REDSTONE ARSENAL, Alabama -- The U.S. Army joined NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center for their Safety, Health and Environmental, or SHE, Day 5K run April 22 and walked away as the winner of the coed team competition.
The U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command/Army Forces Strategic Command, run group name USASMDC/ARSTRAT, had nine runners registered for the group. Four of those came in among the first 15 runners.
"It was a beautiful day for a 5K run," said Maj. Elizabeth Helland, SMDC's secretary of the general staff and the first female to complete the run. "The SHE Day run volunteers and supporters put on a first-class event."
The Team Redstone Sexual Harassment and Assault Response and Prevention, or SHARP, program decided to team up with NASA and sponsor the run rather than have a separate run for Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Month, or SAAPM, which is also in April.
"We wanted to draw attention to SAAPM, so we decided to sponsor the run," said Dr. Julie Lindahl, SMDC's SHARP program manager. "We provided Gatorade and water and set up an information table and our SHARP banner.
"I volunteered to man the table at the event," Lindahl continued. "The turnout from SMDC was great! We appreciate their support of SHARP, and congratulate them on their victories today."
The team consisted of: Maj. James Bennett, Lt. Col. Timothy Dalton, civilian Carrie David, Sgt. 1st Class Angela Fernandez, Helland, Sgt. 1st Class Alfonso Martinez, Staff Sgt. John Schaefer, Capt. Eric Sidio, and Maj. Anthony Tingle.
"We enjoyed pulling together a command team for the race, and were pleasantly surprised to win the coed team award," Helland said. "They told me this was the first time the Army had won the team award. Hopefully next year we'll see an even bigger turnout from the command."
According to Andrew Brown with the MSFC Running Club, that was not all.
"This was the first time an Army team won a category in the NASA SHE 5K," said Brown. "Or for that matter, it was the first time they entered a team."
Helland was the female race winner with a run time of 19:27.257, and she also was the first to finish in the 35-39 female age bracket. Tingle came in first place in the male master's category at 19:34.767, and Dalton came in third at 19:45.570. The top three runners in the men's 40-44 age bracket were Tingle, Dalton and Bennett.
The team award is a monkey in an astronaut suit on a pedestal. The SMDC team left their mark on the award, which is passed from winner to winner each year, by placing an SMDC logo on the astronaut's suit.
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