2007 has come and gone, and 2008 is about to start.
This year, I ran just shy of 1900 miles, which is half again what I ran last year. I attribute that to my lack of injuries this year, with a short stint of achilles tendonitis that I managed to nip in the bud. I did not realize that I was well on pace for a 2000 mile year until right before I took 3 weeks off in November, which killed that goal.
My official total came to 1894.5 miles, but I decided to take today off from running so I will stay a little short of the 1900 mark. Next year I expect to run between 2300 and 2500 miles, helped by the number of trail miles that I plan on running to help hold off injuries.
I ran 2 marathons along with my first ultramarathon this year. I ran the Boston Marathon even though it did not bring me any closer to my 50 states goal. The race was held during the tail-end of a Nor’Easter that caused me to sabotage my race by wearing too much. I still had a good race, but I did not meet my minimum goal of setting a new PR. I registered early for the Marine Corps Marathon, where I did manage to set a new PR and had a thoroughly enjoyable experience.
Through the Summer, however, I felt that I was in good enough shape for two marathons, and I settled on running the Pisgah 50k Mountain Race in New Hampshire. The race was a lot of fun and introduced me to racing distances longer than a marathon while still keeping me on pace for 2 new states per year. I have now run 11 marathons (or ultramarathons) in 10 different states.
I failed to bring my times down for the 10k and 5k races that I competed in this year. I did very well in the Back Cove 5k Race Series and actually won this year. The series was much closer this year; I only won by 6 seconds. I was over 30 seconds slow for my time goals in the 5k, though, so in 2008 I am going to need to make the shorter races a priority. I say that, but I am already trying to decide between running 1 or 2 Spring Marathons…
My weight was even flatter this year than it was last year. My weight trend never varied more than a pound or so away from 144 pounds, and my daily weight never got more than 4 or 5 pounds away from that trend. I do not expect any major changes in 2008.
I wrote about 630 articles here at Run to Win, a 12% increase over last year, and have seen some huge increases in the amount of traffic to the site. I also began an email newsletter and am giving away an 18-page special report on effective workouts, and I expect that 2008 is going to be very exciting. You can see more detailed graphs of my weekly running and weight by clicking on the charts above.
Wow! What a great year!! I never did get my shoes 🙂 You can bring them with you in March!!! LOL!!