By Bryan Westfall

Thanks to the transition from the even, mild temperatures of California to the erratic super hot/cold temperatures of St Louis, 2018 brought the end of half marathon distance training for me. I’ve embraced more frequent, shorter (5k) runs…and have moved indoors (treadmill) for running during the week and on days with more extreme temperatures.

The result was more races than past years, but shorter distances (for the most part). I was able to do runDisney‘s “Star Wars Virtual Half Marathon” (with difficulty), the Potterhead Running Club‘s “Platform 9 3/4k”, the STL “St. Paddy’s Day Run” (a 5 miler), and most recently the “Hot Chocoloate 15k” (in 20 degree weather). Everything else was 5k or shorter.

According to MapMyRun, I netted a sweet 156 miles running this year. Averaging 3 miles running a week for an entire year sounds excellent to this 44 year old who only started running at 39. Aiming for 200 next year! Here’s to an even more active 2019!