My toughest run of 2018 happened last week. Not because of the distance or the weather. My body felt great, and I’d gotten more than 8 hours of sleep the night before. Mentally I felt good too. My running path wasn’t new to me, and there was plenty of water to drink along the way.

It was tough because I could not, at any point of the 80-minute experience, find a reason to get excited about the run.