Running 365 Miles in a Year
“Grand creative visions translate to small daily increments.”
– Mason Currey
In January 2021, I set out to run 365 miles in a year. From a “real” runner’s perspective, this isn’t a lot of distance, but it was an ambitious goal for me.
It led to some injuries and I had to restart in June. But on May 2022, I finally hit my goal. Here’s how I did it and some lessons I learned along the way.
Short term goals make the adventure manageable.
I initially set out to run 31 miles per month. Tracking this felt easy: I just needed my mile count to keep up with the date. However, if I skipped a few days of running, it was hard to catch up. I had a few months where I was running 8 miles on the 31st.
I shifted strategies and decided to run 7 miles per week. My new goal was to run 2-3 miles 2-3 times per week. It was psychologically more easy to stick to smaller requirements on shorter deadlines.
Injury prevention and recovery are more important than distance and speed.
When I first started, I did longer runs of 6-7 miles to help myself get ahead on my mile count. This always backfired. Whenever I got to the 4-mile mark, I felt my form and strength break down, my running would get sloppy, and I’d feel pain in my knees or ankles. Recovering from a 7-mile run would take several days, which ended up setting me back.
There’s no recovery time necessary for 1-2 miles. Form doesn’t break down on short runs and you don’t get the same muscle fatigue, so it’s easier to do every day.
I also made the mistake of treating each run like a race. On one sprint, I severely twisted my ankle. I couldn’t run for a couple of months and was forced to restart the whole year.
Running fast is fun, but it’s also nice to run just for the sake of running.
Running is Meditation.
After a few months, running became my default mode of clearing my mind and managing emotions. If I’m having a bad day or I’m feeling moody, even a casual 1-mile run will lift my spirits. It’s hard not to feel better when you’re getting fresh air and moving your body.
You can always run a mile.
Some days I didn’t feel like running because I was tired or lazy. I got into the habit of running 1 easy mile on those days. I knew I could run 1 mile no matter how I felt, even if I had to run slow. Usually, once I got to the 1 mile, I had more energy, and I could run an extra half mile or mile.
Sometimes the hardest part is getting started.
—Erik Pavia, CEO
Related Resources
Here’s a list of some of my favorite tools for running.
Pantheon wrote about how to get started running if you’re new to it.
If you’re running during the day, you should wear sunscreen, even for short runs. I used to believe sunscreen reduced the benefits of sun exposure, but several doctor friends have changed my mind. Sunscreen helps reduce the likelihood of skin cancer and helps slow skin aging.
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