By JEFF HEMMEL, Tribune correspondent

Most serious competitors sweating through Bay area triathlons and road races do so stripped down to the latest in featherweight shorts and hyperlight shoes.

Not Dianne Villano.

She pulls on U.S. Marine Corps combat boots and camouflage utilities – boots ‘n’ utes – a regulation pack and sometimes a helmet. Just 5-foot-2 and 110 pounds, the 42-year-old dons about 20 pounds of extra weight to run and bicycle for miles through the heat.

The final ounces consist of laminated snapshots of Marines. Most are the faces of men and women killed in Iraq and Afghanistan; some are still fighting there. Many of the photographs change with every race, as more soldiers fall. They cover her pants legs, her backpack, her helmet.

“I don’t know if I would recommend it for anyone else,” says Chris Lauber, who promotes half-marathons throughout Pinellas County. “But she sure is getting her message across.”

Villano’s race wear promotes her charity, Support Our Marines Inc., based in St. Pete Beach. Its sole function is to send care packages to remotely deployed Marines. But her gear and the photos also serve a greater purpose: to remind Americans at home of the deprivations and danger endured every day by those soldiers.

“We’re loving our sport, out here enjoying everything and worrying about whether there’s enough oranges at the rest stops,” she says. “These guys are doing this 12 to 18 hours a day, sometimes on one MRE (meal ready to eat) a day. It just puts things into perspective.”

Villano launched her nonprofit in 2007. A year later, a Marine who had just lost his foot in combat sent word to her.

“This kid – 21 years old and four days out from losing his foot – the first words out of his mouth were ‘Miss Villano, I just wanted to thank you for the packages you sent while we were in country.’ The second comment was, ‘Don’t you worry, I’m not letting my team down. As soon as I get fitted with my prosthetic, I’m going back over.’

“I’m sitting there trying not to cry, because I was just so humbled speaking to this young man.”

Villano wanted to express a commensurate amount of appreciation for his commitment. She saw how while watching a marathon: A Clearwater firefighter ran it in full gear to raise money for the family of a fallen comrade.

Pictures perfect

Though she’s a personal fitness trainer, Villano had not run more than a mile in her life. But she signed up for a triathlon – a 1.5-kilometer swim, 40-kilometer bike ride and 10-kilometer run. With only six weeks to prepare, she finished the Top Gun Triathlon in August 2008 complete with 15-pound pack, full utilities, boots and helmet.

“It is actually the race about which I am most proud,” she says. “It was August, and five or six people had to be taken away for heat-related issues.

“I thought it was going to be one and done. Do it, send him the pictures and be done. But the response I got from people on course noticing me, and the Marines themselves seeing the pictures, was kind of overwhelming.”

So much so that Villano dedicated herself to more races, in the Bay area and beyond, wearing her boots ‘n’ utes and photos of Marines at every one.

“Last year I did 20 races for just short of 200 miles. Since that didn’t kill me, I thought I would have a bigger impact and go for 300 miles and around 35 races this year,” she says.

Some races are dedicated to a particular soldier, some to a unit. At every race, someone hands Villano a Marine Corps flag as she nears the finish line and she crosses with it outstretched before her.

She dedicated St. Anthony’s Triathlon in April 2009 to Sgt. Lea Mills of Brooksville, killed in combat in Anbar Province, Iraq, on April 28, 2006. Mills’ mother, Delores, was at the St. Petersburg race to hand Villano the flag.

At the Grand Prix 5K in St. Petersburg in March 2010, the spectators included Luciano Macias Jr., wounded in Fallujah in 2004. Villano ran that race wearing photos of two of his friends who died in that battle.

When several broken toes kept her from handling all the events of one triathlon herself, she formed Team Tri’ing to Raise Money for Our Grunts. She took the running portion, wearing a sneaker cut to accommodate her injured toes, and partnered with other racers on the bike and swim events. The group now has a Facebook fan page (search “for our grunts” at www.facebook.com) and aims to have a representative in every state.

“The running community and the tri community in this area, once they got past the ‘what the hell?’ moment, has embraced me immeasurably,” says Villano. “It’s very heartwarming.”

Race directors have donated more than $1,000 in race fees, and the attention she attracts prompts donations. The money goes to purchase care package supplies and to mail the boxes – postage alone runs about $600 a month, read more at the Chouprojects.

“It’s a win-win. It’s a great way to honor our warriors, it’s a great way to raise money, and it’s a great way to raise awareness of what our service members endure.”

Motivating force

Villano has no personal connection to the military – no son, no daughter, no parent or significant other has fought in Iraq or Afghanistan. But she’s keenly, and personally, aware of just how threatening the world can be.

On Sept. 11, 2001, her fiance was in New York, in the World Trade Center. She was on the phone with him when a passenger jet crashed into the building. Along with nearly 3,000 other victims in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, her fiance died that day. And like many relatives and friends of the victims, she spent a great deal of time in the city during the weeks that followed, surrounded by the powerful aura of death and despair.

When the United States invaded Afghanistan, and later Iraq, Villano supported various troop organizations with the random check.

“Like a lot of people, as soon as I finished writing the check I didn’t think about the war at all,” she admits.

Then one day she came across a website where Marines described the conditions under which they were fighting, and, more to the point, what they needed to keep going. They didn’t ask for luxuries or fun diversions. Instead, they wanted things like mustard to make their MREs go down easier; baby wipes to combat weeks without a shower; a fresh pair of socks to prevent blisters; or just a reminder that someone back home still cared.

No longer could Villano not think about the war, or the young men and women fighting.

“The whole thing started with some random boxes to some cold Marines on the Syrian border back in 2005,” says Villano. “It just kind of grew from there. Pick up please and sent some letters and pictures, and I sent them to everyone that had donated stuff, which really motivated the donors. They got more people involved. Four years and 4,600 boxes later, here we are.”

Each week, Villano and her volunteers continue to pack and ship 10 to 15 boxes to the most remotely deployed soldiers in the U.S. military. Nearly 5,000 boxes have gone out. In each one is a self-addressed, stamped postcard that asks the recipients to tell the organization what they need. And the occasional photograph of a petite blonde, running a race in combat gear, so that those at home won’t forget them.

“That’s why I race, to raise awareness,” says Villano. “Obviously, it’s not about (getting a good race) time … This year, the goal is to place higher than the bottom five.

“The amount of letters I get back saying you brought a smile to some very war-weary and down Marines, that just makes it worth it. It’s really changed my life.”

Read the full story here.