2023 Year-End Review

Every year, I post a list of goals for the year.  I usually achieve most of my goals, but I sometimes miss a few.  This year my goals were fairly modest, so it’s not too surprising that I nailed them all.

Finish My 4th Circuit of 50 States

At the beginning of 2023, I had already run four or more marathons (or ultras) in 45 states.  To complete my 4th circuit of marathons in every state, I needed to run marathons in Maryland, Oklahoma, Utah, Vermont, and West Virginia.

I got off to a rough start.  I was planning to run the Sun Marathon in Utah in January, but I had to skip that one because of a respiratory infection.  The day before I was scheduled to fly to Utah, I tried running for the first time in a week.  I managed to run just over a mile.  Two miles would’ve been too much.  A marathon was out of the question.

I recovered in time to run the George Washington’s Birthday Marathon in February, giving me my Maryland race.  In May, I ran the Maple Leaf Marathon in Vermont.  Then in the summer, I found another Utah race.  I actually ran two of them.  I ran the Deseret News Marathon in July and the Mt. Nebo Marathon in August.

I finished my fourth circuit in November by running the Marshall University Marathon in West Virginia and the Route 66 Marathon in Oklahoma.

I already had my eye on eventually doing a fifth circuit of states, so I also went out of my way to schedule races in a few states where I already had four marathons.  Besides running my fourth marathon in the states listed above, I ran my fifth marathon or ultra in Kentucky, Maine, Idaho, Montana, Colorado, Utah, Kansas, New Hampshire, and Maryland.  By the time I finished my fourth circuit, I just needed nine more states to finish my fifth circuit.

Run Marathons in Two New Countries

This was a fairly soft goal.  At the start of the year, I didn’t have any international trips scheduled, but I had tentative plans to run marathons in Slovakia and Brazil.  I ended up running both of those races, and I also ran the Antarctica Marathon.  More on that later.

Get Back into Shape

At the start of the year, I was out of shape, and I was carrying a little extra weight.  My training was held back by a high hamstring injury in my left leg and sciatica in my right leg.

To get back in shape, I first had to get healthy enough to train.  To lose the weight, I needed to get more exercise, which also depended on getting healthy enough to train.  I’ve never been able to lose weight through diet alone.

Things got worse before they got better.  In January, I came down with a respiratory infection that was mostly likely RSV.  I was completely sidelined for about a week, and it was two more weeks before I was recovered sufficiently to do any real training.

My hamstring injury was healing nicely, but my sciatica got worse.  It flared up so badly that I couldn’t run without pain.

I had a cortisone injection in February.  The first time I had one of those, I noticed improvement immediately.  This time, I felt no better after two weeks.  Then something surprising happened.  I flew to Argentina to join my tour group for the trip to Antarctica.  After the 10 hour flight from Atlanta to Buenos Aires, I fully expected to be stiff and painful.  My sciatica was usually worst after a long period of sitting.  Instead, I got off the plane with no discomfort.  It hasn’t bothered me since.

It's possible, although unlikely, that it just took that long for the cortisone injection to be effective.  It’s much more likely that something else changed.  One possibility is that I had a synovial cyst putting pressure on the nerve, and then the cyst drained, relieving the pressure.  Those things can come and go unexpectedly.

That trip included a 10-day cruise, so my opportunities to run were limited.  When I got back, however, I started gradually building my mileage.  I was careful not to increase my mileage too quickly, but by mid-July, I was running 50+ miles a week.  I’ve kept that up since.

A goal should be measurable.  I wouldn’t consider myself to be “in shape” until I could run fast enough to qualify for the Boston Marathon.  In recent years, most of my BQs have been on downhill courses.  My goal for this year was to BQ on a course that didn’t have any net elevation loss.

By the end of April, I was able to run a marathon in four hours.  To qualify for Boston, I needed to shave off 10 more minutes.  In July, I qualified at the Deseret News Marathon, but that course has almost 3,000 feet of net descent.  In August, I qualified on another sharply downhill course.  It wouldn’t be until September that I would have a chance to test myself on a mostly flat course.  By then I was not only getting into getter shape, but I had also lost the excess weight.

I felt like I made a major breakthrough at the Clarence DeMar Marathon, where I qualified for Boston with more than four minutes to spare.  That course is also downhill, but not by nearly as much.  The first half descends about 600 feet.  The second half is relatively flat, although there’s a tough hill in the last few miles.

Two weeks later, I finally reached my goal of qualifying for Boston on a course that started and finished at the same elevation.  I did that at the Cape Cod Marathon, which is mostly flat.

I followed that up with a BQ at the Baltimore Marathon a week later.  That course is moderately hilly.  Before the year was up, I also had BQs at the Mankato Marathon (moderately hilly), the Marshall University Marathon (flat), and the Route 66 Marathon (moderately hilly).

My final BQ of the year came at the Hawaii Bird Conservation Marathon.  This course descends 3,700 feet, but it’s worth noting that I was 11 minutes faster this year than I was on the same course a year ago.

Of all my goals for 2023, this one was the most important.  It seems like every year I start the year thinking it’s going to be a rebuilding year, but then I end the year about where I started.  This year, I actually rebuilt.  I’m going into 2024 running better than I have in years.  I have a good mileage base, my weight is down, and I’m healthy.

Do My Winter Running Outdoors

Since buying my first treadmill (to train for the Pike’s Peak Marathon), I’ve fallen into the habit of doing all of my winter running on the treadmill.  There’s nothing wrong with training on a treadmill.  It has enabled me to train at a faster pace than I could if I had to run on icy streets.

The problem is that after years of doing half of my training on a treadmill, I developed the bad habit of barely getting my feet off the ground.  On a flat road course, I have an efficient stride.  On a trail course, I don’t pick up my feet enough, and I’m prone to tripping.

In recent years, I’ve started to trip and fall, even in road marathons.  If there’s an uneven spot in the pavement, I’ll catch it with one of my feet.  In the latter half of 2022, I was tripping about once per race.  Sometimes I fell, but even when I didn’t, I would have a few awkward jarring steps.  More than once, I aggravated an existing injury.

To cure myself of that habit, I committed to doing all of my winter running outdoors.  My hope was that running on snow and ice would force me to pick up my feet.

The first big test came in the Antarctica Marathon.  That was a hilly course on a dirt road with lots of rocks.  There were times when I was racing down a hill, knowing that I would have a bad fall if my foot caught one of those rocks.  It scared me, but I got through that race without tripping on anything.

I thought I would make it through the entire year without tripping.  Unfortunately, I tripped on a pothole in the Cape Cod Marathon, and hit the pavement pretty hard.

I’ve continued to use a treadmill for race-walk training, but I haven’t run on a treadmill at all this year.  While I didn’t make it through the whole year without a fall, I improved significantly.  One fall per year is a lot better than one fall per race.

Doing my winter running outdoors had another benefit.  It forced me to reacquaint myself with how to dress for different temperatures.  I didn’t know I would be running in Antarctica, but dressing properly for that race was a lot easier after running in similar temperatures at home.

Place in My Age Group in the National Senior Games

Most of my goals were running goals, but I also had two race-walking goals.  I was competing in two race-walking events at the National Senior Games.  The first was 1,500 meters on a track.  The second was 5,000 meters on a road loop.

Last year, I took fourth place in the 1,500.  There are medals for the top three and ribbons for places five through eight.  I got a late start on my training this year, so my goal was simply to place in the top eight.  My time was one second slower than last year, but I placed higher.  This year, I came in third, which was good for a bronze medal.

In the 5,000, my goal was to place in the top three.  I managed a second place finish, earning me a silver medal.

Move Up Among Minnesota Runners

Since 2015, I’ve been on the Megamarathon List, which lists every runner in the world who has finished at least 300 marathons.  I rank in the top 400 runners in the world and roughly 50th in North America, but as recently as 2021, there were still six runners ahead of me in my home state of Minnesota.

By the end of 2022, I had moved into 5th place among Minnesota runners.  My goal for 2023 was to move into the top four.

To move into 4th place, I needed to run 15 more marathons.  I ran 30 this year, easily moving me into the top four.  The three runners still ahead of me have all run more than 600 marathons.  Only one of them is still active, but it’ll be a long time before I run enough marathons to move into the top three.

The Goal That Wasn’t Even on My List

For the second straight year, my biggest accomplishment of the year was something that wasn’t even on my list of goals.  Last year, it was winning the state championship for men over 60 in a 24-hour race.  This year, it was finishing marathons (or ultras) on every continent.

I had previous run marathons or ultras on five continents.  I was only missing South America and Antarctica.  I had plans to run Maratona do Rio in June, but I wasn’t expecting to run a marathon in Antarctica this year.

I had made a deposit to run the Antarctica Marathon in 2024, but I was also on the waiting list for 2023.  Marathon Tours & Travel was leading two voyages to Antarctica this year, one in early March, and one in late March.  On the outside chance that I might get in off the waiting list, I avoided planning any other races in March.

By the middle of January, I was getting anxious to finish planning my race schedule for March and April.  In particular, I wanted to book a trip to Vienna and Bratislava at the beginning of April.  If I went on the second Antarctica voyage, I wouldn’t get home in time to leave for Vienna.

I called Marathon Tours to find out if there was any chance of getting into one of this year’s voyages.  I didn’t think there was any chance.  I just wanted to know for sure, so I could start booking other trips.

I was shocked to find out that both of this year’s Antarctica trips had room.  I chose the first one, so I could also go on the Vienna/Bratislava trip.  At the time, I was sick with RSV, so I took a leap of faith that I could recover in time to be ready for the Antarctica trip.

Antarctica was my sixth continent.  Three months later, I added South America as my seventh continent by running Maratona do Rio.