My Christmas Bonus To Myself
By
Michael Selman
of
RUNNERS NICHE
As you know, we're getting to the time of year where we can't
help looking back to see where we are in our running life. Did we
achieve our goal race times for the year? Have we stayed healthy,
and not missed days due to injury or time constraints? What is
our annual mileage looking like with a month left?
During this morning's nice 11.07 mile run (which, of course, I
logged as 11 miles) I started to think about that little bit
extra on the right side of the decimal point. I've been building
up fractional mileage all year long, which I've never logged.
That's just how we are. If our standard course is not exactly to
the 1/4 mile, we have no choice but to round down. We can't round
up, because we would never think to log a run longer than we
actually ran. The simple truth is, the totals just round better
to the quarter of a mile when you add up your mileage at the end
of the week. So down, we round.
Ever since June, when I started running my 5.32 mile weekday run,
I've been logging it as 5 1/4. That has left .07 miles each time
I've run this route which has sadly gone unrecognized.
All my other neighborhood courses I've run during the year have
similar attributes. My 10 mile route was actually 10.13 miles. My
8 mile route measured in at almost 8.2 miles, but I could never
call it 8 1/4. ( It actually started out as a 7.8 mile route, but
I needed it to be at least 8 miles, so I added an extra little
out and back, and it ended up being 8.2, or
a very nice 8). My 7 1/2 mile route was probably closer to 7.53.
The only route right on the money was a 5 mile route which was
right on 5 miles.
So today, on my run, I started thinking about all those
fractional miles.
Almost every day, another deposit has been made in the mileage
bank. Are these the "Junk" miles of mythical lore? I decided that
it might be interesting to tally up the complied totals for the
year. When it comes to annual total mileage, every tenth of a
mile counts. Here's what I came up with:
7 1/2 mile routes = 8 @ 7.53 .03 X 8= .24 "Junk" miles
8 mile routes = 5 @ 8.2 each .20 X 5= 1.00 "junk" mile
10 mile routes = 6 @ 10.13 .13 X 6= .78 "junk" mile
5 1/4 mile route = 32 @ 5.32 .07 X 32= 2.24 "junk" miles
18 mile run (an 8 plus a 10) = 1 @ 18.33 .33 X 1 = .33 "junk"
miles
20 mile run (2 10 mile loops) = 1 @ 20.26 .26 X 1= .26 "junk"
miles
TOTAL = 4.86 total junk miles
Do I round it down to 4.75? Of course I do. Still, it's 4.75
miles I wouldn't have had any other way. Now, I know I can sleep
late on Christmas Day. And when I wake up, and go to my stocking,
hung from the chimney with care, I'll find an extra 4.75 miles to
apply to my log anywhere I need it. It's my Christmas bonus.
How much is yours?
