January 6th, 2020

In 2018 I ran for 100 days in a row, but towards the end of the year, I pretty much stopped running.

In 2019 I really wanted to make running a habit. So I set the following goals:

Run 1000 miles
Run a 1:45 half marathon
Run a 3:45 marathon

I signed up for a half marathon at an active volcano in Indonesia around February and started my training.

Running in Southeast Asia was so hard. They don't really have sidewalks there, so you either have to:

Find a soccer field to run circles around
Run in parks or big public areas
Run on the road and die (jk, don't ever run on the road)

The first half marathon in Indonesia was really hard, my time was over 2:00 and it was so humid, and it was the opposite of flat.

But later in the year, I did run a 1:44 half marathon, which was a personal record and felt so good to do that and hit my goal!

A humbling marathon

I ran the Lisbon marathon in October and did HORRIBLE. I wanted to hit 3:45 but didn't even crack 4:25. At mile 18, I hit a wall and could not run anymore. My legs gave out and I pretty much walked the rest of the race.

I never felt pain like that before. I literally could not run anymore.

The whole experience was really humbling. To be totally honest, I went into that race with hubris, overconfidence, and I got kicked in the ass. It was actually kind of nice to be humbled like that.

I also didn't take my training seriously. I skipped and skimped on lots of long runs, and I thought I would be fine.

Regardless, that failure has given me the motivation to turn around and do the LA marathon in March. My goal, again is 3:45.

Just getting used to it

I remember running every day feeling really hard back then, and especially in 2018, but thing I loved about 2019 is that running just became so much easier because I was running every day.

Nowadays, I can run every day with no problems at all.

Generally, I'm in really good running shape after all this running. I'm not a great runner though, but for me, I'm the best I've ever been.

Goals for 2020

In 2020, I want to run a 3:30 marathon. 3:45 in LA and then I would like to do the New York marathon, but I need to figure out how to get in.

I'd also like to run 10 miles a day for a month, or a 10k/day for a month as a fun thing.

The Stats

In 2019 I ran in so many places! Here is everything I can think of on the top of my head:

Ran on 3 continents (North America, Asia, and Europe)
Ran in 8 countries (USA, France, Portugal, Spain, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore)
Ran in countless cities

Favorite city to run in: New York City
Least favorite city: Canggu, Bali

As far as miles and stats, according to my Strava:

I ran 221/365 days, or 60% of the year.

I was also running for 200 hours, or 8 full days, more than a week! I was running for 2% of 2019, that's insane!