Early in 2008, I made a New Year’s Resolution to run 1000 miles over the course of the year. I liked this resolution from the start – it was quantitative, attainable, challenging, and spanned the entire year. There were ups and downs, but with a few days to spare in December I hit 1000 miles (total mileage: 1013 miles). I’m left with a really happy trend in my mileage over the last 8 years:
I’m ecstatic I’ve been able to incorporate running into my life more substatially every year since I started grad school. I’m not expecting another 30% increase in mileage for 2009, but I do think I can make good things happen by continuing consistent running.
An unexpected feature of the seasonal mileage pattern for the year was that I actually ran more in the winter-spring season than in the summer or fall:
In this chart, “WS” is the Winter-Spring season (January-April), “S” is the Summer season (May-August), and “F” is the Fall season (September-December). Compare the winter of 2008 to any other winter and the difference is striking. My mileage drop off in the warmer months is due to a number of factors — injury, illness, meeting my current girlfriend, but I’m really glad I put those hard miles in early. Those up front miles made the 1000 mile goal possible.
I’ll close now with a collection of all my running posts from the year, but I promise another post with my 2009 resolution soon.
Running posts from 2008: