I’m not one for New Year’s resolutions. It’s not that I’m not a goal-oriented person. But it always makes more sense to me to set personal goals on my birthday than on New Year’s. (This could be because I think New Year’s is the most overblown, overhyped holiday out there. But I digress.)

That said, I LOVE a good challenge, especially when there is a competitive edge to it! So I am happy to announce that I completed my friend Matt’s annual 25/50/75/100 Mile Challenge for the month of January.

The rules are simple: You choose your goal (could be 25, 50, 75 or 100 miles) and commit to completing that mileage by Jan. 31. Every time you finish a run, you log your miles and report them to Matt, who keeps a daily leaderboard that he posts in a private Facebook event. Several dozen of his friends signed up for the challenge, and it’s so fun to see all the participants proudly reporting their miles each day — especially because not everyone is a hardcore runner. It’s inspiring to see people who insist they aren’t runners crush their goals!

Since I am training for yet another marathon, I knew reaching 100 miles would not be a problem for me, but I thought I’d get there sooner than I did. I hit 100 on Jan. 26, after being sick with a nasty cold/cough the week earlier that ruined my long run plans for last weekend. And as I said, having a friendly competition is a powerful motivator! I knew my friend Kree (Matt’s wife) would be at 100 miles on Jan. 26, so I made sure I met my goal that night — even though it was Friday night and I totally did not feel like getting on the treadmill. But I ran those last five miles anyway!

Then the next day, I ran 16 miles in keeping with my marathon training plan — so I am now at 116 miles for January. I should be able to finish out the month somewhere in the low 120s. I was hoping to be in the 130s, and I probably would have been had I not gotten sick. But what can you do? It is cold and flu season, after all.

January is my least favorite month by far — it’s cold (though we’ve had some mild days the past week), the holidays are over and spring and summer feel SO far away. Having a goal definitely makes the month go by faster — which is probably why I just can’t quit spring marathons!