Miguel is a 46 year old chemist from a very small town (population of 2,000) called Santa Anita in Entre Ríos, Argentina. He’s married to a wonderful woman and his daughter is just about to go into University. Last year he completed a marathon with an incredible time (a PB of 3:22) and just recently completed a #RUN30 consecutive running challenge of 10 kilometres per day for 30 days. GO MIGUEL! I’m excited to share his story 🙂
What made you decide to start your consecutive running challenge, how many kilometres did you choose to run, and why?
This year, I set an ambitious goal to get a personal best in a marathon, which I successfully achieved with a time of 3:22. I put in a lot of time and effort in my training, but after completing that goal I was yearning for another challenge; something different than just achieving a PB in a race. I came across the 30 Day Consecutive Running Challenge and thought this would be a perfect goal to push me to become better. I chose to run 10 kilometres per day because it was challenging, yet attainable. I’ve never run 10k for 30 days straight before so it was a bit intimidating, but knew with the right mindset, I could do it.
How much running did you do before deciding to do the challenge?
Whilst training for my marathon, I had a load between 7 – 80 kilometres per week, but this included rest days. I’ve never run so many days consecutively without a rest.
Did you have any self doubts? If so, what were they?
I first thought about tackling 15k/day, but it was a bit too much to begin with and I had a lot of doubts that I would be able to complete it. Opting for 10k still seemed challenging, but much more attainable. I thought that if I could complete 10k/day then 15k/day would be the next challenge on the docket and something to work towards.
How did the challenge impact your life?
While there were days where I was tired and the daunting task of running 10k/day sounded arduous, I mostly felt a surge of energy. The challenge gave me more self esteem and confidence in running and my life. In fact, there were some days where I even snuck in more then 10k. Overall, I ran a total of 370 kilometres in the 30 days.
Are there any other areas of your life that improved after the challenge was complete?
For me, the biggest impact was improvements in my running. I tried to run the daily 10k as quickly as possible and noticed substantial improvements in my endurance and speed. Overall, the challenge made me a faster (and a better!) runner.
I highly recommend the #RUN30 challenge and am going to repeat it with even more daily kilometres! Some of the many benefits are increased self-esteem and waking up knowing that I’m going to get a rush of endorphins and feel that runners high for hours after it’s complete. The challenge connects runners from all over the world, giving me the opportunity to meet people striving for even more challenging goals while inspiring me along the way.
Ready to begin your own consecutive running challenge? Sign-up for #RUN30 here.