Laura Motes - On Training for a 5K

Laura Motes is a former police officer, a future nurse, and a personal health enthusiast. Part of her job involved staying in shape during her 20 years as a law enforcement officer, and she still takes the basic building blocks of personal health—exercise and diet—very seriously. In this vein, she has taken to trail running and competitive distance racing in her community near Watkinsville, Georgia. Motes trained herself for her first 5K several years ago, and she has a few pointers for those wanting to do the same:

 

• Give yourself plenty of time. Laura Motes is very physically fit, but when she was just starting to train for her first 5K race, she gave herself nine weeks to prepare. Most beginner’s programs recommend at least seven weeks of training and preparation before a competition. This is to give your body time to adjust to its new routines and help prevent injury.
• Balance running, resting, and walking. Laura Motes recommends to all beginners to work their way up to fast times over five kilometers by incorporating periods of running, of course, but also walking and resting to avoid injury while still training hard.
• Vary your schedule. For many of the same reasons why beginners should mix in periods of walking, running, and resting, those training for a 5K competition should also vary their running schedules. This means running longer distances at a slower pace three days per week, then four, while also training lightly some weeks as well.

Laura Motes helps her friends train whenever she can. She has competed in several marathons in addition to shorter races.
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Laura Motes - Fervent Supporter of the ASPCA

Laura Motes grew up with animals all around her in her parents’ home in rural Georgia. She knows how to properly care for and treat them and she wants everyone to have the same knowledge and caring nature that she does. Unfortunately, the United States is still a long way from being completely educated of the proper way to take care of domesticated animals. Pets still go neglected and get abandoned all the time. Motes, a former police officer and current nursing student, wanted to join the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA).

The ASPCA has two main causes that it as an organization works hard to fight for: the end of animal homelessness and the end of animal cruelty. Laura Motes works closely with her local animal shelters near her home in Watkinsville, Georgia, but across the country animal shelters are routinely stretched thin because their budgets just don’t do enough to place animals in good homes. With 2.7 million animals being euthanized in the United States every year, the ASPCA works to provide alternatives to euthanasia for shelters throughout the country. The ASPCA also works to help abused animals find new homes and to educated people about the causes and effects of animal cruelty in our society, as well as the signs to watch for. Laura Motes is a vocal advocate of all of these issues.

Laura Motes plans on beginning her Master’s degree in Nursing in the fall of 2016 at Georgia Regents University.
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Laura Motes - Career Progression from Law Enforcement Officer to Nurse

Laura Motes isn’t a nurse yet. She has completed all of the prerequisites to begin her Master’s degree in nursing from Georgia Regents University and plans on starting classes in the fall of 2016. She is prepared to enter the medical profession on the strength of her sense of duty to her community and her experience working for the Athens Regional Medical Center and Managed Medical Transport. Motes has always been committed to helping her community by keeping it safe as a police officer, now she hopes to help the community by keeping the people in it healthy.

Laura Motes spent 20 years working for the Athens-Clarke County Police Department. She started as a patrol officer in the Athens area, helping to ensure that crime is prevented whenever possible and that the streets and residents of the area are as safe as possible. Motes left the police force as a Sergeant in the West Precinct administration. She helped coordinate crime scene investigations, manage office personnel and officers on the street, and work with department leadership to ensure that all rules and regulations are being followed by all officers on the streets at all times.

Laura Motes then left the department because she wanted a more hands-on experience. She found said experience while working for six months with Managed Medical Transport and the Athens Regional Medical Center. Motes learned much from her time there, including how to serve and assist doctors, physicians, and other medical professionals in their duties and responsibilities to their patients with all kinds of medical conditions and ailments. She plans on using this experience during her studies as a Master’s degree candidate at Georgia Regents University in the fall of 2016.
                                              

Laura Motes works hard to keep herself in shape and healthy. Her passion recently has been distance runs of five kilometers or more. She has competed in several 5Ks in the area in the past and she plans on continuing her training to run marathons in the future. Motes hopes that her expertise as a nurse will put her in a position to help instill healthy habits in patients that could prevent serious medical conditions like heart disease and more. With too many Americans suffering from preventable diseases like adult-onset diabetes and obesity, especially in rural Georgia, where she lives, the more healthy habits she can instill in people around her community, the better.

Laura Motes believes that her calling is in the local healthcare system because she cares about the health and life of everyone around her in her community. She has always been there for her neighbors, protecting them from crime and investigating. She also helped keep the police force itself honest during her time in the Athens-Clarke County Police Department, reporting on alleged incidents of officer misconduct and other issues frequently besetting all police departments around the world.

Laura Motes - Many Duties as a Police Sergeant with the Athens-Clarke County Police Department

Laura Motes had many duties throughout her career with the Athens-Clarke County Police Department. She started with the force as a patrol officer in 1993, fresh from her extensive military police training with the United States Army at Fort McClellan, Alabama. She worked her way up and became Sergeant in the West Precinct for the Athens-Clarke County Police Department, where she worked for ten years ensuring that her community is safe and working hard to reducing and eliminating crime. In 2014, she left the force to pursue another avenue of employment as a nurse. She plans on attending Georgia Regents University in the fall of 2016 to earn her Master’s degree in Nursing.

Laura Motes

Laura Motes was in charge of supervising and monitoring shift activities. She also directed the shift’s patrol efforts to help reduce crime in her precinct. She developed strategies using personnel at her precinct to protect her community and ensure that justice is kept on the streets of her territory. Motes loved working closely with officers to mentor and assist them in their daily activities and their career development. She provided the support that all police officers need to do their jobs effectively.

Laura Motes had many daily responsibilities, all of which were integral to the overall effectiveness of the police department as a whole and to her precinct’s operations directly. She reviewed incident reports that officers filed for their thoroughness and accuracy. She used these reports to compile information for her administrative reports. In addition to mentoring officers that came under her wing, Motes also oversaw their training and the socialization of all new personnel in her shift. Motes acted as the communication hub for her shift, receiving and preparing all kinds of correspondence from other departments or precincts. She acted as a reliable source of information for the public and for other police departments in the area, transmitting new information and correspondence to the applicable parties and answering questions that people in the media come up with.

Laura Motes had the necessary and unenviable job of investigating all complaints of officer misconduct or inappropriate action. She took all of her actions against and on behalf of officers in her shift and precinct with the utmost professional courtesy and did her best to sort out all details from both sides of all conflicts. She diligently interviewed all officers implicated in misconduct complaints and collected pertinent information which she used to complete and submit administrative reports to her superiors.

Laura Motes kept the West Precinct of the Athens-Clarke County Police Department up and running smoothly so that it could continue to protect and serve the people of the community in the fairest and most just way possible for ten years.