Awhile ago, I wrote a summary of runs I did up to 2021, in a post called (Hello4). It is time for another update to bring up to the present.
Also I just realized it is time for a quarterly update. The last two updates are (634-24.16) and here (651-24.17).
In first quarterly of last year, I mentioned what I was going to do with a lot of races lining for 2024 and by the second quarterly 24.17, I wrote I ran them. The key take away was to find what I like to do and keep doing it. Nothing has changed much since. I am still trying to keep my passion up for running.
I was going to save this to the end of the year for a Hello World post (last year Hello7, for the curious), which is a kind of post when I have nothing to write about and need to put something in. However, I also did not have much to write for the quarterly update. So why not do it now and have it done.
Here goes.
2022: I finally finished the CRAW, a virtual run around the world with a group of 8-9 people. I was going to write about the experience, but never get to it. The world is big. Virtual run started out as fun but ended being a drudgery. Originally, there’s a map and blog posts of each place we visited, but by the end, all the places seem almost the same. The Google map did not look too appealing. Also there was a time constraint of doing research or reading up on the places we been. By the way, I finally glued all the medals I received for the race on a world map board the race sent me. It took me just as long putting up the medals as running the thing (a 5 year project!)
Meanwhile, I did many in real life (IRL) races that year as marathon races started back up since Covid-19 closing, including: Grandma’s in Minnesota, Ann Arbor in Michigan, Atlantic City in New Jersey, and NCR in Maryland.
I ran some repeated races: JFK, Marine Corps 50k, Rock & the Knob, Naked Nick, Catoctin 50k, Iron Mountain and Stone Mill. Those who know me or in the area would recognize those races. They are my favorites and thus I have gone back year after year. Stone Mill, now I have ran it 5 times and got a free shirt! I don’t know if there any races I ran that many times.
2023: I did even more than the prior year. How could that be, but it is true. It would be too much to list them all.
For marathons, Cowtown in Fort Worth Texas was a fun one. Shamrock in Virginia Beach. Hayden Lake in Idaho, Philadelphia Marathon, and Space Coast Marathon in Florida. I love running my marathons and I was crossing states off races from my 50 states list. Little did I know the next two years, I transitioned into doing ultra marathons.
I started doing some of my favorite long races this year, the Massanutten 100, Bull Run Run 50, Boyer’s Furnace. They are still my favorites.
2024: Last year I did the Grand slam and voted as Runner of the year in my runner club ;), I am embarrassed by the fact I did it. I am not the type of runners people imagine me to be.
In a million years, I would not dream of doing even one of those races, but I was fortunate to get to do them all (almost all minus Leadville 100 and Angeles Crest). The eight 100-milers I did (not all are part or required for the grand slam) were C&O 100, Massanutten 100, Old Dominion, Western States, Vermont, Burning River, Grindstone, Wasatch Front, and Devil Dog. It is a mouthful to say and remember them. I learned of other slams while at it, so in the future, I might do some of them like the Midwest Slam, or the Rocky Slam. Nothing is like the Grand Slam though.
There was no time for me to run normal marathons. I did get to go to Taipei, Taiwan, ran the WJS marathon. Also I ran the Richmond Marathon in my home state, and it was special to me. It was a memory to treasure.
2025. This leads us to the first quarter of 2025. I felt I haven’t done much for the half of the year. One highlight was the Virginia Marathon. I did not know there’s a marathon called Virginia Marathon until this year. It was recommended to me by a friend.
My schedule has been busy. It is a slower pace than last year but I felt still every weekend I have something needed to do. I ran runs such as Hone Quarry and making a trip down to Atlanta for GSER or Dark Anchor in Savannah was special.
I also spent more time supporting other runners and traveling to Savannah and Atlanta for such.
In a prior weekend, I was at Harper Ferry helping out at the C&O Canal 100. This coming weekend I will be at the Massanutten Mountain 100 (not running but helping out), I am praying I would get a chance to shine to help some poor runners out in the depth of despair as they tried to run a 100 miler. (more to follow).
Where will I go from here? I am a bit under pressure cooker with time and commitments.
Looking back the last few years, I was free and had a lot of fun and ran in a lot of races and visited a lot of places. I still want to do the same. I am in the same financial strait as everyone in our nation, with high inflation and tariffs. How tariffs affect races? Maybe our race shirts are more expensive. We are dealing with a great deal of uncertainties. My race plan for the next half of the year has already been or mostly set.
As for next year, I will take it as it comes. There are couple trips I have in mind, possibly visit Savannah again for Dark Anchor, or to Florida for the Long Haul 100, possibly going to doing the PolarNight Soltice Marathon Run in Tromsø in Norway, or Viet Nam for the Ho Chi Minh Marathon, or finally going run the Rim to rim to rim at the Grand Canyon. Because there are a lot of uncertainties, I can’t say for sure any such trip would happen. My heart still wants to complete a 200 mile marathon, looking at Cowboy 200. So likely next year, that would be the goal to attempt. I have a bunch of targets but not sure which one will stick or none of them.
[meta: I am thinking to reset the journal count to 1 soon, and increase the Vol to 2, because we human or me is not made to count that high a number. I might explain the numbering in a future post. Like a sailor, the count is Days been since land/ship been sighted. Ahoy! The days of my wandering is over]
In awe 