What I learned from running 800 miles in a year

I kind of abandoned my blog in 2013.  During the year I came to appreciate other bloggers' reviews of races and missed having a written account of my own race experiences.  With a new year, new goals and a new race schedule upon me I couldn't resist the opportunity to start up again and share.

I wrote the following post a year ago - before I abandoned the blog.  When I read it a year later I was struck by how much of it was relevant to my experience in 2013 when I attempted to run 1000 miles.  So rather than write a whole new post on that I'm just going to publish this one and add "ditto for 1000 miles".
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Once upon a time about a year ago...
One of my big goals in 2012 was to run 800 miles.  I'm honestly not sure how I came up with this goal as I had never really tracked my yearly milage prior to 2012.  I suppose I just picked a nice round number that seemed doable when broken down into 52 weeks.

I grossly over-estimated how much I ran before I started tracking my mileage.800 miles in a year breaks down to 15.38 miles/week or 66.66 miles/month.  This sounds like a pretty reasonable number for someone who runs pretty regularly but the fact is I only hit this goal once in the first 7 months of the year.  Halfway through the year I had only run 300 miles - 100 miles short of half my mileage goal.  For the last 4 months of the year I needed to run 25 miles a week to ensure I'd hit my goal by December 31st.

Double-knot your shoe laces.
If your laces are long enough - double-knot them.  Just trust me on this one.

Having a mileage based goal is very motivating.
I sometimes struggle to remain motivated.  Part of the problem is that I'm not good at denying myself.  I tend to do what I want, when I want to do it and buy what I want, when I want to buy it.  This makes it difficult to create a reward based motivation system.  I'm also generally healthy which makes a health based motivation system (lose weight, lower blood pressure, etc.) ineffective.  Knowing I needed to run 25 miles each week definately made me run more frequently than I would have without a goal.  Achieving the goal was in-and-of-itself rewarding.  And along the way I lost some weight, toned up my core and probably improved my general health to boot.

If you're going to run 800 miles you should probably work on some injury prevention.
For me, this meant taking a Pilates class twice a week to strengthen my core.  The bottom line is that you can't afford to be sitting on the sidelines for an extended period of time while you nurse an injury.  In April I was sidelined for a week with a failry odd injury that ended up being related to weak core muscles.  In reality it was a blessing because it got me started with Pilates (at the recommendation of a physical therapist) and I am certain that this was key to keeping me injury free and in turn to reaching my goal.

Running 800 miles really helps you understand your body.
"Listen to your body".  I have heard this advice hundreds of times throughout my life but until last year, I could never really rely on what I was "hearing".  Now, I know the differnece between discomfort and pain, I know when I can push it and when I need to back off.  I know how to diagnose and treat folicitis and I have a new found love of stretching and sitting with my legs up the wall.

I LOVE to run!
When I started running in 2012 I liked running but it still felt like something I had to do.  I often dreaded putting on my running shoes and I had to work hard to talk myself into running after a long day at work.  After running consistently throughout 2012 - and especially during the last 4 months of 2012 - I can honestly say I LOVE to run!  When I get home from a long day at work there is nothing I would rather do than run.  I look forward to running and love the way I feel when I finish a run - heck, I even feel pretty good during most of my runs.