Real David H.

I’ve run nearly 1,200 miles this year — far and away the most miles in a 12-month span for me. What’s behind those miles, though, are a bunch of stories — some (really) good moments, a fair share of (really) bad moments, and quite a few that were simply ugly.
I’ve thought about all those moments and decided to do a “year in review” of sorts with “winners” of each of those categories and linking to a few older posts along the way.

The Good.

Record mileage with no major injuries is almost the biggest highlight for me. Getting a 10k PR in May is also up there as one of the big moments. PRs aside, the entire race weekend at the Runner’s World Festival in October was huge.

Nothing, though, can top that feeling in March when I set a new mark at the Shamrock Half Marathon. While I didn’t get my sub-1:40, nearly everything fell into place that day for my best race experience to date.

The bad.

While 2012 was mostly good, the bad moments were definitely forgettable.

This comes down to a toss up between the Cleveland Half Marathon in May and the Richmond Marathon in November. Miserable weather impacted Cleveland; exhaustion likely caused a miserable day for Richmond.

Richmond, though, had more elements that I could have controlled, so that wins out as the biggest “bad” of the year.

The ugly.

Here was my debate — do I go literal or figurative? Richmond was ugly. The weather in Cleveland was ugly.

But blood is also ugly, and way back in January I had an awesome experience in the Frozen Toe 10k in Roanoke. That awesomeness included blood.

Blood always wins.