FLEMING ISLAND - A family vacation to Yosemite National Park seemed like a good summer idea in 2017, but the transformation of the idea to an eight year, 50 state running journey evolved for Terry and Marrilee Giles with son Marcus, just seven, in tow.
"We are both U.S. Army Reserves officers so the running part of our lives is in the job," said mom Marrilee, 54, a lieutenant colonel. "The idea of making our family vacation into a running adventure in all 50 states was a whim of Terry's that started for us and some friends, then got our son Marcus into the effort."
The Giles, both U.S. Army Reservists and both lieutenant colonels, got the ball rolling with a half marathon in June 2017 at Yosemite that son Marcus only joined up with to watch at the 12 mile mark.
"Marcus was, how do I say it, quite chunky at the time," said a somewhat apprehensive Marrilee. "But, he was also ready to go do something and he eventually joined us for his first running race in Jacksonville, at a December 2017 Run Santa Run 5K. That put the idea into full forward motion."
The Giles running family joined the group at Yosemite and that was where Marcus got the bug.

Fast forward eight years and 50 states later with the Giles and family friends, Tom, 61, and Nora Smith, 64, have covered the vastness of the United States from Alaska to Maine to Arizona and to a final stop in Hawaii to accumulate a bevy of unique running shirts, running medals and running photos.
"Tom is a writer and I've kept detailed notes along the way and when he decides to make his book into a book, he's ready to just sit and type," said Terry, 46. "We have a wall of photos from every race and a rack of medals from every race, plus the T-Shirts. Nora and I worked together in the Army."
For Marcus, who was the untested participant of the quintet from the start, the runs transformed him from a very energetic seven year old into a high school state cross country championship running member of the St. Johns Country Day School boys high school team in 2023.
"I started out at like 25-26 minutes for the 5Km (3.1 miles) race and just kind of improved along the way," said Marcus Giles, 15 with 16 just up the road (pun intended). "We did have one segment of the 50 race chase where the team was running in regions in 2023 and we didn't know if we would get to state and we had a plan to go to Arizona for a race in the middle."]
Marrilee improvised the Giles agenda to accommodate the change of plan because the Giles entourage now had to travel to Tallahassee to watch son Marcus and his Spartan teammate challenge the Class 1A cross country field.
"We literally finished up the race, high fived everyone, headed to the airport and flew to Arizona that afternoon," said Marrilee. "They made it to regions this year (2024), but finished ninth and didn't go to state."

Along the way, Marcus Giles, an incoming sophomore for St. Johns, turned his running acumen into results from a 25 minutes for 5K as a seven year old to an 18:55 finish in 2024 at regions with a handful of overall wins across the country.
"I had a win in Nebraska, a win in Iowa and South Dakota, with a 22nd in North Dakota in a race with 3,500 runners then a second in Minnesota," said Marcus Giles, who now owns a personal best of 18:11 for his 5K time. "The second place in Minnesota was kind of a gesture to the guy running with me to the finish line who told me he had gotten second the past two years."
As far as difficulty, the Giles cited a 10Km (6.2 miles) in Moab, Utah as the most difficult due to hills and heat while a race in Ohio was the coldest at 17 degrees.
"It was 17 on race day and 19 degrees the next day," said Marrillee Giles, who noted her oldest son Brandon, is an accomplished ultra marathon.
The biggest race was the North Dakota race with 3,500 runners while the Moustache Dash in Nebraska had 65 hearty souls at the start line.
"I won that race and it was just a small race that we happened to find on the internet that got us to Nebraska," said Marcus Giles. "The 25th race was in Soldotna, Alaska in June 2021, but that race was actually a very hot race. Never figured a hot race in Alaska."
Terry Miles noted that their furthest drive to get to a race was an hour jaunt to Louisiana in 2018, but that the logistics of the adventure employed the U.S. Army training of both parents.
"I guess as Army people, we have certain grasp of organization and preparation and Terry was kind of the training and conditioning end of the deal while I handled a lot of the travel logistics and planning," said Marrilee Giles. "Terry had a website; RuntheUSA.com, that had details of races in all parts of American and we just drew up a plan and executed it."


For Terry Giles, the race destination had a few parameters; a sanctioned race, a running bib, with Terry the training, conditioning and nutrition advisor.
"Early on, it was so tough because 50 states is alot of planning and to wrap that around jobs, school, cross country, getting sick and even COVID put us on hold," said Terry Giles. "We did have a January 1 race to kick off 2025."
The planning of the trek was to get to the 50 states not necessarily 50 races in 50 states in one year.
"Most of the races we went to were planned for holiday weekends, or out of school, or not in season for track or cross country," said Marrilee Giles. "Coach Greg Stratton at St. Johns got us his schedules as early as he could and we made plans from there. After a race in Savannah, all five runners, adding Tom and Nora Smith, made the commitment that all races had to have all five runners."
In one three race, three state trip, Tom Smith had suffered a few broken ribs racing dirt cars, but still traveled.
"He's Tom, he just toughed it out," said Marrilee Giles.
The furthest, most adventurous travel plan to a race was an eight hour drive to Maurice, Louisiana in 2018 that had an added obstacle.
"We drove ahead of a hurricane to get that one in," said Terry Giles. "We hit Mississsippi on the way, raced Mississippi, drove two more hours to Maurice and raced that one."
After 40 states was completed, with Terry Mills documenting their progress on Facebook, the last 10 races offered up some notoriety as the guys from Florida that are trying to run all the states.
"When we got to Alaska for the 25th race, the race director kind of knew who we were," said Marrillee Giles. "Hawaii we just did as number 50 on July 4 and they were all excited about being the 50th race."
For now, the Giles will still compete around Jacksonville, Marcus will be a key runner for St. Johns cross country in the fall and the Appalachian Trail is being bantered around as the next challenge.
"I'd like to run a marathon at some point," said Marcus Giles.