Dreams and Records

Yesterday I went back and read my first ever blog post. And I’m not talking first post on this blog. I’m talking all the way back in the etrain’s Track Blog: Nuff Said days. Posted on June 25, 2010, it was called Dreams and Records and recounted the journey of the CB South boys record setting 4x8 in 2009. Apparently, I used to be a big fan of exclamation points. I didn’t know how to spell ridiculous (still don’t honestly, but I use spell check more nowadays) and I wasn’t afraid to utilize the mid-post rhetorical question concept. The article still has zero comments and only 78 views. If you didn’t look for it, you would never know it was there.

But the post set the tone for everything that would come after. At the end of the article I wrote: “Don’t listen to the doubters, set big goals, work hard and don’t stop believing”. Journey references aside, I still feel like these words defined the next eight years. Hopefully not just for me, but also for the runners who would eventually read my words.

Three years later, I announced my (first) retirement. On May 27, 2013 I wrote Brett Favre where I said my good bye to the blog community. I took the time to go back and read this one too. It contained some nice sentiments and touching moments, but what I found the most entertaining was a prediction. A prediction that, consistent with most of the predictions I’ve made on these blogs, has been proved completely wrong.

I mistakenly wrote that, five years from now, I would be “completely unconnected to this blog and to the high school track scene. The etrain name will likely disappear into obscurity”. Whoops. Turns out that no matter how much information and experience you have, you can’t predict the future.

Yes, life is unpredictable – and not always in the fun way. I know many of the runners on this site have overcome serious obstacles during their career to reach this point. I hope they can understand that their struggle has been an inspiration, even if it wasn’t necessarily chronicled on this site or others like it. One 4x800 squad in particular stood out to me among the performances, drawing success from the remnants of tragedy. I dedicate this final post to that team and all others with stories like it that I may not know.

Although I’ve typed over one million words on these sites, I continue to believe the most important words were the ones that each of my commenters posted. The stories, the analysis, the predictions. Each contribution builds off one another. As individuals, the trials and tribulations of life and training can overwhelm us. But as a community of runners, there is nothing we cannot overcome.

Today this blog ends, but our community is stronger than ever. What was cultivated here on this site will endure. It will evolve. But regardless of what form it comes in, the next iteration of this blog will continue to be what the ones before it were. A place to learn. A place to grow. A place to come together.

A place for dreams and records.