A collection of race reports and other writings of and about ultrarunning, trail running, and other running related topics with a strong focus on the East Coast. The "Beast Coast" has a strong trail running community and some amazing events; this blog aims to showcase some of that.
As we enter the holiday season of 2019 it is prime time to take a look back and assess goals for the past year. After much thought and consideration, I had three running goals this year:
PR a marathon
PR my greatest distance run
Improve my cumulative time for the entire Pennsylvania Triple Crown Series
With time running out to complete any unfinished tasks on this list, it appears that I will have missed the mark on two of my three goals. Things looked great to start the year. At my first race of the year (Rat Race 50k) that I was mainly using to check my fitness level I hit a 50k PR. That wasn’t even one of my goals, but I’ll take it! I managed to smash my marathon PR by nearly 20 minutes at the NJ Marathon only one week after running the Hyner 50k checking box number 1 off my list of goals. Goal number 3 seemed to be just a matter of time as I improved my times at Hyner 50k and Worlds End 100k, but the ultimate goal of improving my cumulative time would fall out of reach at Eastern States 100. I still can’t fully explain it, but something was just off with me leading up to and during that run. That only leaves goal number 2 left, to PR my greatest distance run. Unfortunately, after Eastern States 100 I was just feeling a bit burnt out on running altogether. My original plan was to tackle a supported 200 mile trail run after recovering from Eastern States. I thought that my fitness would be there and this was a great plan, but I hadn’t accounted for the unexpected burn out (and possibly the disappointment that played a role) I would be facing at that point. So in the end, I scrapped the 200 mile attempt and accepted the one out of three goal completion rate.
Although that seems like a low completion rate which may upset some people, I am still pleased with how my 2019 running season played out. I may have not hit all of the targets I set for myself, but I had some pretty big, unexpected successes in other areas. The first being the aforementioned 50k PR and the amazing end to the race where I got smoked by Rich Riopel a quarter mile from the finish. The second major accomplishment for the past year that I am super proud of is the success I’ve found in ‘last individual standing” (LIS) races. I registered and ran my first LIS race (Run Ragged) in June just two weeks after Worlds End 100k hoping to do well, but feeling pretty uncertain about how well with the lack of recovery time between the two races. Surprisingly, I turned out to be the last one standing. I followed that race up with my second LIS race, a true backyard race organized by a running buddy of mine with the start and finish in his backyard. This was a smaller race with only around twenty some runners. I went into it intending to stop at the 50 mile mark because Eastern States 100 was just four weeks away, but by that time it was down to me and one other runner. I decided to stay in it a bit longer and the other runner ended up timing out after finishing only one more lap. Again, I was the last one standing. With those two results, I’m excited to test myself next year at a more competitive LIS race and see what I’m capable of there.
So that more or less wraps up my goals and their outcomes for 2019. Now it is time to look ahead to next year and decide which endeavors I intend to tackle. I still want to PR my greatest distance run and take a shot at a 24 hour race, so I’m thinking I should be able to hit both of those targets in a single event. As for what else is on my to do list next year, I’ll have to give it some thought.
After one week of a dedicated effort to begin to take on the “Every Single Street” challenge, I have managed to increase the percentage of streets of Egg Harbor Township, NJ I’ve run from 1.94% to 7.63%. While this seems like a pretty substantial increase for a single week towards a goal that I have said is a long term goal, it’s important for me to keep in mind that this was likely one of the greatest gains I’ll make in a single week’s time, at least in the near future. Mainly because of the location of the streets I ran this past week and the weather.
I’m the first to admit that I am not a cold weather runner. Once the air temperature drops my running discomfort seems to always increase. The change in weather seems to induce a bit of asthma for me making outdoor running far less enjoyable. Given that and the fact that I bought myself a gym membership at the end of last year, I’ll likely be running many more treadmill miles this winter than actual road miles.
The second reason I probably won’t see this kind of increase again until next spring is because I started this project by basically running mostly streets all close to home for me. Obviously, this means as I run to streets farther from home I’ll be repeating mileage on streets I’ve already completed. That is of course unless I drive to location further from home to complete more streets while running less miles. While I may do that to complete some areas/neighborhoods, I want to try to complete as much of this project without driving at all. I’m not making this a hard rule for my project, but just want to see how far I can take it without resorting to any traveling other than running.
