Amy Lu's View

My Running Streak of 2020 ended yesterday, December 23. I ran 210 days in a row (a minimum of a mile every day) for a total of 1051.58 miles. That’s an average of just a smidge over 5 miles per day.

This isn’t a particularly Christmasy topic, but as the conclusion of my running streak occured during my Blogging streak (of only 12 days), I’m going to write about it and count the post as one of the “Twelve Blog Posts of Christmas” (Day #9).

The only connection I can make to Christmas is that my running streak was a gift I gave to myself. Particularly the time that I made for myself so I could run that much. I spent over 178 hours running during my streak. That’s only the actual running–that doesn’t count all the time I spent trying to work up the motivation to go running and get dressed for running, etc. Not to mention all the time spent on taking selfies and social media posts about running.

Was that the best possible use of that time? Certainly some of those hours could have been better spent, but overall I feel so grateful that I’ve had the time and health and ability (and cooperative weather) for my running streak. And thankful for all the hours of podcasts (mostly “TBTL”) and audiobooks that I listened to.

And of course, as I’ve blogged about numerous times, running gives me so many gifts: confidence, discipline, all the benefits of movement, a reason to get outside, an obsession that’s relatively positive, and membership in a amazingly supportive community.

There wasn’t any special reason that my streak ended at Day 210, beyond yesterday’s blizzard (I had plenty of time to get my run in finished before the weather turned) and my decision not to risk running on ice today. And I do like that it’s a “solid” number (no, that’s not a mathematical principle, but 209 would have felt unfinished).

I don’t have new running goals at the moment, beyond trying to support my running with a foundation of healthier nutrition (that’s my polite way of saying that I aspire to cut back on my cracker/chip and booze intake.) Yeah, nothing new there but just because it’s not a new goal doesn’t mean it’s not worthy).