“You’re really putting in the miles,” my friend Megan said about a month ago. “You’re probably going to catch me.”
“How are you coming on the 1,000?” another friend, Rick, asked two weeks ago. “I have a mileage goal, too, 1,500, and hope to get there.”
Just a couple comments along the way, hopefully toward 1,000 and completing the 1,000-Mile Challenge presented by iRun Local.
The first came about 800 miles into the challenge, maybe less, but sometime in November when the thoughts of running were spread between confidence and doubt. Isn’t it always that way?
Doubts surface in the morning or afternoon, when you start to think things like, “will I have time to get the miles in today?” or “will I be able to finish the 5 mapped out?”
Confidence arrives after the run, the endorphins in full effect and you start looking at the calendar, subtract the total from 1,000 and say, “only 4.5 miles a day from here on our and that makes 1,000.” Like Sean always says, “there’s nothing like running. It’s one of the only things you can do where one moment you feel absolutely terrible and a few minutes after you’re done you feel absolutely awesome.”
But back to Megan and Rick.
Megan clicked past 1,200 Monday, so there’s no catching her. Not that I ever thought it possible. Congrats on the 2021 milestone.
Rick logged about 7.5 miles early Tuesday morning to make his 1,500. Never in doubt. Congrats.
Joe hit the 1,000-mile mark Sunday, putting in 11.5 in and around Newark, De., and he wrote about the accomplishment here. Congrats to our leader, the glue, on the milestone. Another that was never in doubt.
I’m hoping to join him soon, with between 6 and 8 miles planned for Tuesday and the last bit Wednesday and with a couple days to spare before the New Year. The tally officially sits at 988.6, a bit behind the projection mapped out last week and before the freezing rain and snow that fell Christmas Day and Sunday.
Thank goodness for the miles Megan mentioned last month. They weren’t enough to catch her but made all the difference on the way to 1,000.
