“Spring” as defined by me for the purposes of this site (March, April, May) has effectively ended. As is tradition, I’m reviewing my goals for the season and the year to see my progress.

I will note this winter/spring has been pretty terrible for me as far as running is concerned. I found joyful runs to be few and far between, and spent far, far too many miles on the treadmill. I also found it hard to get my runs in while heading up to Duluth for hockey. That’s something I’ll have to work on for next winter.

My spring running goals were:

1. Distance personal best. Zumbro 50 was canceled, but I wouldn’t have finished anyway considering my training and the men’s hockey national championship game.
2. 50K personal best. I thought I came close at Ice Age Trail 50K, but then it turned out I misremembered my PR. I got my second best overall time, though!
3. Set up a corporate team for Twin Cities Marathon. I’m working on it, but haven’t gotten very far. We can have an unofficial team, if that doesn’t work out.
4. Run in three new counties. I ran in Carver County, Le Sueur County, Wright County, Rice County, and Goodhue County. Overachieving!
5. Throw away all socks that have holes in them. This is ongoing since I am making new holes all the time, but I ditched a LOT of pairs of socks.

Let’s call that 2.5/5. Not great, but I did have a great time exploring new areas of Minnesota.

My annual goals are:

1. 2019 mileage > 2018 mileage
   I’m not doing very well on that right now, but I’m not too far off and have plenty of time to make it up.
2. Do 100 pushups/day
   The first few months of the year, this didn’t go well. Then my colleagues started doing a group push-up challenge at work, and I got back into doing them. I’m not anywhere near 100/day, but I’m working toward making up for lost time.
3. Run more new races/courses than old ones.
   So far, I haven’t run any old courses! I ran the Polar Dash Half in January, which was a new race to me, and then I ran Ice Age Trail last weekend, which was entirely new terrain. Even FANS is going to be a new course, thanks to epic flooding on the Mississippi River.
4. My highest category of training mileage will not be treadmill mileage. I’m still at probably around 50% treadmill workouts and maybe 45% treadmill mileage, but again, I can make a lot of that up as the year progresses.
5. Start taking a multivitamin. Done. I didn’t notice a difference.
6. Volunteer at a race that isn’t put on by Rocksteady Running.
   I volunteered at The Willow 10 & 20 Miler in Hudson, WI. I didn’t know anyone there, but I had a great time and truly enjoyed everyone I met. I got to hand out the awards to the top runners, answered questions, and helped call off bib numbers. I narrowly avoided being showered in blue Gatorade puke by a hard-charging tween boy.
7. Go for a run in every county in MN. See above.

I think for the year, I am doing pretty well, except in the push-up area, which I’m already working on. I’m not sure what my summer running goals will be, I should firm them up in the next week or so.