Some of my friends call me “Forrest,” as they tease me about my running streak.  Unlike the Tom Hanks character in the movie, I’m not really running from anything,  For that matter, I’m not running to anything, either.  However, Forrest Gump and I both may have found something that “we’re good at.”  For me, I’m simply good at being disciplined, having run every single day now for the past 3,139 consecutive days.   I’ve never won a race that I can recall, have never been particularly fast, and can’t really explain why I do it.  I can’t even say that I enjoy the activity every day, but i can easily admit that I enjoy knowing that I’ve done it every day without fail.  Will I feel like a failure if I stop?  I know I’ll be disappointed!

For the past few weeks, my running has taken on new meaning.  I’m in training, and it feels good to have a new goal.  I had my first meeting yesterday with my Hood to Coast teammates. These are people that I barely know, that will be counting on me to do three of the thirty-six total legs on our two-day, 199-mile journey from Timberline Lodge on Mount Hood to the coastal beach of Seaside, Oregon.  I’ve not run with any of my teammates yet, and at no point in the relay race will we ever run together.  However, each of us is preparing every day, in our own individual way, with 23 days left on the countdown.  I’m pretty sure that I’m the oldest member of the team, and probably one of the slowest.  Most people would guess that since I practice every day then I should be pretty damn good at it.  Well,  I’m good and slow!

I’m not much of a competitor, although I’ve run many organized races throughout my life.  I was on the track team in high school, but always looked to do the shortest possible races.  I had a friend in high school that would throw rocks at my window in the early morning hours to get me to run with him.  I really don’t remember if I ever gave in to his persistence?  I was at a family reunion in my mid-twenties, and remember a cousin mentioning that I might have put on a little weight since she last saw me.  I would have never made that comment to her or to anyone else, but in retrospect it probably changed my life.  It was a hot 4th of July weekend, and I reacted to her comment by lacing up the running shoes for the first time.  I was too embarrassed to do it in full view of the public, so I chose a wooded path behind our house to make my running debut.  I was sure I ran for much more than a mile, but judging from the time I was actually gone from the house, it would have shattered the world record!  A mile was a lot longer than I thought!

I eventually came out of the woods, and hit the streets in full view of everyone.  I lost the weight I wanted to lose and many more pounds, as I slowly became addicted.  Soon I had a subscription to Runners World and the goal of running a marathon.  I was particularly enamored with Iron Man and Ultra-Marathon events, but never got beyond a second marathon.  I did not run every day as I was training, and it was hard to decide which days to choose and how far to run?  The longest I ran before my first marathon was about 16 miles, but I was obsessive, mostly out of fear of failure, about getting my fill of road work each week.  One week, running three times a day, I managed 116 total miles, thinking that maybe I could do an Ultra.  In the meantime, I chose the Detroit Free Press Marathon on October 14, 1979 and set a goal of 8 minutes per mile.  I stayed at a friend’s house in Ann Arbor, Michigan and we drove to Detroit early the next morning.  The starting line was in Windsor, Canada, and getting through the tunnel into the United States was a time consuming log-jam, but this inconvenience made it truly a unique International experience.   There were no timing chips, so race times were based solely on the starting gun, and it took at least a half-hour to get to the starting line and another ten minutes of nothing but walking into the tunnel.  Finally, I got up to speed and away from the herd, but my finish time was 3 hours and 40 minutes.  I would have easily reached my goal with today’s modern timing technology, and maybe even have qualified for Boston.  I ran the Chicago Marathon unofficially about a year later, but injuries prevented me from attempting longer distances, and my desire began to fade.

I would run, on and off, throughout the next 25 years.  I remember doing Indianapolis 500 Mini-Marathons in the mid to late 1980s and some 10k and 5k runs in the 1990s to keep in shape.  i never really got a consistent running program going, knowing that I would need to at least run for 30 straight days to build a habit.  A friend brought to my attention the United States Running Streak Association (USRSA) back in the summer of 2009.  His personal running streak got to 400 days, and then he simply forgot to do it.  It served as a reminder about all the difficulty I had encountered in the past with mind-games around which days of the week to run, and which to rest?  Running every day was the simple solution.  No decision necessary – just do it – thanks Nike.

As a result of this friend’s challenge, I started my running streak just a few days before the 2010 New Year and have continued religiously ever since.  Typically, I’ll run about three miles every morning.  Once again out of fear about failing my Hood to Coast teammates, I’ve upped this ante to about 5 miles a day, including a lot of hills.  With the temperatures expected to reach 108 degrees here in Portland, the rest of this week will continue to be grueling.  I ran three miles early this morning, and then drove to my middle leg of the relay near Mt. St. Helen’s High School, and proceeded to run two more hilly, sweaty miles.  I wanted to familiarize myself with the route, that appeared to be much hillier on paper than it really is.  What a relief!

Will all this newly-kindled interest in running lead to something more?  I don’t know, but this race will age me another year.  In fact, the very next day after the Hood to Coast I turn 66 years young,  and all I can think of is Highway Route 66.  A sixty-six mile run is out of the question, despite the dreams of my younger years, but a training half-marathon, a marathon qualifier, and the Boston Marathon would add up to 66 total miles, if I needed a new inspiration!