Days off

 I do not like taking days off.  With injuries, it is a rare year that I don’t have any days off.  The last time I made it an entire year without missing a day was 2017.  On average my longest “streak” is 165 days.  I guess I shouldn’t complain as it has been 199 days since I last missed a run (December 8, 2023).  I’m hoping to start back running on Saturday.  I got a platelet rich plasma (PRP) injection on Monday and have to wait for it to “settle in” before getting back to it.  Hoping this will be a way to avoid surgery (torn meniscus).  Time will tell.

Never missed days

Through a quirk of fate, I've never missed running on both May 9 and May 12.  I've missed 1940 days over the last 43.5 years of running.  That averages out to one day off every 8.2 days.  I've managed to cover 153,398 miles for an average of 9.67 miles per day.  I like running!

Days off on each date - fewest = 0, most = 11.

Days off by day

Looking for any pattern to days off over my 40 years of running didn’t really turn up anything.  The distribution is fairly even.  There are only 2 days that I’ve never missed and two days at the top end (10 times missed).  January and October have the most DO’s and May has the least.  May does seem to stand out a bit as it is well below the average.

Days off

My Days off are creeping up this year as I wait for a diagnosis on my ankle…

6 months - No days off

Today marks 6 months since my last day off.  Thanks to Bob at Pinnacle Physical Therapy and Dr. Gauthier at Reading Foot and Ankle I’ve been able to average just under 12 miles per day over the last 182 days.  I’ve got three more weeks until the US Masters XC championships then it will be time for a break.  Onward!

http://www.pinnaclephysicaltherapy.com/

http://readingfootanklespecialists.com/

 

Math rules!

Earlier this month I posted that I had never missed running on May 9th and 12th over all the years I've been doing this (1979-Present).  I wondered what the odds were for that.  Ken Tripp, the "stat man" did the math while riding the commuter rail home one evening.  I have no idea of any of thisis true or not but damn it is cool.  Great stuff!

From Ken:

You have been running for 13,310 days.  Of those days, you have missed 1,685 days.  If the days are independent and random (which they will not be), then the probability of missing any day is 0.127 (12.7%percent chance).  This also means that you have an 0.873 probability of running.

 So, the probability of running on May 9 is 0.873 (days are independent so date doesn’t matter).  The probability of running May 12 is also 0.873.  The probability of running May 9^th AND May 12^th is 0.837x0.837=0.763  So the probability of you running on May 9^th and May 12^th is 76.2%.  Now for over 37 years, it is still multiplicative like the 2 day calculation.  The prob(running on May 9^th and May 12^th for 37 years)=0.763^37=4.46584E-05( 0.004% or 4 out of 1000).  Clearly, it is a pretty small probability for this to occur.

Going forward, the probability of you running a complete year is 0.827^365=1.22146617E-43.

 

*Probability lesson:  If you flip a coin twice, what is the probability of getting 2 heads.  The possible outcomes are HH, HT, TH, or TT.  The prob of 2 heads = 1 (HH)/4(total number of possible outcomes).  This problem could be written as Prob(Head on Flip 1) and Prob(Head on Flip 2)=1/2*1/2=1/4.

Day (s) off

Until last week (Sept. 1) I hadn't missed a day since last year. In Sept of 2012 I missed a seven days due to my trip to Kilimanjaro (a price I was willing to pay). So my streak of 346 days ended and now I'm on a streak of another kind (days off) that I hope ends at 28. Be careful out there!

1,500 days

Yesterday marked my 1,500th day off! Not a mark I want to celebrate. Getting injured is just part of the game, just have to work to come back as fit as possible and hopefully keep the downtime to a minimum.

Breakdown of days off by year:
1978 - 3
1979 - 205
1980 - 89
1981 - 75
1982 - 53
1983 - 68
1984 - 42
1985 - 90
1986 - 89
1987 - 29
1988 - 15
1989 - 4
1990 - 8
1991 - 0
1992 - 0
1993 - 0
1994 - 39
1995 - 3
1996 - 0
1997- 209
1998 - 48
1999 - 66
2000 - 16
2001 - 20
2002 - 38
2003 - 39
2004 - 59
2005 - 65
2006 - 28
2007 - 11
2008 - 60
2009 - 29

Total = 1,500 days off
That is more than 4 years of not running!
11,206 days since I started running.
That means 1 day off for every 7.4 days run, which I guess isn’t too bad. Unfortunately it isn’t like that; typically it is months of running followed by weeks off.
My best stretch was 1991-1993 when I didn’t miss a day for over three years.