Milestones

We humans tend to notice milestones. Turning 37 is not a big deal but turning 40 means a special party. It's nothing special when the stock market hits 9,642, but at 10,000? That's a big deal. I remember the massive parties around the world for Y2K including a massive fireworks show at the Toronto waterfront. In 2001, there were no fireworks off the CN Tower and we probably just went to bed early.

Running Milestones

Running has some of the same things. We have 5km and 10km races. There are 10 milers. Things get a bit weird with the half marathon and marathon thanks to some odd history that may or may not be true but after that, 50km and 50 mile ultras are special.

A lot of runners are looking back at 2024 right now as Strava has dropped their "Year in Sport" round up on their app. Many, myself included, are looking at our goals for 2024 and seeing how we did.

I started the year with a goal to hit 2,400km in 2024. That's 200km per month and it's a total I have hit in the past. Everything has to go pretty well to get there and of course, a few things did not go too well this year so 2,400km was out of reach.

I missed a week and a half with COVID-19 in May, after the BMO Vancouver Half Marathon. And I fell on a run on July 21 and busted my finger pretty badly. That cost me 4.5 weeks and a lot of fitness lost.

After that, I revised my annual goal to 1,600km and then more recently, to 1,000 miles (1,609km). I'm just a couple of days from topping that total for the year. I'm sitting at 1,595.6km right now which is 991.5 miles. Saturday's 8km will push me past 1,600km for the year, but I'll need Sunday's run to get over 1,000 miles.

Goals Matter

Tracking goals and milestones like this are important providers of motivation throughout the year. At the start of each new year, I always set some goals and track them; maybe it's to run 2,400km, or to do 12 half marathons, or to run more than 250 times.

Personal bests in various race distances are always great goals to set and go after, but at some point the personal bests just aren't attainable anymore. I don't know that I can get back to my 5km PB anymore, for example. But annual goals are far more attainable since you can alter them based on your current level of fitness or other factors.

I'll be putting some thought into my 2025 goals in the coming weeks and I'll be sure to put them down on "paper" here. Maybe 2,025kms is a good total to try for?