Lieutenant leaves ‘footprint’ at Soto Cano

SOTO CANO AIR BASE, Honduras -- At this Central American base, one Airman is taking the phrase “going the extra mile” to the extreme.

First Lt. Kellie Courtland is going an extra 1,500 miles to be exact, one of three goals she set for herself when she arrived at Joint Task Force Bravo here.

“So far I’m at 1,263 miles,” she said.

As the officer in charge of the JTF-Bravo subarea petroleum office, and the food services officer for the base, she knows her time is precious.

“I’m going to have to up my miles a little bit to meet that goal of 1,500,” she said with only two months left in her one-year tour.

While many might gasp at the thought of such a feat, the lieutenant focuses on the positive effects she receives.

“I realized the changes I could make in myself, what a discipline it takes and what a challenge it is,” said the Montague, Mich., native.

And she is not shy about the changes she has seen. Lieutenant Courtland has lost more than 40 pounds since she entered the service, and credits her success to a steady fitness program.

“In my lifetime, one of the things I was challenged most with was losing weight,” she said. “When I came in the Air Force I was on the weight management program for my first three years and I had to find a way to overcome that.”

Her solution: Running, the one thing she said never stopped challenging her.

“It never gets old. You can always go faster, you can always go farther, you can always find a harder marathon, you can always find tougher people to train with,” Lieutenant Courtland said. “And I know the benefits of it -- I’ve lost the weight; I’ve found ways to stay healthy.”

But the feat of running 1,500 miles was not enough, she was also determined to ace her physical fitness test, participate in four marathons, start her master’s degree and make a positive effect on the base -- all in a year’s time.

“(I wanted) to come here and better the place,” she said, “leave some kind of legacy behind that people knew that ‘Lieutenant Courtland was here, tried her best to help out everybody and be involved with things that were going on on post.’”

In many ways, her goals have merged. Her intensity for running has motivated others and made her somewhat of a celebrity.

“Everyone knows Kellie, not only from her running, but just her outstanding nature,” said Capt. Dan Beard, deputy director of logistics at JTF-Bravo, and Lieutenant Courtland’s supervisor. “She’d do anything for anyone. She’s just that kind of person.”

It is that nature that has drawn a following of sorts, a group of runners called “The Spa Girls.” Despite the name, the group includes mostly men. They chose the name because they adopted the same plan that Oprah Winfrey and her running group, “The Spa Girls,” used.

“It’s so helpful when you have people like this that are with you every day, to run with you, to challenge you more,” she said. “Some of us are faster, some of us are slower, obviously some of us are better runners, but at the end of the day we run together, we challenge each other, we help each other, we motivate each other.”

And that togetherness has also allowed other people to reach goals as well.

“When I first got here I was totally out of shape,” Army Sgt. Nelson Galarza said.

With Lieutenant Courtland’s urging, the sergeant started training with the group. Nearly eight months since he arrived here, Sergeant Galarza has passed his run, lost 15 to 20 pounds, and even competed in a marathon.

“I really enjoy it,” he said about running, “and I hope to run a marathon every year.”

While the focus of the group is enhancing their fitness levels and run times, for the lieutenant, it has offered her a great opportunity to learn.

“One thing that I really like about the Spa Girls is that we have people here from every rank, every service, and we learn a lot from each other,” Lieutenant Courtland said. “The days we’re out on slow runs, we get a lot of good mentorship. They’ve helped me with different problems, and I’ve learned so much.”

But as the lieutenant looks forward to celebrating her 1,500-mile mark, she is also focusing on her next assignment, what she considers her biggest challenge yet.

“[I’m going] back to basic military training as an operations officer,” she said. With her sharply pressed uniform and stoic nature, it is no surprise the lieutenant was a military training instructor before receiving her commission. “I need to be able to set the standards, and that’s important for basic trainees to see officers doing that. That in itself is going to be a big challenge.”

But, as with her tour here has shown, one challenge is not enough for the young officer.

“I’ll also be gearing up for the Air Force Marathon to hopefully get a better time.”