Running With My Daughter – A Bit of an Update to My Favorite Blog Post

About seven years ago I wrote what I still consider to be my most personally meaningful blog post. It was about my (then 8 year old) daughter, Emma, and how she had just run the cross country race of her life. Emma was never the fastest runner as a kid, in fact she quit cross country […]

I’m not sure if I’m supposed to feel good or bad about all of this…

Spring is typically an exceptionally busy time of year for me. Between teaching and coaching (track and field, soccer), it’s rare that I get much time to myself. For obvious reasons, this year has been a bit different. Lockdowns associated with the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic have brought life to a halt for almost all of us, […]

The Mysterious Sleeping Injury

There’s no doubt that as I have gotten older, my body has changed. Coming back to running a bunch this summer, I’ve noticed that I tend to be stiffer on the days after a hard workout, and I pay the price if I don’t take days off. I’ve had fairly regular lower back issues, though […]

The Ghost of Races Past: Reconciling an Older, Less Fit Body With Expectations Based on Prior Performances

On July 4th I ran my first timed race in probably five years, and I’m pretty sure it was the first race I’ve run since I turned 40. I’ve done a few Ragnar relays with friends in the interim, but nothing where it was just me against the clock. The race was held in Bridgton, […]

The Benefits of Stepping Away From Running For a Bit

This morning I ran five miles at a pace of just over 8:00 per mile, then finished with a mile or so of hill repeats. A few years ago this would have been a pretty standard type of workout for me, but on this day it was a big step forward to feeling like a […]

Pete’s Year 2015 in Review: Teaching, Blogging, and Running

2015 was a year of change for me on both the running and personal fronts. I decided in late 2014 that the full-time blogging thing was not for me. Though the freedom of being my own boss was great, and financially I was doing well, I realized that as a career it was just not […]

I Was Bitten By a Dog While Running: A Christmas Story

My most unexpected Christmas gift this year was a 3 hour trip to the emergency room. Fortunately Santa Claus was not the giver of this cruel present. Rather, it was received from a large German Shepherd that I encountered while out on a run on Christmas Day. I’ve been running on the trails behind my house for […]

So That Bit About Me Not Racing This Fall…I Blame My Wife

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post about how I had no plans to race this Fall. Life has gotten incredibly busy with my return to school (though I’m having a blast!), and it seems like most of my time these days is spent either in a classroom or on a soccer field […]

Running Free: Ditching the GPS and Learning to Obsess Less

My relationship with running has changed a lot this year. In many ways I feel like I’ve come full circle back to where I started – running simply for enjoyment, the release, and the health benefits that it provides. I ran only a single race this past Spring, a ten mile trail race that kicked […]

The Best thing About Blogging and Running: People

Sometimes you need to get things off your chest before you can move forward. I’ve been suffering a bit of writer’s block because I waited so long to write and publish the post I released yesterday. Though it can be difficult to reveal one’s vulnerabilities to a larger audience, I’ve found that doing so can […]

On Blogging, Burnout, and Life

I nearly pulled the plug on this blog last Fall. The fact that I didn’t is largely attributable to the support of my wife and my family. I feel compelled to mention them at the beginning of this post since they are far wiser about issues of life than I am, and they deserve credit […]

Respecting the Heat on the Run–I Never Seem to Learn

I feel like I write this post every spring. In fact, I probably do. I figure that maybe if I keep writing it, one year I’ll learn to do things differently. This was not that year. Yesterday I went for a seven mile run. Nothing too special about that, but it was the first really […]

Reflections on a Killer Trail Race

I ran my first race of the year on Saturday. It was a 10 mile trail race, but I feel like I just ran a marathon. My body is pretty well wrecked, but in a good way. As is often the case with races, the pain I felt during has been replaced by a feeling […]

Finding a Runner’s High in Maine

The “Runner’s High” is an elusive thing. I sometimes think that non-runners believe that we all go out there in search of the high on every run. That running is some kind of addiction. Maybe it is, but I can honestly say that in the seven years that I’ve been running with purpose I’ve felt […]

How Many Miles Do You Run at Running Camp?

For the past two weeks I worked as a coach at the annual adult summer running camps in Craftsbury, VT. My primary role there is to present on training physiology, form & footwear, and to do gait analysis for the campers. However, I also get to participate in a lot of the workouts and do […]