TL;DR summary: I decided on some goals for 2024 and beyond. I walked 4.6 miles and ran 12.1 miles. As always, I need to do more strength training and yoga. My nutrition and hydration need work.
The longer version: Thanks to Garmin, I’ve decided to try to earn the 2024 Running and Walking badges. The yearlong walking goal is 365 miles (1-ish mile a day since it’s a leap year) and 1200km or 745.65 miles of running (2-ish miles a day). I’ve been trying to keep my average consistent with the yearlong goals. I’m close, but have fallen a little bit behind.
I did do yoga one day this week and it felt great. I keep seeing people post about how strength training and yoga helped them get faster, and I need to work on that. I don’t have any desire to be as fast as I once was, but getting faster would really help with some other long term goals.
Getting the right nutrition and hydration will help, too. I know, I know, I’m a dietitian. I know things. But knowledge does not equal motivation. I did sign up for Hello Fresh again, and I’ve talked to my coworker about “harm reduction” (yeah, convenience meals still aren’t healthy, but they are healthier and more cost effective than going out or getting fast food for every single meal, which is what I usually do). I bought a Cirkul water bottle and it did help me drink more water at first, but I’ve been slacking.
So these big goals. There’s two big ones on my mind at the moment.
- 400 racing miles in the 40 months before I turn 40
- Run my first 50k in June 2025
I had recently decided that Noland Trail was going to be my first 50k, but the pace requirement is daunting. Kirsten and I looked into a race we are doing this summer that has a 50k. It will definitely be tougher than Noland, but it has a 20 min/mile pace requirement, which is much more doable for me. I still want to work towards improving my pace, and someday I would like to do the Noland 50k, but this will give me a more reasonable goal to shoot for.
The 400 racing miles in 40 months came from a post I saw in a running group on Facebook. Someone said she plans to run 50 races before she turns 40 in like 30 months. I realized that I am close to 40 months away from turning 40 myself, so I wanted to challenge myself. Kirsten helped me to come up with the 400 racing miles – that works out to racing a total of 10 miles per month on average. It seems challenging but doable to me. This challenge starts in March! My 40th birthday will be on a Thursday, and I have some ideas of what I might do running wise to celebrate, but we will see.
I plan to keep up with my training blogs more often this year just like every year. Maybe 2024 will be when I actually do it!
RD on the Run 