BHAGs



What is a BHAG? It is a 

  • Big
  • Hairy
  • Audacious
  • Goal
I form BHAGs and I'm persistent (or stubborn? headstrong?) enough to keep working at them. I draw my motivation from the legendary Liberian president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. Read about her here. She says
"If your dreams don’t scare you, they aren’t big enough"
Here's Ellen Johnson Sirleaf looking at me thinking, "Don't you dare give up on those BHAGs!"

Sidenote: Her quotation also can be heard in the song Dreams by Life of Dillon.

As some of you know I am a (slight) Steve "Pre" Prefontaine fan. Here is a quotation he made famous, reminding me to always pursue my goals.




You can have BHAGs in all areas of life. Don’t make them easily attainable goals. Make them something you will really have to WORK for. I will list my 2018 BHAGs for running below:

5k: Break 18:50 (Overall PR: 19:06. 2017 PR: 19:31)
10k: Break 40:00 (Overall PR: Unknown. 2017 PR: 42:24)
Virginia Ten-Miler: Break 65:00 (2017 & Overall PR: 70:00)
Half-Marathon: Break 1:23 (2017 & Overall PR: 1:38:50)
Marathon: Break 3 hours and qualify for Boston (PR: 3:32. Boston Qualifying Time: 3:05)
Ultras aren’t set in stone for the next year, but I do have two goals:
  1. Break 20 hours in Georgia Death Race (GDR) 68-Miler (I've seen distances ranging from 66 - 74 miles)
  2. Complete 6 ultramarathons, bringing my lifetime total to 25
Are some of these goals out of my grasp? Perhaps. Maybe. But I won’t know until I try. I have a great group of running friends here in Lynchburg (Shoutout to BRTR, Lynchburg Road Runners, and the Hill City Harriers!) who I know will push me day in and day out.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Bazinga!

Image
Last Friday I sat down to watch the previous night’s episode of “The Big Bang Theory” (TBBT). This is a weekly occurrence for me as I do not have cable television. For those of you unfamiliar with the show, let me give you a basic rundown. The show chronicles the lives of Sheldon Cooper (Jim Parsons) and Leonard Hofstadter (Johnny Galecki, or as many of you know him, the son from Christmas Vacation). These 2 geniuses live together in a California apartment; despite their quirky features and Sheldon’s idiosyncrasies, the duo have an intimate group of friends: Howard Wolowitz and his wife Bernadette, Sheldon’s girlfriend Amy Farrah Fowler, and forever-alone colleague Rajesh Koothrappali. The four male characters work together at Caltech: Howard is an engineer and the other three are physicists. With the show being based around science, not many Christian values can be taken from it. Just look at the title! Here are the lyrics to the theme song: “Our whole universe was in ...
Read more

Hellgate 2017 Race Report

Image
After my last race report (Grindstone, a couple posts back) I decided to make this recap *slightly* less long-winded. Hope you enjoy! Accurate Course Description! Pre-Race Last year I crewed for my friend Jeremiah “Bullfrog” Clark. As I helped at the aid stations I ran across a Liberty student named Kaitlyn. Bundled up, all I could really see was her face. Not thinking much about it, I ran into her at Snowflex a couple months later when she recognized me and I didn’t recognize her (awkward!). Fast forward to the summer and I saw her at her other job, Riverside Runners. We reconnected and stayed in touch through social media. After seeing her own plans to run Grindstone in 2018 (!!) I asked if she would be my crew for Hellgate. She responded with something along the lines of “heck yes”, and a plan was hatched. As the time drew near I asked her to pull double-duty: crew and pace. She willfully obliged and we were able to meet twice to run some trails and discuss race-day logi...
Read more

Life Lessons... at Hooters?!

Image
“Like father, like son” is how the saying goes. If you truly know me, you know that the saying has a very direct application in my life. From our physical characteristics to our genotype, I am a lot like my father. One specific way that I am like my father is with finances. We both believe in the “less is more” strategy. We like to conserve money wherever possible – wearing more layers to keep the heat off in the winter, frequenting yard sales and the local Good Will, and buying food in bulk are several examples. In fact, last year I had my heating bill well under $30 for several months during the winter months. Being conservative with my money has led me to apply to several restaurant email clubs. A perk to joining these clubs is that they usually send you free food around your birthday. Seeing as last week was my birthday, I received several great offers. I have already been to Black Bear Diner (a local place here in the Springs) for free pancakes, Ruby Tuesday for a free burger...
Read more