Who Am I?

I am an avid runner and have been running since I was 15 years old. I began running low to medium distances while on my high school track team, running the 800 meter and 1600 meter races (I was a sub 5 miler and a 2 minute 800 runner). In addition to the track team, I also joined the cross country team. After high school I still wanted to run and decided to start doing road races. I have probably ran a couple hundred 5k races (16.29 PR)along with many 10k's as well. In 2009 I decided to step up my game and try to tackle my first marathon. I will be honest; the only reason I did this was because my father ran a few and I wanted to show him that I could do what he did. I trained poorly for my first one and regret it. If you are going to run a race, train like you want to win. I still continue to run marathons and other distances as well, and every race is a chance for me to better myself.
I started this blog to hopefully communicate with other runners and to shed any knowledge I may have about the sport that can help other runners. I believe running is the best sport and can be a great stress reliever. I encourage all runners to spread the word of our sport and show people why running is so good and why the community of runners has such great people. You can follow me on twitter @byrne1324 or find me on facebook- Shaun Byrne

Wednesday, November 11, 2015

The Season Of Giving

I want to start by saying a big thank you to all the men and women who have served and our currently serving for our country. Veterans day should be the most important holiday of the year, because without those men and women sacrificing so much we would not have the freedom we do today.

With that being said a sad statistic you may not know is 1 in 4 homeless people are vets. The same person who fought for our freedom is now sleeping out in the cold trying to figure out where their next meal is coming from.  I am a person who likes to try and help a person in need. Last year you may remember me posting something about Rucksgiving. Rucksgiving was made up by the Obstacle World Championships and was done in quite a few cities across the country and in Canada. The idea was a group of athletes got together and did a Ruck ( running with a backpack on ) and handed out food to the homeless. In Pittsburgh we had about 6 runners and things didn't go as great as other cities but we still had a great time and were able hand out sandwiches to many people in need. The problem we ran into was each city had a leader and the leader was supposed to find a place where you could donate food too. Our leader didn't do much research so we kind of went on our run with no real plan. Other cities were finding places and handing out whole frozen turkey's. It was amazing to see what the other cities were doing. We were able to find a homeless shelter that let us hand out food to the men and women waiting to get rooms for the night.
The ORWC is once again doing this amazing day to help those in need.  It started with just 3 cities and in 1 day has already jumped to 7 or 8. Pittsburgh has yet to be added on the list, and I imagine is because no one has stepped up and said they would be the leader of the city. I am not sure if Pittsburgh will get on the list or not this year, but I am hoping it does. I even thought about telling them to add it and I would lead anyone who felt like doing it, but I am very busy at work right now and don't have the time to call places and see where we could donate to. I still would love to do something like this even if Pittsburgh does not get on the list. So if anyone has any idea's or wants to start our own type of event let me know and lets plan something. You don't have to be an obstacle racer in order to do this, and the idea is not to go out and run a 5 or 6 mile PR. The idea is to get a group of people together and have a nice run while running for a good cause.
If you want to check out the website and see if Pittsburgh gets added onto the list you can that here: http://ocrworldchampionships.com/rucksgiving/   If they do add Pittsburgh you can even sign up on the page.  Like I said this isn't just for obstacle racers this is for anyone who wants to get in a few miles while helping some people in need.

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