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Guest: My dad, Mark Hill
Show Notes:
Mark Hill is my dad, so we met nearly 40 years ago and I've known him my whole life. 😉 I finally interviewed him for the podcast after we both ran the 2025 Marine Corps Marathon.
During this episode, sponsored by Previnex and Foot Levelers, we talk about:
- Shoutout to my mom for getting both me and my dad into running
- The dilemmas of racing pre-cell phone and nearly missing my sister’s First Communion
- The Marine Corps Marathon
- The other marathon’s he’s done - five of them we did together
- How reading the book Born to Run caused him to break his foot
- His first Boston Marathon in 2013, the year of the Boston Bombing
- Poop stories (because you can’t interview my dad on a running podcast without covering this topic)
- Some of his best life advice
Sponsor Details:
- Previnex - Use code ALLY15 for 15% off your first order
- Foot Levelers - visit the website to find a provider near you
Details and tickets for our celebration event at Indy Monumental.
Episode Transcript:
[00:00:00] This is a Sandy Boy Productions podcast.
Welcome to Finish Lines and Milestones, a podcast for everyday runners. I'm your host, ally Brett knocker, and if you run, you're a runner and every runner has a story. Join me each week as I share these stories and we celebrate finish lines and milestones together.
This week's episode is brought to you by Pren X Pren X creates clinically effective supplements that promote longevity, performance, and everyday health. If you've been around the podcast for a while, you know I am a huge fan of Pren X Gut and Greens Superfood. I take it every morning. Religiously, it's part of my routine and you know who else also uses Prev X is national champion and Olympian runner Emily Feld and Emily Feld is actually coming to Indianapolis for the monumental marathon and will be at an event that [00:01:00] I am hosting with Lindsay Hein. So if it's good enough for Emily Feld, it is good enough for you and me.
I tell you what the benefits of natural energy, gut health, immunity. Even anti-aging benefits are some of the reasons why I take pren X every day. And if you would like to try Pren X, you can go to pren x.com. That's P-R-E-V-I-N-E x.com, and you can use Code ALI 15 A LLY 15 for 15% off of your first order.
Thank you so much to prev next for supporting this podcast.
And now for this week's episode, this is a really exciting one, in case you missed it. I just ran the Marine Corps Marathon on Sunday with my dad, not together, together, but we both crossed the same start and finish line, and I did a full race recap episode on Wednesday. So if you miss that, go back and listen.
It has all the nitty gritty details. One of the biggest highlights for me was having the opportunity to push for Ainsley's Angels, an [00:02:00] organization that allows runners to lend our legs to somebody who can't cross the finish line on their own. And so I've done a few races with Ainsley's Angels. This was my first full marathon and I was terrified, and that led me to reach out to a complete internet stranger, Rob Perez, who ended up pushing for almost the entire race with me.
You guys have to meet Rob. He is on Instagram and TikTok, go look for him. Follow him. Such a great human being. And again, go listen to the recap episode if you want. All about my race. This episode of the podcast is featuring my dad, and we talk about his running journey, how he didn't start until later in life.
His first marathon, which was the same as mine on 10, 10, 10 in Chicago. His first Boston, which was in 2013, the year of the bombing, other races he's done and how he swears he's done with the marathon. He even told my mom that and she took a screenshot of the text he sent, so she has proof if he ever tries to run a marathon [00:03:00] again.
But it was such a pleasure as always sitting down with my dad and I'm so thrilled that I get to introduce him to you. So enjoy this episode with my dad, Mark Hill.
Ally Brettnacher: Dad. Welcome. All right to the podcast.
Mark Hill: Okay, finally, I get to, I get to be here. How cool is that? Finally,
Ally Brettnacher: you were giving me a hard time for not having mom on first, so we should just acknowledge her immediately.
Mark Hill: She should have been on first.
Ally Brettnacher: She wouldn't wanna do this though.
She,
Mark Hill: I don't know. She'd be good. She'll be good.
Ally Brettnacher: Okay. You heard it here first? Mom's next. Well, she's the reason that we've run. Would you say that?
Mark Hill: Uh, absolutely. So she was a runner first before, before I started running, and she ran the mini and, uh, I was so impressed she did the mini and I thought, oh, you know, maybe, maybe even I can do that.
So that's what got me started.
Ally Brettnacher: Do you remember what year it was around when she would've done it first?
Mark Hill: Uh, let's say it'd been the early nineties, I think. Yeah. In the nineties. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: The time of cotton [00:04:00] T-shirts and Yeah. Cotton socks. Well, a lot. A lot.
Mark Hill: Uh, it was, uh, pre-cell phones. I mean, for sure. So
Ally Brettnacher: did you go cheer her on or did she just go run it and then you, you
Mark Hill: know, and kind of in her way she just went and ran it, you know?
Yeah. So, yeah, I didn't, I didn't, uh, I don't remember her cheering on. I might've, I might've, although she has cheered me on so
Ally Brettnacher: that she has
Mark Hill: that she has.
Ally Brettnacher: Thank you, mom.
Mark Hill: Mm-hmm.
Ally Brettnacher: Okay. So do, what year was the first year that you did a half marathon?
Mark Hill: The half marathon? Oh, that had to be 90, 95 or six, something like that.
Ally Brettnacher: Okay. I'm trying to do the math. I'm like, how old I would've been. Yes.
Mark Hill: So I was, I was 50. You'd have been 20 ish.
Ally Brettnacher: Wait,
Mark Hill: yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Is that the right math?
Mark Hill: I was
Ally Brettnacher: You would've been 50. I was 40. I was 40. 40.
Mark Hill: You'd have been 10. Yeah. There we go.
Ally Brettnacher: I was like, I would've been young because I remember. My first, maybe it was a little
Mark Hill: later.
It, it had to be a little later than that because it was, uh, the first one I did was when Morgan was, was her first communion. [00:05:00] So, uh, oh, that was the first year. That was the story. That, okay. , Dan Trada. Okay. Let's, this is
Ally Brettnacher: such a good story. Yeah, it's a good story. Let's just, let's start off with one of the best stories that you have.
Mark Hill: Uh, so it was my, it was, it was the first one I did, I was running with Dan Trotta and Dan had run before, and so we were running together. We were maybe halfway and Dan said, Hey, you know what, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go ahead. Well, we had previously decided we were gonna meet in military park at the certain place.
And so I said, okay, we'll just meet at, you know, we'll just meet at the hut, you know, in military park. He said, okay. So he takes off, somewhere in there. Between then and the finish line, I passed him. So I finished first. So he then thinks, oh, I'll just wait for Mark to finish. Line. So instead of going to the hut where we were supposed to be, he goes and waits and waits and waits, and he starts to get worried at what happened to Mark.
What Mark. In the meantime, I'm at the hut waiting for him. Well, that afternoon Morgan was supposed to be getting, having her first communion. I'm like, what? Where the, where the [00:06:00] hell's Danny? What's he doing? I was starting to get, you know, irritated. Where is he? Then I started worried. I didn't know which, and at one point I'm like, I, I gotta go.
And so I was thinking, I'm just gonna leave him and he's gonna have to figure it out. So this is all pre's cell phone? Yeah, cell phone. Right. So, so I get to the car and he's at the car. I am like, I am so mad. I'm just like, are you kidding me, Dan? If we were supposed to meet at this place, where were you?
Well, I finished first and I was waiting, you know, blah, blah, blah. Anyway, so I rushed and I rushed and I went home and I was, I mean, I was speeding. I was. Crazy man trying to get there on time and, uh, rushed to it and got to the back of the church, St. Reti where Morgan was having her first communion.
Literally ran up to the door. Morgan was at the back of the church. She turns around, looks at me, smiles, and then walks up and you're like, and I'm like, yes, yes. God. Did
Ally Brettnacher: you change your clothes?
Mark Hill: Yeah, I, I had gotten home and showered, I mean, in, in a minute. Right. That's a miracle. It was just, yeah, miracle
Ally Brettnacher: because like [00:07:00] worst case.
Yeah. And, and, yeah. So Mom, you had planned to like go separately 'cause she probably figured there Mom was Yeah, mom was, she had to get her there early and
Mark Hill: Yeah. Yeah. All that, all that. So I, I thought I was gonna have. Literally a couple hours. I, you know, because I was Right. So get nap. Yeah. Yeah. I thought all of that.
And, so anyway, I, I love Danny, but I was not happy with him. You'll probably, you might listen to this, even he might listen to this
Ally Brettnacher: because you were still friends to this day. You just traveled to Europe together. We just, we
Mark Hill: just went to Portugal together. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: So you made it through Yeah. Somehow after that incident.
Mark Hill: Yeah. That was good.
Ally Brettnacher: Okay. We'll talk more about some of your race stories before. Okay. But I wanna, I wanna talk about Marine Corps. Okay. While it's still
Mark Hill: Yeah. So
Ally Brettnacher: fresh.
Mark Hill: Yes. While you're still making
Ally Brettnacher: your old man noises. Yeah. How in your house, you don't really have to go up and down the stairs, so that's great.
Mark Hill: That's really good. Yeah. That's really good. I do have a couple stairs in and out the garage that are a little painful.
Ally Brettnacher: Oh my gosh.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah.
Mark Hill: So,
Ally Brettnacher: but otherwise, how do you feel today? Today is first day. Today is good.
Mark Hill: Uh, yeah, today is good. So it's, uh, been four [00:08:00] days, so I'm, I'm pretty much back on track. My, uh, I do have a little hammy problem, but, um, I had that before the race and mm-hmm.
So. You know, as old as I am, it's gonna take a while to, to heal, but the rest of me is, it's all good.
Ally Brettnacher: Good.
Mark Hill: Yeah. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: So look at you. Okay. You're 69 years old and you just ran. You say it's your last. Yeah,
Mark Hill: it is my last for sure.
Ally Brettnacher: Will you? I'm here
Mark Hill: on video. It is my last there. I mean,
Ally Brettnacher: I'm sure there are people on this podcast, podcast who have said, I will never, they've admitted I'll never run a marathon.
They run a marathon. I'm
Mark Hill: sure they have. I'm sure they have. But I told, I told Karen, I said, Hey, if I even start to talk about it, you need to slap me upside of the head. Because she
Ally Brettnacher: showed me the text last night, actually. She's like, did, did Dad tell you what he said to me after he finished the marathon?
Like, you're like never again.
Mark Hill: Although, you know, before the race, you know, I'm walking there and so often now I'm the oldest guy in the room, like in Ansley's Angels. Yep. We had the, we had the dinner the night before. I'm looking around for [00:09:00] somebody older than me in the room. There's, you know, a couple hundred people in this room.
I'm the oldest person in the room, so I'm walking to the, starting line of the marathon with 40,000 of my closest friends. Well, I'm looking around. I'm looking around. There's gotta be somebody older than me here. So finally I find a guy, he looks about my age. I said, Hey, I'm looking for somebody as old as me.
How old are you? He says, I'm 71. He like, I'm like, wow, that's awesome. How many marathons have you done? He says, . This is my 278th marathon. I'm like, okay. You know, you and I are not the same. Know, even in the same, we are not. We are not the you win. We're not the same. You win. Uh, he said, yeah, I was just running a couple weeks ago with a buddy of mine that's seven seven.
I'm like, and so I had been thinking, okay, maybe that would be a goal for me, you know, to run when I'm a little, a little older. But, but, but then I ran this one and I'm like, no, that's enough.
Ally Brettnacher: I don't know. It's only four days, dad. It's only four days.
Mark Hill: Oh, that's enough. Like in the ring. 10 ten's a good number.
I did 10. 10. That is true. I did 10. That's a good number.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah, you don't wanna go with an odd number. 'cause I need, [00:10:00] I was thinking, I
Mark Hill: was thinking maybe I wanted to try Boston once more. 'cause it was, Boston is so, such an awesome experience. Yeah. So I thought, okay, I wanna do that one more time. Well, that means I'd have to train and, you know, qualify and blah, blah, blah.
So.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Yeah. And your time was 4 20, 4
Mark Hill: 20 qualify around four 20. Yeah. Yeah. And I, I, I, I didn't really think, I didn't, part of my problem is I just didn't, I just didn't train. I was, uh, I think a little cocky. I, right in the middle of my training, we had a vacation scheduled, so it's three weeks. I ran like three times six miles when I should have been running, you know, 16, 18, yeah.
20 milers. And I just didn't, I didn't get the running. I was biking. It was a biking trip. So I did quite a bit of biking, but that's, again, that's not quite the same. Yeah. And so,
Ally Brettnacher: yeah, even doing like more walking and stuff would've been better because time on your feet is, yeah. Time
Mark Hill: on your feet's. Time on your feet's good.
But, you know, it was what it was.
Ally Brettnacher: But you did it.
Mark Hill: Yeah, I did. I did finish. It was, uh, [00:11:00] it was, uh, it was good to finish. It was good to cross the line. Yeah. You know, you talk about, uh, people that run marathons, talk about the wall and in the marathons I've done, I've, I have two, two of 'em that I, that I hit the wall and it's, you know, it's, it's no fun.
So you said,
Ally Brettnacher: would you say this time you did
Mark Hill: I hit Oh, for sure. Hit the wall. Yeah. Yeah. I hit the wall at mile 20, which is kind of early to hit it, frankly. Yeah,
Ally Brettnacher: yeah.
Mark Hill: Um, last time I did it, it was probably 20, uh, third time I ran, uh, in Boston. I hit it at mile 22. And it, you know, again, I just at issue was I didn't train enough.
Yeah. I just didn't get enough training in, and I got a little cocky and started off a little too fast and paid the price at the end. But it's, you know, it's running that distance is all about training. A hundred percent about training, training, training, and getting a lot of, a lot of miles in. Yeah. You know, it's, it's like a [00:12:00] part-time job really to do it.
Mm-hmm. So, um, if you don't get the miles in, then you're really at risk of, of, uh, of hitting the wall.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah.
Mark Hill: It's a lot more fun when you don't hit it.
Ally Brettnacher: It's a lot more fun. Yeah. Uh, do you remember how long it took? How long did it take you based on where you were in your corral to like cross start line? Do you remember?
Like,
Mark Hill: uh, probably I think about, uh, between 10 and 15 minutes. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: So not too bad, but like some time.
Mark Hill: Yeah, for sure. Sometime. Yeah. Yeah. It took, I mean, there's 40,000 people. It was crazy. Yeah. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Did you meet anybody else at the start or, I was talking to some
Mark Hill: people and, you know, like that older guy.
Yeah. And, you know, I was, you know, talking. Just chatting with a few people up, but I didn't really run with any money. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Did you bring the goose I gave you?
Mark Hill: I did. And I, and I had 'em both. Thank you. Good. I appreciate that. I'm glad you did. Yeah. IE even had one of the, uh, maple syrup things they gave out, which tasted awful, but I felt like I needed the energy.
So which flavor
Ally Brettnacher: did you get? Do you remember? Was it [00:13:00] citrus?
Mark Hill: I don't, I don't remember what flavor it was because it was smoky, kind of a smoky flavor. It was, you know, weird. It wasn't very good.
Ally Brettnacher: I like plain maple syrup. Yeah. Yeah. So I run, I took, I don't know how many, I think I took maybe two or three with me.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Of the plain maple syrup. I had three different kinds, four different kinds of fuel, so I could just like kind of mix it up because I get tired of the same thing. Uh, the guy I was running with, he tried the untapped, it was like a, it was like a chocolate salt. Yeah. He said it was really good. I was like, that doesn't sound very good.
Yeah. It doesn't sound very good. But he said it was really good. Yeah. Everybody has their own, so I don't
Mark Hill: usually, I don't usually, uh, fuel too much in a mm-hmm. In a race or even, I don't really have that much water either. But Yeah. And it was temperature. This time was so good. It was just, couldn't have been better really.
Um, I think it was about 45 when we started and 60 maybe when 65, maybe when we finished 60, I think. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: And you got to wear a bathrobe that Mandy and Tyler gave you.
Mark Hill: I was the coolest looking guy. I had this bathrobe on, you know, [00:14:00] you gotta be confident to have to, to wear aro. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: I brought a hot pink bathrobe.
Ah, yeah. So, yeah. That I bought on Amazon because the bathrobe is kind of, it's become kind of the thing. It's Oh, is it's the easy, it's an easy thing to do.
Mark Hill: I didn't see anybody else in a bathroom. That's, that's surprising. I, yeah. But I was back with the, with the unwashed masses. The unwashed in the back.
Yeah, in the back.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. So, yeah, I had a pink bath throw. It was pretty, yeah. Pretty funny. But it helped keep me warm for a bit.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Well, good.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. So five 14 was your finished time?
Mark Hill: Five 14. Yeah. And I was it, um. I was there, I was with the four, I was with the four 20 guy, you know the mm-hmm. The Pacer, the Pacers.
Mm-hmm. I was with him for a while and then I fell back and then, you know, 4 25 guy went by me and then, you know, the four 30 guy went by. Okay. And I'm okay. And then I'm looking way ahead and I'm, and the way the route was, you, it kinda went down and it looped around so you could see the people that were in front of, there
Ally Brettnacher: were a [00:15:00] lot more of those than I remember.
Yeah. I didn't remember from the other time we came back.
Mark Hill: Remember? Yeah. And so I could see him, I'm like, oh man, he's way, he's way in front of me now. I'm way back. Yeah. So, and then I, I, I really did okay until about mile 20. And then I just really fell off. I, I just felt way off after, after mile 20 when I hit the wall.
Ally Brettnacher: So, yeah. And then you saw the Ainsley's Angels table, 'cause I remember chatting with you. Yeah. Mile 22 or something like that. Yeah. I grabbed some potato chips. Yeah. Yeah. I was like, perfect. Good.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: I. I'm sure they told us they were gonna have a station there. Yeah. But I had no idea. Yeah.
Mark Hill: I didn't, I didn't remember talking
Ally Brettnacher: about it.
And so, yeah. So I was like, oh, awesome.
Mark Hill: Yeah, like was good. The
Ally Brettnacher: regular coke for me, but I was worried at that point to mess up my stomach because my stomach felt awful until mile 20. Yeah. Mile 20. I started feeling good.
Mark Hill: Yeah. That's the opposite of me. Which is bizarre. Yeah. That is bizarre.
Ally Brettnacher: But it was a long time where I just didn't feel good.
Yeah. Yeah. My nerves. Well, it's
Mark Hill: a good thing you had had some help.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Thank the Lord.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: yeah. So we, I didn't say that you and I had done Marine Corps before. We did it in 2013. Right? [00:16:00]
Mark Hill: Right.
Ally Brettnacher: So 12 years ago. Yes. And then
Mark Hill: Yes. Did
Ally Brettnacher: it again.
Mark Hill: Yes.
Ally Brettnacher: And so when I told you I was signing up, you were like, maybe I should.
Yeah,
Mark Hill: yeah,
Ally Brettnacher: yeah. And then what race did you sign up for? Dad?
Mark Hill: What are you talking about? Oh, you know, it was gonna be the 50th. We were like, okay, we gotta sign up on this day. We don't want to. Shut out. So on the day that we were supposed to sign up, I signed up and I signed up for the wrong race. I signed up for the virtual race instead of the the Marine Corps race.
And so I didn't know, and you asked me, I don't know, three or four days ahead of time, Hey, what time are you signing up for your bibs? I'm like, bibs, what are you talking about? I hadn't gotten any emails or anything. I had no idea what you were even talking about. So I looked up and saw that, oh my gosh, I signed up for the wrong race.
Ally Brettnacher: Which, I mean, a couple people, when I shared that story, people were like, why in the hell is there a virtual option?
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: But I mean, ever since COD, yeah, a lot of races provide the option for people to do it. Yeah. [00:17:00] Wherever they are. And for Marine Corps, you have armed forces that are deployed all over the world.
Right. And so,
Mark Hill: right. That makes, that makes, that makes sense. Total makes total sense. I mean, it was just. Just me being
Ally Brettnacher: old and senile. Yeah. Old and
Mark Hill: senile.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah.
Mark Hill: As you made very clear in your, in my subject line, in my emails. Yes. Begging
Ally Brettnacher: the raised people to change it, which they did.
Mark Hill: It worked. I mean, you know, I got my old and old and senile dad 69.
Oh my gosh. He can, can't even figure out the difference. He doesn't know how to
Ally Brettnacher: sign up. So if you could just switch it and then,
Mark Hill: yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. And then you got to meet Michelle Sledge, who was their head of operations. She was the one who made the switch. Yeah. She called you.
Mark Hill: Yeah, she called me at, uh, like eight o'clock at night to say, you know, that she was gonna put me in the race.
She was awesome. And you know, I got this number coming in and I saw it and I clearly don't usually answer the phone if I don't know the number. And then I thought about it, I thought It's Falls Church. I wonder if that's somebody you know from Marine Corps. So I called the number [00:18:00] back and she said, hi, mark.
I mean, it was, it was like we were all friends. She was great.
Ally Brettnacher: Hey idiot, I got you. Yeah, I got
Mark Hill: you. I got you. And here she's running, I mean, she's basically race director for 40 a race with 40,000 people. I mean, she's three days ahead. She had to be crazy busy.
Ally Brettnacher: Yes.
Mark Hill: So
Ally Brettnacher: I mean, even at for monumental, like our team, seeing what our team does Yeah.
For 15,000. Yes. Yeah. And
Mark Hill: then you
Ally Brettnacher: uplevel that. Yeah. In the nation's capital, right. I mean,
Mark Hill: yeah. So she was awesome. Really awesome. And then I did get a chance to meet her at the, at the expo.
Ally Brettnacher: So I don't know if you remember me telling you this, but at the end of the race, after we finished, I was coming to try to find you at Iwo Jima At the statue?
Yeah. Yeah. So that we could get a picture there too. Okay. I really wanted a picture there. And we didn't get one, which I still am kind of sad. Yeah. Well, but I, I met face to face with Michelle, with her megaphone. Yelling at people like me to like turn around. 'cause I was trying to swim upstream. Oh, okay. I was trying to sneak along the fence so I could come to you.
There's, and she was like, no. And I didn't even, I was like, I get [00:19:00] it. So then I turned around.
Mark Hill: Yeah. The dilemma with a race with that many people is the crowds and, uh, the effort that it takes to get to the start line. Yes. And then after you, 'cause I probably walked from the metro maybe two miles to get to the start line, and then afterwards we probably walked two or three miles.
Oh my God. To get to the metro and, and you know, so I think, I bet it was
Ally Brettnacher: less than a mile, but it felt,
Mark Hill: it felt like five miles. It felt like 10 miles.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. People are gonna be like, that math doesn't add up. I think it was like 0.7 miles to the station. That
Mark Hill: might be right. But it felt, it felt, and plus we were in the crowd for the first part of it.
You're in this big crowd of people trying to get out and everyone's
Ally Brettnacher: trying to get the ponchos and, and it was like, yeah.
Mark Hill: It's, it's, uh. It's mayhem, but, uh, I think they managed it. I think they managed it reasonably well. Considering that many
Ally Brettnacher: people. That many people, yeah. Our worst part was the traffic for the expo.
That was bad.
Mark Hill: Yeah. The getting into the, that was, I
Ally Brettnacher: didn't tell the Tesla story, um, in my recap, so maybe you could [00:20:00] tell just that quick story.
Mark Hill: Yeah. So we were waiting at least, uh, at least 45 minutes to get in. The traffic was really slow to go the last mile to get into the parking lot, so we were literally a hundred, not even a hundred yards away from turning into the parking lot.
And the cops were in front of us kind of directing traffic. Well, they wouldn't, they, for whatever reason, they didn't let our lane go, didn't let our lane go. And I said, Allie, why don't you just go in? She said, okay. So she went in and I got in the driver's seat, and then I thought, oh my gosh, I don't have the key.
So. Maybe a minute after you left, I called you and you brought the key back.
Ally Brettnacher: Thank God.
Mark Hill: Thank God you brought the key back. 'cause then finally you left. And then the cops, the cops came and, uh, whistled us on and you know, there's all these cars. They're honking. It's just this, it's, it's man, right? It's just, and then all of a sudden I put the car and tried to put the car in, uh, drive.
'cause you know, I have a Tesla. It's no big deal. Put it in drive. Oh my gosh. It, it go where? Where's the key? It's the car [00:21:00] says, I don't have the key. I'm like the key's right. Freaking here. And it, I knew that it wanted me to put the key somewhere, somewhere special. So I'm putting, I'm putting here, there everywhere.
All the cars behind me are honking. Everybody's going. I'm like, oh, you gotta be kidding me. I've been sitting here 10 minutes and finally I figure out, you know, where I have to put this key and I put it down and I go. But it was just this moment felt like.
Ally Brettnacher: 10 minutes. 10
Mark Hill: minutes. It had to be 30 seconds.
Yeah. But it felt like this just a awful feeling. Right. It was nuts. It was nuts.
Ally Brettnacher: Just like another layer to add to the madness. Another, another layer of the madness. What we had to go through. Yeah. Like the first marathon. First marathon. Getting the expo, getting the even getting the start lines of marathon.
And then after we left too, like we went through the Rosslyn metro station and the escalator was shut down. Oh yeah. And that was just, at that point you're like laughing. 'cause it's like this, this is, it has to be 300 fricking stairs. Yes. And we're all hobbling down it. Yeah.
Mark Hill: Everybody was like moaning and groaning.
This is, everyone's like, this is, this is crazy. Ridiculous.
Ally Brettnacher: I can't believe we're doing this. [00:22:00] But had that been like the day after having to go downstairs like that? Yeah. It wasn't as bad as I, I mean it wasn't fun, but Yeah. We made it happen and then we walked from Memphis. It's a story. It's a story.
Mark Hill: It's a story Story.
It's a story. Yeah. And that is the thing about the, the difference between doing a race that's a big one. Like a, like a Chicago, yeah. Or New York where you're doing this big race where they have. 30,000 people. Right. It's just there's the logistics of that are just hard way different, harder things, you know, don't all go right and da da da.
Yeah. Which is, which is more, you know, why something like the Monumentals better, it's less, less hassle, less people, right? Yeah. It's just a Or the caramel one or, yeah. You know, there's a, there's a ton of different marathons all, all over the place. Right. A place a
Ally Brettnacher: million. Yeah. So for people who complain Yeah.
About stuff like that. It's like, hey, like
Mark Hill: one of the things I wish I would've done is probably done more different marathons. I, I did, uh, you know, three Chicago, three Boston, two Marine Corps. One Illinois. One [00:23:00] Illinois. Is that
Ally Brettnacher: add up to 10? Yeah. What are we forgetting? Close to 10?
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Okay. Well I know you have done 10.
I just forget how many.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Okay. Okay. So let's talk about your first marathon.
Mark Hill: First marathon. 10. 10. 10 I think. Yeah. And you, you were Yeah, that was my first marathon. Yeah. Yeah. I think actually of the 10 that I've done, hun.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah,
Mark Hill: I've done five with you.
Ally Brettnacher: Aw, that's pretty cool.
Mark Hill: Yeah, it's way cool. That's pretty cool.
It's way cool. It's really the only reason I did Marine Corps, frankly, was 'cause you were gonna do it.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah.
Mark Hill: You know, and sorry mom. Um, so, so, so that was good. So the first one was, uh, was Chicago another really big race? This was before, you know, you had, before they had the lottery, so it was, yeah. You know, relatively easy to get in, but it was a big race.
Even then. It was probably 25,000 people. And um, you know, I trained, I think I was 54. I think I was 54. It was 10. 10, 10. Yeah. [00:24:00] So I'd have been, yeah, 54 when I did, when I did my first one. That's so
Ally Brettnacher: that, yeah, in and of itself is really amazing. I think
Mark Hill: I did like 4, 4 30 or four 20, something like that.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah, you beat me.
You kicked my butt.
Mark Hill: Yeah. Yeah. Um, so that was probably the last time that happened.
Ally Brettnacher: No, your Boston qualifiers. Yeah. Well that's, uh, still, still got me, but then the tables did turn. That was a good one. Yeah.
Mark Hill: The tables did turn. So, yeah, so, yeah, what a great, you know, what a great experience. That was a beautiful day.
I remember. And, and, uh, I, I do remember the first half that I did thinking when I crossed that line, okay, now I'm gonna turn around and go back. And the idea of that was just overwhelming. And I'm like, I'll never do it. I'll never goof fool. Yeah. It's like when I started running, people said, oh, be careful 'cause you'll get like addicted to running.
I'm like, I hate running. I hate it. I will never get addicted to running. But then I started running more and more and [00:25:00] more and, you know, so I, I, uh, I had the time so. then I decided I was gonna do a marathon. It was just, it was really just a matter of, training and getting the miles in. Mm-hmm. You know, it really, 'cause, uh, if you think about your training schedule, like you just inch your way up, inch your way up, inch your way, every week you go a little further, a little further, a little further, and before you know it, you're going 20 miles.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah.
Mark Hill: And then you're like, okay, I can do it
Ally Brettnacher: for all. For your marathons, most of your training, has it been on the Monan Trail here?
Mark Hill: Uh, I'd say 90% of of my training has been in, uh, on the Monan. Yeah. Yeah. I did. Uh, when I was in Montana, I did a lot of training out there, which was, which was incredible. It was so beautiful out there, and really a great place to run because, uh, it's at altitude.
Mm-hmm. So, you know, I'm running at 6,000 feet and when you. When you run at 6,000 feet, you're conditioning your body, uh, a little in a little different way. And then when you [00:26:00] come back down to here 600 feet, it's, it's, it's, it's good. So it's a good, it's a good way to train Yeah. At altitude. So that's, I think I only
Ally Brettnacher: remember one story where mom had to come pick you up in Montana.
Mark Hill: Yeah. I did have that one time where I didn't quite, I didn't quite, I think every, almost every runner Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Has had that moment where they call their significant other or whoever to come get 'em.
Mark Hill: Yeah. I've had a couple of those moments. Yeah. One was, I broke my, broke my foot. This was back in, this was back in the CRA of, it was a great book called Born to Run.
Oh yeah. Really, really a great running book. Probably the best running book. But, um, it's just an interesting, interesting book. And what it, one of the things that it did was it, it was kind of advocated the use of these, uh, minimalistic. Shoes. Right. So they, they got toes in 'em. It's like, you're, it's like running barefoot, right?
Yeah. And it advocated that. And I remember, I, I, I was all excited about that, right? And I read about it and I was gonna do it, and I'm running in it. And I talked to Bob Kennedy, uh, an [00:27:00] Olympian who's Olympian runner who had a, who had a shoe stores, right? And he's like, he's like, you're crazy. You're gonna hurt yourself.
I'm like, oh no. I read this book. I'm all, you know, I, I know more than you, Bob. Well, sure enough, sure enough, you know, I'm running and I fracture. I did a, a stress fracture to my foot, and I went down and I, I couldn't get up. And I called Karen, she's not around. I had a, I'm looking for somebody to come pick me up.
Who got you find eventually? My sister-in-law. Kimberly came in. Kimberly got you. Kimberly came and picked me up. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Oh, I don't remember that.
Mark Hill: Yeah. I, 'cause I, I couldn't even, I couldn't stand. Where was
Ally Brettnacher: I?
Mark Hill: I my God, hell, surely
Ally Brettnacher: I would've answered my phone.
Mark Hill: Surely you would've maybe.
Ally Brettnacher: I mean,
Mark Hill: you would've if you would.
Yeah, I would've if I would've for sure if
Ally Brettnacher: I was available.
Mark Hill: If you would, you would. Yeah. I can't remember. Yeah, you were probably working or something. I don't
Ally Brettnacher: know. Yeah. You know. Okay. And so Chicago 10, 10. 10. Our first one. Yeah, I remember. I think we did half of that together, if I recall, because I remember thinking around halfway, I just was struggling and, and I was like, you, yeah, [00:28:00] go ahead.
Yeah. I can't remember. We didn't Then there was, was next one
Mark Hill: that would Zach ran? Did Zach ran? I think it because Zach was a one and done guy, right? Yeah, he
Ally Brettnacher: was. He did. Which had to be interesting for you too. 'cause it was like almost handing the baton over to my
Mark Hill: you guys boyfriend at the, I don't think you, I don't think you remember.
You weren't even a, I think he was, I he was early. He was, I think he was still working hard to over to win you over was according me to win you over. He was. He says, okay, I'll, I'll do a marathon. That's gotta, that's gotta say something.
Ally Brettnacher: It did, for sure,
Mark Hill: for sure. I was like,
Ally Brettnacher: this guy has run three miles in his life and now he's training for a marathon.
Yeah,
Mark Hill: yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: And he was obnoxiously like, I remember. Him kind of carrying me the last, I don't know how many miles. Six. Let's just call it six.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: And he was like feeling good and he said his arms were sore from like fist bumping to the crowd. 'cause we had our wow names on our shirts. Maybe helped him make us matching shirts.
I remember that. And uh, yeah, that must have been 11. I ran it the year that we got married too. I ran How many Chicagos you said only [00:29:00] three you've done? I've done four Chicagos maybe,
Mark Hill: maybe four. Chicagos, I can't remember.
Ally Brettnacher: Because there was one where we spectated for you.
Mark Hill: Yeah. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: And we had your face on shirts.
Mark Hill: Yeah. And I had my, my fastest time at Chicago.
Ally Brettnacher: And what's your fastest marathon time? It
Mark Hill: was 3 34. So,
Ally Brettnacher: so that's what I gotta do for,
Mark Hill: and I was 50, I think I was 56. That's crazy. Yeah. And so that qualified me. So the way Boston works is, is it used to be if you qualified, you know, you just put your name in and the first people that put their name in got in.
Now they do it based on your time. And they also let you, if you finish more than five minutes before your, the qualifying time, then you can go a day early. Yeah. So I finished more than five minutes ahead of my time and I was, I was hell bent on doing it. 'cause the year before that I had run and I think I did a 3 43.
Okay. And it wasn't enough. It wasn't quite fast enough, and I thought [00:30:00] it was 3 45, so I thought I had hit it and then it was three 40. And so I just, you know, again, so I, yeah. I did these senile things even when I was in my fifties alley. Yeah. So I, I missed, I missed it and I was hell Ben on that year. And so that was less about the race and more, more about the training, you know?
Yeah. So just, just the race is not the thing. It's the training. Yeah. Really. So, yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. And so tell people about your first Boston experience. What year was that?
Mark Hill: Uh, my first Boston experience was 2013, and some people may recall that was the year of the bombing. That
Ally Brettnacher: was your first Boston? That
Mark Hill: was my first Boston, yeah.
For some
Ally Brettnacher: reason, I don't remember that being your first, yeah,
Mark Hill: 2013 was my first Boston. And uh, I ran that in I think three 50. And, uh, the bomb went off at about, it would've been my time would've been about four 10. So I was 20 minutes [00:31:00] ahead of the bomb going off. So I never even, I never even interestingly enough heard the bomb go off.
So I was, if you know Boston at all, it's got the t with the subway, it's called the T. And so I had walked through all the stuff and then I went down to the T Yeah, I was gonna go meet mom. Um, and the TI come out of the T, some guy says to me, Hey, did you, were you at the bombing? I'm like, what are you talking about?
I was just there. There's no bombing there. It's fine. And then. Yeah. All of a sudden my phone starts blowing up of people that were, uh, you know, concerned about me. So, blowing up is probably not the best choice of words there. Uh, so yeah, probably not. So, so, uh, so I was, you know, 20 minutes in front of it, uh, in front of it going off.
And then the next year I ran it. I, I, I was, I really wanted to run it the next year 'cause I knew it would be very emotional and it was, and, uh, 2014 and, uh, I crossed there at four 10, which would've been
Ally Brettnacher: the time, the
Mark Hill: time that it would've been the year before. So anyway, [00:32:00]
Ally Brettnacher: you're getting a little emotional.
Mark Hill: Yeah, it was, uh, it was, it was a crazy thing.
Ally Brettnacher: It was crazy. You've heard me tell this story a million times, but I don't know if people here have, I remember I was at a conference, a work conference in Chicago. This is when I worked for Salesforce and it was a mobile conference of some kind. And I had Zach's, I was walking.
To Portillos.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: There's like a Portillo's half a mile down the road. I'm going to get my Portillo's. I, I'm in Chicago. Yeah. And, um, Zach's friend Justin calls me, he lives in Boston. And he knew that you had been, were running the race. And so he calls me, I'm like, why is Justin calling me? And so I answer and he's like, Hey, um, I know that your dad is at the race.
Have you seen what happened? And I still, actually, it's funny, I like feel this feeling right now. Yeah. I just remember being like, oh my God. Like,
Mark Hill: yeah,
Ally Brettnacher: I had, you know, and at that time you have no idea what that means, right? Like, is it hundreds and hundreds of people? I mean, thousands of people. Like just, you just don't know.
And so I remember calling mom [00:33:00] and she was at the mall in Boston and she was like, well, I'm at the finish line store. I don't, I don't see anything. And I was like, mom, not that finish line. Oh my god, mom. And I'm like, no. And she's like, well, I just talked to your, and that's like all I needed to hear.
Yeah. Like I just talked to your. Huh. But yeah. Your mo after a race Yeah. Even to this day is like, you get in, you get out of there, you are like, I'm out. I'm ready to go. Yeah. Get your stuff. Yeah. You are like, I'm not lollygagging around. No. Taking pictures, laying down. I'm out.
Mark Hill: I'm out for sure.
Ally Brettnacher: So that was a blessing on that day.
Yeah. 'cause had you just been, I mean, you still would've been okay. But like, the aftermath of that I'm sure was insane for people who were
Mark Hill: there. Oh. Just all, just, just, just awful to think about Yeah. What those, that those young men did. I mean, just awful.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Well, I remember getting lunch with you the week after and being like so happy that Yeah.
You were, and I, and I,
Mark Hill: you know, Boston responded in this interesting way, you know, it came up Boston Strong, but it was [00:34:00] just, it was just this feeling like, we are not gonna let a couple terrorists, you know, make us scared, make us scared of, of doing this again. Mm-hmm. And so, um. You know, obviously there's a lot of security around it, but
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah.
Mark Hill: Um, you know, they did it and I give them a lot of credit.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Was there any security for you at Marine Corps?
Mark Hill: I
Ally Brettnacher: don't
Mark Hill: really remember, uh, a lot of security there at Marine Corps,
Ally Brettnacher: because in New York you go through metal detectors. Yeah. On Staten Island. There was, there,
Mark Hill: there was a metal detector. We went through a metal.
Okay. You did. We did, we did go through it because I
Ally Brettnacher: did not go through a metal detector. Yeah. I was going to a different place though. I was going. It was,
Mark Hill: I'm sorry, it wasn't a metal detector. It was a, there was Mar Marines. Marines, yeah. At a checkpoint at a checkpoint kind of checking, looking at your stuff.
Yeah. But, you know, it wasn't in such a way that
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah, I, I mean, I had this backpack of stuff. Yeah. Like, they didn't take all my stuff out of my bag. Yeah. And like look through everything. but they were making sure you had the bib and you were, I think they were trying
Mark Hill: to make sure that somebody didn't have a, you know, a yeah, like a big gun, a big rifle that [00:35:00] could get a lot of people,
Ally Brettnacher: right?
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. yeah. Wow.
Mark Hill: Yeah. It's, it's sad that we need to think about that. I, we did a, you and I do the rock and roll.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. It was making me think that too. The half in,
Mark Hill: uh, in Las Vegas and the year after the shooting at that concert where that guy killed, I don't know, 50 people, that staging area for that was right outside that same hotel.
And so they moved to staging area, but I remember they were very serious about the security and they had, uh, these cherry pickers and they had, uh, police with binoculars mm-hmm. Looking at all the hotels mm-hmm. And the windows, because you know, when you're staging a race, you know, of 30,000 people, you got 30,000 people just in a big crowd.
Ally Brettnacher: I mean, it's not something really that ever had crossed my mind. No. Ever. No.
Mark Hill: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. And so, yeah, that was made that a little different too. Yeah. Yeah. What's the first [00:36:00] year you did Vegas Half.
Mark Hill: Oh, boy. I have no idea
Ally Brettnacher: because you tried to get me to do that for a long time until I finally did
Mark Hill: maybe 10, maybe 10 years ago or something like that.
Okay.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Yeah.
Mark Hill: Do that with my cousin and my cousin's son and who, you know, uh, Dan used to not train. I know he's in his early thirties now. He's getting to be 40 and, uh, he's gotta work a little harder. Yeah. Well, it's like Zach, you know, my husband,
Ally Brettnacher: he, you know, in the Indie mini where he does it every year and you finally like,
Mark Hill: yeah.
This last
Ally Brettnacher: year or two years ago, he didn't eat and he like barely tried. I'm like, what do you think? You are not invincible because you go lift weights every day. Yeah. Like, you gotta actually put in the work, man, if you're gonna not be Well,
Mark Hill: that's what, that's what miserable. That's the difference between being 30 and being 40.
Ally Brettnacher: Amen.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. So Vegas, the first year I did Vegas, I actually, I'm not gonna remember the year off the top of my head. Maybe 22. Yeah. I don't know.
Mark Hill: Yeah, I don't remember.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Um, you finally me, got me to go out there and now that's kind of our thing.
Mark Hill: Yeah. That's fun.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. My friend Selena though, got married during that, on that weekend, one year.
So that
Mark Hill: missed,
Ally Brettnacher: missed one, but now I'm like, [00:37:00] okay, let's do it.
Mark Hill: Yeah, that's good.
Ally Brettnacher: It's so fun. Tell people what you like to do in Vegas.
Mark Hill: You mean play craps? I mean play craps. What else do you do in Vegas? All you guys. All my dad does.
Ally Brettnacher: All we do is play craps. My dad does not eat. Like there's no, like, let's go to a nice dinner.
It's like no more playing craps. I
Mark Hill: mean, we're in Vegas. What? You can go to nice dinner here. Why would I, why would I always that there? Yeah. Why would I waste my time out there when I could be at a crafts table?
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. So as a result, I've learned kind of how to play craps. Yeah. I still kind of, you're still kind of my crutch.
Mark Hill: Yeah. Well, you, you with the rules. You're getting, you're getting better. Yeah. You know, you're getting, we had a pretty good run at Bellagio this year or last year. Oh my gosh. Yeah, we did. So that was fun.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Two out of the three times I've done the Vegas habit, I've come home with hundreds of dollars.
Yeah.
Mark Hill: Well, the reality, the reality of crabs is that you lose, I mean, that's, you know, they don't build those big hotels because people win at crabs. Yeah. That's for sure. There's no skill. Um, but, um, it's, you know, it's the gaming [00:38:00] fun part of it, and the times that you do win, that makes it fun. And as long as you're just doing it with, you know, a little cash that you can, it's just entertainment dollars.
Right. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: I mean, there's nothing like a hot crap table. It's fun.
Mark Hill: It's just really, people are screaming. You're high fiving everybody. It's, it's so fun
Ally Brettnacher: when you've got the dice. Yeah. And you're rolling.
Mark Hill: It's, oh, it's, that's just, that's just fun. Yeah. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: So literally on this weekend we would get up, like maybe grab a breakfast and then we're gonna, the craft tables.
We like play craps for a long time. Yeah. I mean, it's just literally, yeah. Yeah. And then the last couple years we've gotten to go to the sphere.
Mark Hill: Yeah. Ooh. So that's now kind
Ally Brettnacher: of become part of this weekend.
Mark Hill: Yes. It's, um, we saw U2. Mm-hmm. We saw the Eagles. Mm-hmm. Uh, there, it's kind of like, uh, I would say the Grand Canyon.
Right. So I'll describe the Grand Canyon as this beautiful, picturesque thing, but you cannot experience it unless you stand at the edge and look at the Grand Canyon and the spears put it, and the, and the sphere's the same [00:39:00] way I could describe to you this thing. But you can
Ally Brettnacher: watch all the tiktoks and Instagram videos.
You can watch all the stuff
Mark Hill: you want, but unless you go in there Yeah. You can feel it and get the sound and the air moving and the seat shaking. I mean, it's, the whole thing is just unbelievable.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. This is so cool. Yeah.
Mark Hill: Very good.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. It's funny, it reminds me almost of when we saw Avatar in 3D. Yes. We were like, that's the best movie I ever.
Yeah. I remember, remember, I remember you
Mark Hill: turned to me and said, that's the best movie I've ever seen. And it was, which
Ally Brettnacher: you think about it, you're like, okay. The plot, I mean, it's not like the best movie I've ever seen, but it was the best experience that I ever, but the 3D was the
Mark Hill: best experience. It was the 3D was so good in,
Ally Brettnacher: and that's how I felt about the U2 concert.
It's like, was it the best concert?
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: You know, well define concert. Yeah. Like, but it was the most entertaining. I didn't
Mark Hill: particularly like the choice of music for you two, but, um,
Ally Brettnacher: Eagles on the other hand,
Mark Hill: Eagles was, yeah, Eagles was really good.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. If people had, can fork up the money, they're charging for that now.
Mark Hill: Yeah. Yeah. I saw the tickets there, like five or $6,000. I don't, I don't know if that's [00:40:00] just the time that I saw or when the last thing crazy I looked up was like, wow. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: It's insane. It's insane. Insane. So yeah. So now we have Vegas.
Mark Hill: We paid a thousand. I thought that was a lot.
Ally Brettnacher: That's. Yeah, that's, that's something.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So thank you. Yeah. Um, thank you for the craps. Winnings for, yeah.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Oh yeah. So we're signed up for next February. So for anybody listening, I've tried to get people to go and people to, I'm like, fine. Like this is our thing. So I want other people to experience the race because rock and roll really does a good job with the bands.
They do. They do a
Mark Hill: really, they do a really nice job.
Ally Brettnacher: Vegas is at night, which is weird. Yeah.
Mark Hill: It's fun running down the strip at night. Finishing, finishing. You start, it's interesting, you start when it's light out, but then you finish. They got a time to perfectly finish, you know, running down the strip, all the hotels, you know, all lights and stuff.
So Cool. It's very cool.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Yeah. And similar to how you did for Marine Corps, you'll have cigars at the craps table before you run.
Mark Hill: Yeah. Well, that's part of my training. That's part of [00:41:00] your
Ally Brettnacher: training. Yeah. Do you have any like pre-race rituals to speak of? Not, do you eat the same thing? No.
Mark Hill: No, I don't. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: No, no. It's so funny. Old man, old man doesn't have his, he just, just, just
Mark Hill: get it.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Just get it done. Get it done. another race we did together was Illinois.
Mark Hill: Yeah, yeah. In Champaign. We talk about that a lot when we
Ally Brettnacher: talk about weather in particular.
Mark Hill: Yeah. That was one where we, uh, drove over to Champaign, a couple hour drive, and we stayed in a hotel and we got up in the morning.
It was like seven in the morning and it's dark and it's raining, and we're standing at the starting line. And it wasn't, we were in trash, trash bed. I don't even remember. Yeah. We're in trash bags. Yeah. Only, only maybe 2000 people. So not a very big race. And uh, I just remember look at you saying, you know what?
I could be back in that bed right now. Nice and nice and warm, you know, but I'm here standing here as I'm freezing, you know, it's, it's raining here. We, here we are having some fun [00:42:00] now.
Ally Brettnacher: We paid to do this. This is great. Yeah. We
Mark Hill: paid, we paid to do this, but that was, uh. I qualified for Boston in that run.
Ally Brettnacher: You did?
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: I remember cheering you on. I remember seeing you towards the end and you didn't see me. I was like screaming at the top of my lungs. Yeah, but you had your music going and you were
Mark Hill: humping. Yeah. You were ready. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: You were flying.
Mark Hill: I had apparently trained enough that time.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah, yeah,
Mark Hill: yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Other races You've done Geist. We've done together.
Mark Hill: Geist. Yeah. I've done that several times.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Are there I did that. I
Mark Hill: did that the week. I remember doing that once the week after I ran a marathon.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. No big deal. Yeah. Well, the year, what was the year was I thinking? Oh, the Marine Corps. The year that we did Marine Corps.
I was like trying to look up like what else that year you had done Boston and Chicago. Yeah. The same year. You'd done three marathons in one year, which the only time I've ever attempted to do more than one marathon in a year did not go well
Mark Hill: for me. Well, yeah. You see these people that are running. You know, like 50 of them.
Ally Brettnacher: Or like my guy Rob, who was running 20 plus miles a day every [00:43:00] day.
Mark Hill: Yeah, yeah. Every day.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. You're like, what?
Mark Hill: Yeah. Well, he's young.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah,
Mark Hill: that helps.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. He stopped. Did you know that? Oh, he did. You probably wouldn't know that. Yeah. So he announced today that he stopped because he has, he has a nine to five job.
Mark Hill: Yeah. Well, that's makes sense. And
Ally Brettnacher: he's traveling to New York City for the marathon where he's guiding somebody from the Achilles Foundation. And so he was like, listen, I can't do it. I physically totally could do this, but there are just not enough hours of my day.
Mark Hill: Yeah, yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: So I thought good for him, for, you know, not being realistic, killing himself, and like being realistic.
So anyway, yeah. So let's bring it back a little bit because people don't know you at all.
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Thank you to Foot Levelers for supporting this podcast [00:45:00] and for supporting our event Now back to the show.
Marker
Ally Brettnacher: So anyway, yeah. So let's bring it back a little bit because people don't know you at all.
Mark Hill: Okay.
Ally Brettnacher: When you were growing up, were you really athletic as a kid?
Mark Hill: No, not, not really. At, at freshman in high school, I was, uh, five foot two at about 110 or 120 pounds. I remember playing football and, uh, high school that I went to was really good at Foot Bishop Luer High School up at Fort Wayne, and they were really good at football.
And the guys that I was with, they were all really good. And I just remember getting thumped and, and some guys kind of really liked to hit. I didn't really like to hit, I didn't like to get hit. And so I played freshman year and then quit. And in some ways that's a blessing for me because I know so many guys now that really can't run because they hurt their knees in high school football and that's
Ally Brettnacher: kind of,
Mark Hill: or their back or their neck or, you know, something that, that, you know, kind of lived with them for the rest of their life.
And so I didn't [00:46:00] really play sports in, uh, high school. I played, you know, pickup basketball, a lot of pickup basketball, but, You know, I was never, uh, that good of an athlete, so I was never a runner. I never ran. Yeah. Never golfed. Never, you know, never did much.
Ally Brettnacher: Just think about that now. It's kind of weird.
Yeah. Yeah. A lot of the pickup basketball was a big part of,
Mark Hill: yeah. So that was a big part of, uh, of certainly my college experience. I played like a lot. And then, and then I, uh, didn't play so much when I was in Chicago. I lived in Chicago then I lived in Denver for 10 years. I played three or four times a week there.
Ally Brettnacher: You gotta tell people where you went to college. How else are they gonna know?
Mark Hill: Uh, I went to college in South Bend. I went to Notre Dame. Oh, you did? Okay. Oh, there, yeah. There you go. Are you happy?
Ally Brettnacher: Yes, I am. Well, and also, I wanna know, tell people how you met mom. 'cause I think that's so interesting.
Mark Hill: Uh, I met her in high school.
Yeah. Yeah. And I remember, I still remember her as a freshman. She was walking down the hall and I said, oh, that's, that's a cute girl. I haven't seen her before. [00:47:00]
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. And then your cousin dated her first? My cousin
Mark Hill: dated her first and I had to haul him around. And I really didn't like her then. Um, and then, uh, at the end of senior year, I asked her to the prom.
And so we went to the prom together and
Ally Brettnacher: Pretty sure didn't she make her dress?
Mark Hill: She made her dress. We picked the flowers. Oh, that's cute. You know? Yeah. Uh, do
Ally Brettnacher: you have pictures of
Mark Hill: that? I'm sure there's pictures of around somewhere. I, you know, that's where Did
Ally Brettnacher: you pick the flowers at the house or like you go to park?
No, I remember we went
Mark Hill: to, we went to the foster park. We went to the park and
Ally Brettnacher: Aw.
Mark Hill: Picked the flowers. I don't know. It was spring. It was springtime.
Ally Brettnacher: That's cool. Yeah. And did you like make your little Yeah. Gluten outta the flowers you painted. And it, and
Mark Hill: you know, the thing about picking flowers versus going, buying 'em from a florist, they like die.
So my, my thing, just like, but by the time we even went, it was just like, dead dead. And so were her flowers. But, you know, we didn't care.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. That's pretty cute. That's funny. Well, then she went to, she [00:48:00] went to St. Mary's. She went to St. Mary's, which is very close to Notre Dame. For anybody who doesn't know that.
Mark Hill: Yeah. Across the street. Yep. So we were, went to college together and then, um, she graduated a semester later. And, uh, so I went to Chicago and then she came to Chicago, um, a semester later. And, , we lived in Chicago for a couple years and then gotten married, went to grad school in Bloomington.
Ally Brettnacher: Talk about how you decided to get married.
Mark Hill: Uh, what does that mean? I don't remember how we decided. So you lived
Ally Brettnacher: together so you could live together, right? Like it was a very not romantic if I remember the story.
Mark Hill: Yeah. I was like, let's go to, I was like, let's go to IU and go to grad school. And she's like, I'm, you know, I'm not moving there without being married.
I'm like, uh, you wanna get married? Okay. You wanna get married? There was no romance. There was no, I don't think, no, I didn't, I didn't get her an engagement ring. Um, in fact, my wedding ring I got from my uncle Harold. For 80 bucks and he threw in her wedding [00:49:00] ring. So it's so yeah. That's so special. So she has since got her, uh, herself a wedding ring.
It's really nice. It was, it is beautiful. It was her, her ants. Yeah. Like she had it made out of the diamond. She had it from her. Yeah. Her aunt story. It's really beautiful. Yeah. That's funny
Ally Brettnacher: to think about.
Mark Hill: Yeah. Kinda a
Ally Brettnacher: And how many, how many years married now? Is it gonna be, uh,
Mark Hill: 40? We've been married 45 years.
Yeah. Like a long time.
Ally Brettnacher: Like a long
Mark Hill: time. That's a long time.
Ally Brettnacher: That is a really long time. It's good. It is good. And you lived in Chica or Chicago? Chicago obviously, and then also in Colorado for a decade. We
Mark Hill: lived, uh, you were born there. You and Yeah. Your sister Casey were born in, uh, in Aurora, Colorado.
Ally Brettnacher: Did you ever run out there?
Like never ran? It's a hated a huge running scene. I hated it. So you just never, what did you I hated running out. Did you play basketball? I played basketball all the time. Colorado basketball.
Mark Hill: Yeah. I played, we, we belonged to, uh, a club that. And, uh, pick up basketball at lunch. So I would at lunchtime go over, instead of going out to lunch or anything, [00:50:00] I would go over for an hour, hour and a half and play, play basketball probably three or four days a week.
It was great.
Ally Brettnacher: You also played, this is fast forwarding a little bit, but you also played indoor soccer.
Mark Hill: Played indoor soccer. I did,
Ally Brettnacher: uh, for a time. Yeah,
Mark Hill: I did. So when you guys were playing and, uh, Casey and Morgan, all you guys were playing? We got to be friends with, you know, a bunch of the Westfield soccer folks.
They're parents. And so we decided as a group we were gonna play in a league. And so we started, we played outdoors soccer, we played,
Ally Brettnacher: you played
Mark Hill: outdoor soccer? We played outdoor soccer. We played, wow. I don't know if I knew that. We, we played indoor soccer. We had Yeah, it was, it was, it was really fun. I really enjoyed, so, so, you know, I was playing basketball and indoor soccer.
I was doing stuff to keep myself active. Yeah. Yeah. And then when I turned 50, Uh, I just, I just saw like my friends, like tearing their acls and getting, you know, just getting hurt and its just, uh, so I, so I quit when I was 50 of doing any of that kind of stuff. Yeah. Yeah. [00:51:00] I
Ally Brettnacher: quit, yeah. A while ago. Yeah,
Mark Hill: so, so, um, I had to do something to, you know, stay in shape.
I was starting to get a little belly and, you know, I'm thinking, ah, what am I gonna do? I'll try this running thing.
Ally Brettnacher: There you go. There you go. Yeah. After seeing mom, seeing mom do it. Yeah. I remember, I have a visceral memory of you playing indoor soccer, getting into a fight.
Mark Hill: I never got into a fight, but you know, like
Ally Brettnacher: you pushed a guy or he pushed you one of the two.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It
Mark Hill: was a little, you know, it was, I remember as a
Ally Brettnacher: kid being like, oh my gosh, my dad's, you know, in a fight
Mark Hill: mean you get all these type A people and they get out there and get competitive and, you know, you kind of. Lose sight of.
Ally Brettnacher: Oh, totally. Well, I mean, believe me, like we would play and people would be like former college athletes.
Yeah. It's, and I look
Mark Hill: back on that now, I go, eh, you That's so ridiculous. What a dumb ass. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was, I was, I was a dumb ass. So,
Ally Brettnacher: you know, I mean, aren't we all?
Mark Hill: Yeah. So,
Ally Brettnacher: yeah. So during this time too, you and mom had a business. We did. So how did you find, like, so you [00:52:00] still in the height of the business, were you still playing basketball on the side?
Yeah. Coaching, soccer, like doing all the things. Yeah.
Mark Hill: Yeah. I did those things. Yeah. I mean, I just, you know, we had a great team and I, I was never the person that worked 60 or 70 hours a week. I just, I just didn't, we had a good team and, but I didn't do a lot else. Right. I was, you know, between, uh, between the business and, you know, three young girls.
That was kind of my, that was my life for sure.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Three young girls. Yeah.
Mark Hill: Yeah. And then you were all teenagers. That was, uh, that was a no comment. Interesting time. Let's not, let's just
Ally Brettnacher: breeze right over that. Okay. Because, uh, I was not, there's some
Mark Hill: good stories there. Ooh.
Ally Brettnacher: Oh. People would love for you to share that.
Yeah. Did you guys ever run, did you ever push me in a stroller? No, we were too old by the time you started. No. Yeah.
Mark Hill: Never did that. 'cause I, yeah. You guys were
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Too old at that point. It was too old. Yeah. Being teenagers like you were,
Mark Hill: You probably had to
Ally Brettnacher: run just to like, so I didn't really, you know,
Mark Hill: I did some halves, but I didn't really run till I was, till I was 50.[00:53:00]
Then I started kind of thinking, okay, maybe I can go a little faster and a little faster and, you know, I was running two and a half an hour, two and a half hour halves, which was, you know, it was fine. Finish. It's good.
Ally Brettnacher: Do you remember what your fastest half marathon was?
Mark Hill: I probably, probably one 40.
Five-ish.
Ally Brettnacher: Okay. Somewhere around
Mark Hill: there. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Have you ever gotten any, you've gotten age group awards? I'm trying to picture in your office. I swear from, from Illinois. You got one? I got, I was,
Mark Hill: I was second in, uh, 55 to 60. There was, I think there was two of us.
Ally Brettnacher: That doesn't matter. Believe me, I've been there too.
It's like, oh, there's like, I won. Oh, there's only one other person. Well,
Mark Hill: yeah. Yeah. Well, okay. Still won. It's like the 4th of July race. Yeah,
Ally Brettnacher: at Wawa C.
Mark Hill: There you go.
Ally Brettnacher: The age group award's there. Yeah. We gotta st You gotta start doing that race again with me. 'cause it's, it's so fun.
Mark Hill: May maybe it's early. [00:54:00] I gotta get, I I know it's only four days
Ally Brettnacher: past your marathon.
It's not very nice. Well, I couldn't believe that Marine Corps was sending out. I mean, I can, but Marine Corps is like ready to sign up again. I was like, no.
Mark Hill: No.
Ally Brettnacher: That is mean. I'm not even, no, I'm
Mark Hill: not,
Ally Brettnacher: I'm not, I'm not ready for my half marathon next weekend. I am, but I'm also like, if the weather's bad, I just won't do it because I just, you know, it's like, okay.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah.
Mark Hill: Well, good for you. Mm-hmm. I'm very proud of you, sweetie.
Ally Brettnacher: Oh my gosh. I'm so proud of you, dad.
Mark Hill: Yeah, yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: When I was like reading my recap like out loud and then I've listened to it. I mean, it makes me so emotional. Yeah.
Mark Hill: Well, I, I, I just think about the Ansys angel thing that you did and pushing, pushing that young girl and, and, uh, how proud of, I proud of you.
I was for just you doing that, you know, giving, giving them yourself of that. And then, and then we went to that, uh, to that dinner the night before. And I was just so impressed. You know, there were 50 people running that [00:55:00] were pushing strollers and their families and the disabled kids and their families.
Mm-hmm. And it was just quite a group. And the, and the gentleman that, runs that, the nickname of Rooster, I think he's been on this show. But yeah, rooster, uh, was so good and so inspiring. Uh, it was just really fun to, really fun to be. You know, to go to that dinner Yeah. And be part of that. I, I really took a lot away from that.
And, and it was so great for your girls to see that. Oh my gosh. That'll make, thinking about
Ally Brettnacher: that makes me cry.
Mark Hill: That was really, that was really good for them to see you doing that, I think is a very important thing.
Ally Brettnacher: Well, Sydnee has show and tell Tomorrow and she goes, mom, I can't decide either I bring, like one of my race medals or, or I really like to bring the Ainsley's Angels book to show my class.
Yeah. And I was like,
Mark Hill: that's, that's a good one. That's really cool. That's really cool.
Ally Brettnacher: And last night I found her reading the book in bed to herself. Yeah. And I just was like,
Mark Hill: see, there you go. Wow. I mean, it's not what you say to kids, right. It's what you, what you show 'em. [00:56:00] Mm-hmm. And uh, you know, you're showing her good things.
So
Ally Brettnacher: yeah. Thank you. It was, it's well, and I had such great role models in my life. Mm-hmm. I mean, the stuff that you guys have done to give back to the community too, I mean, that list goes on and on. Yeah. So, you know, I get that from somewhere.
Mark Hill: Mm-hmm.
Ally Brettnacher: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Mark Hill: I can't, I can't believe you haven't asked me about, you know, the dilemmas that I have when I'm running.
Ally Brettnacher: Oh God. We haven't talked about poop.
Mark Hill: I can't believe you that Casey missed that. I, Casey would be very unhappy if you didn't she Okay.
Didn't ask me. Sorry. She
Ally Brettnacher: texted me actually before this and was like, are you gonna talk about the poop? And I was like, well, probably. I was like, how could we not talk about
Mark Hill: the poop?
Ally Brettnacher: Okay. And the bloody nipples. Okay.
Mark Hill: Yes. All right.
Ally Brettnacher: So dad.
Mark Hill: Okay.
I, I just tried to be like really sweet and then we just pivoted to poop like immediately.
It was like, actually, you know what? Let's just talk about poop because let's, [00:57:00] let's light, let's like lighten it up. Okay. Um, that's so funny. So at what point in your running career did you start having issues? With needing to go to the restroom? Probably,
probably, you know, probably not right away. Um, I was fine for, for a while.
And then, uh, what your mother likes to call my fecal incontinence.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah.
Mark Hill: Uh, which basically, I've never heard her say that, but that tracks, she's like, you need to, you need to look that up on the, you need to look that up on Google. And I'm like, you know what? If I put that in there, they're gonna just start sending me ads, ads fors for everything.
Ally Brettnacher: They are probably, yeah. You know, so you probably get those anyway.
Mark Hill: No, not yet. Now you, I'll now, now you'll, you're welcome. Um, but you know, for me, all of a sudden, uh, what started happening is when I had to go, I, I, there's nothing I could do. I was just, I was just gonna go. I had maybe 30 seconds between the time I felt like I had to go, and then I, when I went.[00:58:00]
You know, nothing to really say about it. So, and the bad part of it was that running tended to, you know, kind of bring it on. So, you know, I'd wait around in the morning, wait around in the morning, wait around in the morning, try to go, try to go, try to go, and then I'd go, and then I'd go, okay, good. I can go.
Then I'd go, I'd start running. I'm like, oh no, here it comes. You know? And maybe, maybe a couple times during the run,
Ally Brettnacher: maybe a couple times during the run. What is the craziest place you've pooped? I'm
Mark Hill: not talking about that.
Ally Brettnacher: Why? You know, come on, nobody. It's probably been a while.
Mark Hill: No, actually, actually the crazy.
Come on, come on. Just
Ally Brettnacher: tell the people.
Mark Hill: Ah, so we were in Portugal.
Ally Brettnacher: Oh no mom, poor mom.
Mark Hill: And I got a couple runs in and I got a, I had a run and it was just beautiful. Long as. Duro River. It was this beautiful run, really. And I'm on this road that's along the [00:59:00] river and it's kind of winding and, but then it's, it's got a big wall.
So I'm running along the wall and there's a road's kind of narrow and then there's a fall off to the river and a in a, uh, thing to keep you from going off the road. A barrier. Mm-hmm. So there's like nowhere to go and all of a sudden I, I gotta go and it's, I'm on the road and I'm looking around, there's not much traffic and uh,
Ally Brettnacher: you poop in the road,
Mark Hill: just think, well, I got a little bit off the road, but, uh, just
Ally Brettnacher: pull your pants down.
Gotta go. White, white ass. I can, in the winds, I can, I can either
Mark Hill: do it in my pants or I can just, you know, try to miss, so. And I did. You successfully miss and I successfully missed, thank God. I
Ally Brettnacher: need to get you more of those butt napkins. I need to give you a case of those so you can have 'em with you always.
'cause yeah, that just would be better. So, so
Mark Hill: the worst, you know, the worst part of, you know, this, the Marine Corps was, you know, I'm nervous that I'm gonna have to, I'm gonna have to [01:00:00] go. Yeah. So, you know, I'm doing the Imodium and stuff the night before. Try to make sure that I don't go. And I was, and I was, uh, pleasantly surprised.
Hey, gosh, I was successful. Yeah,
Ally Brettnacher: because here's the thing, like when you started running and like maybe had some of that, like there weren't like, so like the video stuff there is now. Yeah. Now. Like this poor guy at Boston a couple years ago pooped in someone's front yard 'cause like that's what he had to do.
Yeah. And it was on their ring doorbell camera and he was on the news.
Mark Hill: So that could have been me. I mean, that could have been me. I mean, that's for sure. You've
Ally Brettnacher: gotten pretty lucky.
Mark Hill: Yeah, I've been very, I've been in that regard because I've been, I've been very, I've been very fortunate
Ally Brettnacher: because that, oh my gosh, just in Portugal, you pooped in the road. Yeah. That's So it was
Mark Hill: better.
It was a beautiful view. Yeah. And this, I could see the river, the valley. So there are no cars past you while you go. It was no cars. I was hoping that somebody didn't come around the corner when I was going.
Ally Brettnacher: Right. Well, now that might like blow it around. That wouldn't be fun either.
Mark Hill: Well,
Ally Brettnacher: yeah.
Mark Hill: I wasn't like on the road.
Yeah. So, [01:01:00]
Ally Brettnacher: yeah. I mean, well, I think that it's, but I know all the
Mark Hill: spots now. You, you know, I know, I know all the spots. And the beautiful thing about the Monan is there's a, you know, there's a bunch of restrooms along the way. Yeah. So how often would
Ally Brettnacher: you say you use those restrooms?
Mark Hill: All the time. Okay. Yeah. So you make it to them that surpris?
Yeah, usually. I usually, usually, usually can make it to 'em, sometimes, you know, gotta jump into the bush.
Ally Brettnacher: I, I mean, I've had to do that one time on the monon.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: One time only. Yeah. And I remember thinking I'm a real runner now.
Mark Hill: I think most people who run a lot have probably had that experie. Absolutely.
If
Ally Brettnacher: you have not pooped yourself or pooped in the woods or like somewhere Yeah. You're not supposed to like, then you should be working harder.
Mark Hill: Yeah. You just hoping when you go in there that somebody hadn't been there before you. Right. So,
Ally Brettnacher: oh boy, dad. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Mark Hill: Yeah. In fact, I think one of the, one of the things that your mom's got most irritated [01:02:00] about is like, I'll come back from a run and I'll, you know, take a shower and I'm, you know, cleaning myself off and all of it doesn't quite make it way down the drain in the shower. I was,
Ally Brettnacher: no, she can get irritated.
She
Mark Hill: can get more than the, she fact, she's the not banned
Ally Brettnacher: from the shower.
Mark Hill: She, well, she was talking about having separate showers.
Ally Brettnacher: I can't believe that hasn't happened yet. Yeah.
Mark Hill: I'm, I'm kind of surprised lose her to that. I'm kind of surprised she hasn't, she hasn't, you know, put me to the other bedroom.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah, right. You know,
Mark Hill: so,
Ally Brettnacher: yeah. Anyway, well, you do have separate beds, which I, you know, I think that's great.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: It's hard to say. It's not like you, like snuggle up when you're, I mean, I don't know, maybe some people still do that.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: But it's like having the ability to sleep. Yeah. Well she's so,
Mark Hill: so I could sleep anywhere.
It doesn't, yeah, it wouldn't bother you. It just doesn't bother me one way or another. But for her, she's a very, very light sleeper. Yeah. And I am not. And so I'm moving around and moving [01:03:00] around and, you know, in the middle of the night, grabbing the sheet or whatever, and, you know, that wakes her up and she just, you know, so she's got a good routine now where she's got a, this, this, uh, special cover and, and so she sleeps better and she's.
You know, she feels better. So Yeah. It works.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. So, so separate beds first. Yeah. Now separate showers. Yeah. You already have separate toilets.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: So that's, yeah. That's key. It's probably,
Mark Hill: probably coming.
Ally Brettnacher: I wish I had, I wish we had separate toilets. Yeah. Yeah. So that's also nice, but, you know,
Mark Hill: yeah. Mine's taller.
What a, what a luxury stall It is. I, I am blessed in that way
Ally Brettnacher: that you are. Yeah. Yeah. I can't believe we almost forgot to talk about that. That would've been bad. Casey would've never forgiven me.
Mark Hill: That would've been kid. Casey would've, would've never. She said,
Ally Brettnacher: there's one thing I wanna hear about. Yeah. Yeah. The other thing I remember back in the, the indie mini days was we would go to Dr.
Greg Wall's house. Yeah. Your friend.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Friend, uh, Greg. And we would, we would get ready at his house. [01:04:00] And that involved me, like seeing you guys like all put band-aids on your nipples. Yeah. And I remember being like, what in the actual world is this? Like, yeah. Because I, you know, yeah. Didn't know or have that problem and.
So,
Mark Hill: yeah. Well, if you've typically, obviously it happens in the cold and when it's cold out and your nipples become erect and you're running and the, and depending upon the kind of shirt you're wearing, it can rub and, uh, it, it's, if it happens, it's very painful.
Ally Brettnacher: Oh, I can't even that. Well, I can't imagine 'cause I've had children.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: But
Mark Hill: it's very painful. And so we just get in front of it. But I, Greg, I think had one year he had bloody nipples. I mean Oh yeah. That's like a, that still happens to people. Yeah. And it's, you know, when you see somebody and, you know, they're like, blood coming down, you're like, Ooh, that's gotta, and it hurts for, you know, a couple dates a while.
Yeah,
Ally Brettnacher: yeah, yeah, yeah,
Mark Hill: yeah. So we were just, uh, we were just avoiding that.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. It was [01:05:00] funny. But it was like, for me being like, oh my gosh.
Mark Hill: Yeah. What are these old, what's going on here? What are these old guys doing?
Ally Brettnacher: Well, I was, for me, I was in college the first time I did the mini, which for some reason in my head I had thought that I was in high school.
But I think. There was a year where I tr I trained with Brittany Fraley, my friend. Yeah. And we were like, yeah, let's try to do it. And then we like half-assed it and didn't do it. Yeah. I don't, I don't even know if we would've registered or anything like that. But you had tried for a while to get me to, to do it.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: And we never quite got Casey there.
Mark Hill: No.
Ally Brettnacher: There's still time for Casey, I think.
Mark Hill: I don't think so. Mm. Well we'll see Morgan. Morgan has, uh, Morgan is a runner. Morgan's a runner. Yeah. Yeah. My youngest sister. So, yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. So you got, you got two out of three? I got two out of three. Yeah. Not bad. Well, and then, you know, I think you'll be able to do 5K maybe with Sydney if you'd want to.
She, she's ready. She's asked, started asking me about doing a fucking
Mark Hill: thing. I am, I am hopeful that I can do a half with her.
Ally Brettnacher: That'd be pretty cool.
Mark Hill: But, uh, she's a few years away from that.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah.
Mark Hill: So I gotta just [01:06:00] stay in, in shape enough that I can do a, do a half. Yeah. Now I not, might not be able to actually run with her 'cause she'll probably be faster.
Ally Brettnacher: She, oh my gosh. That's true. She would have to,
Mark Hill: she is so, she's faster runner than me now, so
Ally Brettnacher: she's a faster runner than me now.
Mark Hill: And, uh, but you know, I'm a faster swimmer
Ally Brettnacher: for now.
Mark Hill: We'll see how long that lasts. We'll see how
Ally Brettnacher: long that lasts. Um, we forgot to talk about this when we were talking about Marine Corps, like the race itself.
Yeah. But like when you got to see them.
Mark Hill: Oh, because
Ally Brettnacher: that's really cool. Oh. Is being able to see your people during a marathon is like, well one
Mark Hill: of the very cool things was that you were running in it and I'm running with you, but then, you know, seeing my granddaughters there, I don't know. They were mile 11 or 12 and then you
Ally Brettnacher: saw 'em at 11 or are you talking about the National Mall?
Did you see them one time? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was like 16.
Mark Hill: Oh, that was 16. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, um, I was still feel, I was still feeling pretty good. I know that. Yeah. That's good. Um, 'cause if you see the picture of me, I'm [01:07:00] still, you know, yeah. You can put your hands up. I got my arms up and I'm still, you know, feeling okay.
And, but I do remember saying to, oh, I'm glad I saw you guys 'cause I get to stop for a minute. Yeah,
Ally Brettnacher: yeah, yeah.
Mark Hill: Uh, but it was really exciting to see them. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: It was so cool.
Mark Hill: It was really cool.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. The pictures are just worth a really, yeah. Thousand words. Cool. And,
Mark Hill: and hopefully that's a, a memory that Sydney will, will, uh, will have, will have.
Yeah. Yeah,
Ally Brettnacher: for sure. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not sure
Mark Hill: Sloane at four, but Sydney probably. Well, I mean, the thing
Ally Brettnacher: now with them as you know, like the amount of times they look at my pictures on my phone. Yeah. I feel like some of those memories will just be like seared into their brain. Yes. Yes. Even though they don't remember experiencing it.
Mark Hill: Yeah. It is, uh, it is an interesting thing how kids growing up today have, you know, a zillion pictures of themselves. I mean, I have, I think about the pictures that I have of when I was a kid. I, you know, I have a handful, right? So weird. It's so I have
Ally Brettnacher: thousands of pictures of those kids.
Mark Hill: Yeah. And they won't even be able to go through 'em all.
No, no. Nor would they probably want, I mean, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. So that's a different, [01:08:00] you know, it's a different, uh, it's a different era. Mm-hmm. And then we were, we were messing around with, uh, with the AI video stuff. I, I've been messing around with Grok, uh, and it's really easy to use Grok to do a AI video.
And, uh, so I was with, Sidney and Sloan and, and, uh, their cousins, and we probably spent an hour doing these fun videos where you just take a picture and then the AI creates something, whatever, yeah. Whatever it wants to create. And you just, uh, we had a lot of, we had a lot of fun doing that.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Yeah.
You and I are chatting about how like, they might not even, like, how are they gonna look back and know sometimes, like what was real and what wasn't? Yeah. What's
Mark Hill: real and what's, what's not. Yeah. And I was a little concerned when Sloan was looking at it because. Because it had her like, going through this screen and she's like, did I do that?
Did I, you know, I mean, she's right. Like what? She's struggling a little bit with what's real and what's not real. Right? Yeah. It's crazy because it was a picture of her Yeah. [01:09:00] Doing this thing, right? Mm-hmm. And so it's, uh, that's an interesting thing that's happening and what, what can I believe and what, what's true and what's not with respect to video now is mm-hmm.
It's, it's gone. I can't look at something on video and just assume that it's, that it's Right. No. Especially, and sadly, most
Ally Brettnacher: people do still probably. It's,
Mark Hill: it's, and it's, it's an awful thing. I mean, we've kind of learned, I think, society not to believe everything we read on the internet now. I mean, hopefully most people I think of there people, and it kind of doesn't even matter where it comes from.
It's kind of like, you know. Yeah. Doesn't, is CNN or Fox or whoever it is, you just don't, everybody's got a, everybody's got an ax to grind, right? So, so you just don't know what's. What's real and what's not. And now that video Yeah, it's, ooh, we gotta, we gotta be careful about that now too.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. It's gonna be nuts.
Mark Hill: It is a different world.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. I can start, I can make pictures of myself running that, like, look like I'm running really fast. Right.
Mark Hill: Maybe we can get [01:10:00] me running across the winning,
Ally Brettnacher: Hey, give me a video of me winning the Marine Corps marathon. Yeah. That would be, that would be, I mean, that's easy. All you do is type in the prompts, right?
It's crazy. Yeah. So crazy. You go. oh man, this is so fun. I'm gonna ask you the end of the podcast questions. Okay. And there's two, and I'm gonna like, kind of tweak the first one a little bit. Oh, okay. To be a little bit broader. But my, I ask, what is your favorite running mantra and or song?
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: So I'll let you answer that first.
Well, those, those are two,
Mark Hill: those are two things. I think they, there's two things within one question. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Ally Brettnacher: yeah, yeah.
Mark Hill: Um, so, so the mantra is.
Ally Brettnacher: Don't poop yourself.
Mark Hill: Uh, this is from a friend of mine, Trent, Trent Seed, who was a, who was a runner and, uh, triathlete.
Ally Brettnacher: What branch of the military? He was in military, wasn't he?
He was,
Mark Hill: uh, he was in the, I think he was in the army. Um, I'm not a hundred percent sure, but Yeah. but his, his mantra to me it was bring on the suck. You know? Bring it. That's a good one. Bring it on. [01:11:00] Bring on the sock. 'cause 'cause that's what it is. You know, when you're training and you those last few miles and you're running a race, it's last few miles.
It's like, bring it on, man. I mean, I, the pain, the, the suck. It's the suck. It's just bring it on. Bring it on. And, uh, so that's the, that's the best mantra that I've used and that I have. And then of course, you know, I have a whole playlist for running a marathon, but it starts with, uh, Bruce springing Born to Run.
Oh. So good. And, uh. Huey Lewis Power of Love. That's a good one. Yeah. So those are the couple, those are the first two songs in the, I'm trying to think of, so the other one I always remember
Ally Brettnacher: is Running On Empty Playlist on Empty, because there'd be times where we would share AirPods and Run.
Mark Hill: Yeah, yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: I dunno when that would've been like just training for stuff or where we would run together.
Yeah. And there's a lot, we've shared a lot of miles outside of races Too Lot.
Mark Hill: Yeah. There's a lot of, there's a lot of, uh, there's a lot of good songs. Sometimes I go to extremes. Ooh. Billy Joel. Billy Joel. Yeah. [01:12:00] That's a good one.
Ally Brettnacher: Oh,
Mark Hill: that's a good one. Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Talk about going to extremes. Yeah, yeah,
Mark Hill: for sure.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Yeah.
Mark Hill: So those are good.
Ally Brettnacher: Those are good. Yeah. Um, other would be like any just general wisdom from a 69-year-old man. Oh,
Mark Hill: wow.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. I know that's, but I gotta get, I gotta capture a little bit of that.
Mark Hill: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I, I, you know, life. Is, is, uh, is such a blessing. I, I think we so much take it for granted, right?
And we take, you know, I live in Carmel, Indiana. Well, people say, oh, Indiana, it's like, oh my gosh, this is such an awesome place. Like, look at this library and there's so many places in the US they're so awesome, right? We just, we have so much. And you know, if somebody in the average income in the United States, you know, they're in the top couple percent of people in the world's income, right?
We, you know, [01:13:00] so we as human beings have this tendency to look at people in, in front of us, right? And have more than us, or, you know, they're prettier than us, or they're skinnier than us, or they're faster mm-hmm. Uh, faster than us, or they have more money than us, or whatever it is, right? It's like, wow. Uh.
You know, just being grateful for what you have. And I, I, you know, I, I've been incredibly blessed, so. Mm-hmm. so being grateful, I think is true. Kind of no matter where you are, what you have, it's makes for, makes, makes you just more content.
Ally Brettnacher: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. The other piece of advice that I think about a lot from you is if you're wondering whether or not you should show up for somebody to just show up.
Mark Hill: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think when you, when you lose somebody, uh, in your life, and then people, people show up for you. [01:14:00] Mm-hmm. I think all of a sudden you go, oh, wow. Yeah. That matters. Mm-hmm. And, uh, you know, somebody loses somebody. Obviously it's awkward. What do you, what do I say? You know.
And I don't wanna say something dumb. Yeah, well just, you don't have to say anything. Right. You just be there. You need to show up and I'm just say, I'm here for you.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Yeah.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: I think that is just one of the best pieces of advice you've given me. Yeah. Because I try to take that to heart and be like, oh, would it be like, should I, and it's just like, well just do it.
Mark Hill: Yeah. Just, yeah. just do it. Like, you know, I, I don't know. I have friends have lost somebody. I call 'em.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah.
Mark Hill: Call 'em. You know what, if they don't wanna talk to you, guess
Ally Brettnacher: what? They won't answer the phone. They won't answer the phone. Yeah. Yeah. But
Mark Hill: they know you called.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. Yeah,
Mark Hill: yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. So good.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: And then the last question I ask is, what's your next finish line? Oh. And or milestone since for you. We're not Well, Vegas.
Mark Hill: We're we are? Yeah. Well, yeah. Vegas, that's my next, uh, that's my next [01:15:00] run. So
Ally Brettnacher: the milestones you're gonna turn, oh, what are, what are we doing next year for Big up?
Mark Hill: So, uh. My friend Greg Wall, who we talked about earlier, just turned 70 and, uh, you know, he was in grade school and high school with me and, and, uh, so he's the first, my, my other friend from that era, Matt Kelly, is gonna turn 70 in January, and I'll be in April
Ally Brettnacher: then mom's in May and
Mark Hill: mom's in May, and my cousin Paul's in July.
And so we're all
Ally Brettnacher: year of the milestones, man. I'm gonna be 40 this year.
Mark Hill: Yeah. 40. Oh wow.
Ally Brettnacher: It is kind of cool since you guys had me at 30 that I, we share those milestone years. Yeah, yeah.
Mark Hill: Yeah. That's cool. And I remember my 40th birthday party mom put a surprise birthday party. I don't know if you over the hill.
I remember. Yeah, yeah. I
Ally Brettnacher: remember being a lot of over the hill decorations. Yeah. And thinking about that now, like, I'm about to turn 40.
Mark Hill: Yeah.
Ally Brettnacher: And I'm like, oh, and you
Mark Hill: remember your dad turning 40? That's like, whoa. Wow. He's really
Ally Brettnacher: old now.
Mark Hill: He was, he, it seemed like he was old then.
Ally Brettnacher: Right. Now you're like, okay.
Um. [01:16:00] Yeah. So are you gonna do anything?
Mark Hill: I haven't really thought about it. Yeah. Yeah. I don't have any,
Ally Brettnacher: you gotta do something. I've never really
Mark Hill: been a huge on the, on the milestones. I do remember a good saying though, when I turned 60, you know, I was thinking, oh my gosh. 60. And somebody said to me, mark, you're gonna wish you were 60.
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah. You said that to me. And I was like, oh my God.
Mark Hill: Yeah. And I'm like, wow. And now I think that was very insightful. I wish I was 60. Yeah. It's crazy. Yeah. Oh yeah. So it's, uh, you know, it's a matter of enjoying and the friends that I, you know, we talk about getting older and it really is about enjoying what we have.
Mm-hmm. And, and, uh, you know, everybody's got ailments and this and that. It's like. Okay, let's talk about our ailments, but let's get beyond that and then, you know, enjoy, enjoy life and enjoy the time we have. Mm-hmm. And be grateful for what we have. [01:17:00]
Ally Brettnacher: Yeah.
Mark Hill: So, mm.
Ally Brettnacher: This is so fun. Oh, good. Finally got to do this.
Yay. Now we'll have to get what number? What number? 100 and this'll be 1 32 maybe. Geez. Wow. 1, 3, 2 in the one thirties. Yeah.
Mark Hill: Well congratulations to you for doing 132 of
Ally Brettnacher: these. Who would've thought? Yeah, who would've thought Not me.
Mark Hill: Yeah. Well, good. It's been pretty
Ally Brettnacher: fun.
Mark Hill: Good for you.
Ally Brettnacher: Thanks for doing it with me.
So
Mark Hill: good.
Ally Brettnacher: Thanks for Alright. Trudging around DC for me.
Mark Hill: Alright, well I love you Sweet. Congrat you. I love you. I'm so
Ally Brettnacher: proud of you. Yeah, it was so fun. Alright. All right. Thanks everybody. Happy running.
Mark Hill: Happy running.
Ally Brettnacher: Survived.
Mark Hill: Very nice.
Ally Brettnacher: If you enjoyed this episode of Finish Lines and Milestones from Sandy Boy Productions, please share rate review. Text my dad. Tell him you loved it. And thank you so much to Foot Levelers and Previn X for supporting this episode. And to everybody who supported me and my dad throughout this crazy journey of running the Marine Corps Marathon, couldn't have done it without you.
See you next week. [01:18:00] Love you, dad.