep lengthening my weekend runs. I have a plan to build to 31 miles three weeks before the White River 50. Then I'll taper down to practically nothing that last week. This is fun. I really enjoy running. I get frustrated sometimes when I have to push one of my kids in the jogging stroller, but it's not too bad. I get over it. It relieves a lot of stress when I run so much. I also love to listen to music and thanks to my beautiful wife, I have a 1G ipod shuffle. I love it. It is so small and compact. It has given me no problems. I get to listen to hours and hours of good music while I'm running. Sometimes I just like it quiet though. On my 19 mile run last week up on Whidbey Island, I had to turn off the music for a bit. It is so beautful and peaceful up there that I just had to turn off the music and listen to the birds and beach and the sounds of nature.

If I don't get up to Washington before July to run the White River 50, then I'll probably make my own course down here and run it. I wouldn't enjoy it as much as I would running around the cascades, but this way I still have something to look forward to if WR50 falls through. I'll find my own support crew to help keep me going. Maybe I can even get people to run portions of it with me. I'm sure my wife and kids will help for at least part of it. I really probably don't even need much help. There are plenty of gas stations and stores along the route I would probably take. I just got a new water bottle too, so I would carry my own water and energy gels and even my cell phone just in case something happens. If I did a run here in Florida in July, I would definetly start it about four or five in the morning so that I could at least start in the cool of the morning. I'd have to be flexible too, if it is forcaste to be really hot, I would push it back another week. Well, all this is speculation. For now, I'll just plan on running the White River 50. Maybe I'll have to take a vacation and drag the family up to Washington if we haven't moved by then.

I'm going to start looking for a marathon to do here in the begining of June. That will be fun. That will go right along with my training plan.

White River 50

So, several weeks ago I decided that I wanted to run an Ultramarathon. I was reading the latest Runners World magazine and they had an artical about running your first Ultra. They even had a workout plan to build up to it. Here is a link to their online aritcle about it. I found an ultramarathon in Washington. I hope to be up there by the time this race happens. It is the White River 50. It looks like a really good race. It is on July 26th. I've been running a lot more. I've been working at building my mileage each week. My long runs have gone up from 13, to 15, to 17 this last saturday. I'm going to build one to two miles each week until I peak at 31 miles three weeks before the race. My weekly mileage has also gone up, for the last four weeks it has gone from 29 to 32 to 33 to 37. I hope to top out at 50-60 miles per week. Then after the 50 mile race I hope I can keep up the 50-60 miles each week and just work at improving my speed. On most runs I average about 8:30 miles. On my quicker runs It can be in the low 7 minute miles. If you want to check out my running log, I keep it online at runnersworld. Here it is.

I just hope that my shin doesn't give me any more problems. It hasn't been too bad. Just yesterday though, it hurt after a quick two mile run. I ran five easy miles this morning and it was hurting pretty much the whole time. The pain usually dulls out after the first mile. I'll take tomorrow off (because I'll be traveling all day) and hopefully thursday will be a good running day. Maybe I won't do a tempo run this week in an attempt to give my leg a little break.

I am really excited about going up to Washington this week. I get to see my dad. I also get to run in the mild Pacific Northwest. In the last week it has gotten way too hot here in Flordia. Yesterday reached 88 degrees and today is about the same. It will be nice to go for a run in the 40's or 50's.

I'll try to get some photos to put on here too. A blog can be pretty boring to read without some pictures... I just tried getting a photo to put on here but it wasn't working. Here is a link to it though. I bought a new pair of running shoes yesterday. The Asics Gel Landrtth 4 seems to be a pretty good shoe. I tried them out last night and the first mile they were loose then I tightened them and they were much better for the second mile.

My Shin

I’ve been trying to take it easy lately because my right shin has been bothering me. It’s been about a month maybe even more that my shin has been hurting me. I’ve tried icing it, resting it, going easy on it, as well as some other remedies that don’t seem to be making much different. I wonder at what point I should go and see a doctor. I should probably go now while I still have insurance. It doesn’t hurt so much that I can’t run on it, but I don’t want to push myself too much and really hurt my leg. I’ll just keep taking easy. I went for an easy five miles today. My leg didn't hurt as bad as it has the last few times I ran.

Just Waiting

It gets a bit boring when you can’t really do anything. Let me explain. About six months ago I found out that I was going to be getting out of the military. They said that it would probably take about two months. Now, six months later, they are still saying that it will take about two months. It is getting old and really annoying. I can’t plan for anything. Originally I had planned on starting school in January, but that didn’t happen, then I thought maybe spring term and start in May, but now I am skeptical about even starting school in June. I am trying to get into BYU and I’d like to do Air Force ROTC. I’ll have to wait and see if they will let me out of the Navy soon enough. I am also waiting on BYU to see if they will accept me or not. I don’t know what I would do if I don’t get accepted. I keep telling myself that I can’t complain too much, because during these last six months I have done practically nothing and I am still getting a paycheck.

As far as running goes I haven’t been running as much as I’d like to. I’ve been feeling sick for the last couple of weeks. I think it has to do with seasonal allergies: yet another reason I would like to move away from here. Florida is the only place I’ve ever been where I have gotten seasonal allergies. I really don’t like it. Anyway, I have been running just not much. Once so far this week, although I’m feeling pretty motivated right now and as soon as I get home, I’d like to go out and run at least five if not seven miles. Last week I ran five miles and the week before that I think I ran three times. I definitely lost my oomph for the SLC marathon. I still might run the half marathon, probably not though, because I will be stuck right here in Florida.

Lately

I've been pretty lazy for the last couple weeks. I was sick for a few days and my back injury wasn't getting better fast enough. I did go for a run last night though. It felt great. I decided to get some frustration out and so I ran hard. I ran mile one in 6:24 then slowed down for an 8 minute mile then for mile three I ran 6:17. Overall it felt great. Maybe I'll get to go for a 7 mile run today when the kids are napping. We'll see.