EARNED RUNS 5TH ANNIVERSARY!!!

One of the earliest phots in the Earned Runs album, taken by PKSenagore, October 19, 2014. All rights reserved.

OCTOBER 2019 MARKS 5 YEARS ONLINE! THANK YOU
 
THE FIRST DAY OF THE 10TH MONTH OF 2014 was shaping up to be an important one for Earned Runs LLC.  The company was incorporated in February but the online material wasn’t ready until later in the year.  Ready to go live, all of a sudden, the website host rolled out a formatting change! No kidding.  Weebly.com had chosen that very day to accomplish this overhaul. The Earned Runs materials were a mess.
 
There wasn’t a crisis because I had decided beforehand not to go live with the Facebook rollout until October 12, Columbus Day/Indigenous Peoples Day.  Only family were notified that the site was live, to obtain their critical reviews before the outside world had a chance to see what was being offered. All was fixed by October 2.
 
But since then it’s been a positive experience, with a few glitches, in terms of excitement and rewards. In 2018, bib requests began to come in from competitors all over the world.  Most have come from the USA, Eastern Europe, Russia, and recently from Northern Africa.  Your notes of appreciation have been greatly appreciated! Thank you!
 
The international requests busted the 2018 and 2019 Earned Runs budgets, and difficulties interpreting addresses slowed the mailing process considerably. Mailings outside the USA and Canada were suspended until this past September.  Currently the policy is to honor international requests that include complete addresses on a limited basis from each country.
 
The address issues mostly involve international mailings that lack street names and numbers.  All locations are investigated online, but with mixed results. Sometimes the proper address can be deduced, but oftentimes that cannot. Over the past year I’ve come to think that not all will have a number because the town, center, or village is very small and certain residences may be known to mail deliverers by description (“third house from the corner”).  Like in Hebron, the West Bank, in the Palestinian Territories. As a result, some mailings have been sent, with fingers crossed, that the person making the request will indeed receive their bibs. Only two envelopes have been returned, but there’s a good chance that many don’t find their way to the correct ‘home’.
 
Initially Earned Runs made efforts to email requests for complete information, but possibly due to language issues, this action has not realized good results and has been stopped. The option of personally printing a bib has been offered, although it seems not an optimal solution. Hopefully another will be identified this year.

But enough with the business of mailings!!!
 
KNOW THAT YOU ARE PART OF A NEARLY GLOBAL COMMUNITY. Requests have not come from the continents of Australia and Antarctica, so not quite global (yet?).  Below is the listing of the countries from which requests have come.
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ALGERIA (MANY), ARGENTINA, BRAZIL, BELARUS, BULGARIA CANADA, DENMARK, EGYPT, FINLAND, FRANCE, GREECE, INDIA, IRAQ, ITALY, JORDAN, LATVIA, LITHUANIA, MOROCCO (MANY), PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES, POLAND, RUSSIA (MANY), SPAIN, TUNISIA (MANY), UKRAINE (MANY), UNITED KINGDOM, USA (MANY), and UZBEKISTAN.

The USA states from which requests were received include: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Texas.
 
In attempting to decipher addresses so mailing envelopes could be prepared, I’ve used the internet to investigate whether place names (unfamiliar and exotic sounding to me) were streets or city sections, villages, regions, or administrative seats. The online images that appeared showed incredibly lovely parts of the world, many that are situated on coastlines near beautiful bodies of water. Others are in very rural locales. The Ukraine, Russia, Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria have provided the greatest of such surprises in the course of this detective work.
 
The isolated nature of some addresses reminds me that these athletes might benefit especially from having bibs and informational support, at no cost, to motivate and power their efforts to train and compete in personal events. It’s exciting to think that they will be helped to challenge themselves as others do in big population centers surrounded by easy to join groups. In imagining outdoor workouts in these homelands, I hope each person feels connected in a small way to each other. If you train to meet an athletic goal, you can consider yourself an athlete in my opinion, regardless of the remoteness of your training site.
 
Thanks are due to all who have been supportive, especially family. My sister is the Number One cheerleader! She took me to the start of the Dipsea Trail last summer so I could experience the feel of the iconic race, if not actually participate in it, and regularly suggests potential topics for blog discussion. My husband passes research news along to me that might be used for Science Friday posts, and endures the clutter of bibs, stickers, envelopes, and stamps in our living space without complaint.  My friends and family endure constant comments on topics they raise, “… that topic was covered in one of my Earned Runs blog posts.”
 
At this time, blog posts since 2014 number 1230!  
 
I am grateful for having an opportunity through Earned Runs to share my enthusiasm for running and fitness, and the interest shown by all who visit the website. Thank you for the connection I feel to you from my small town on the shore of Lake Michigan in the USA.
 
RUN & MOVE HAPPY!