Blog numbers (thoughts on a New Year!)

Year-end reflections are commonplace as we (try to) blend seamlessly from 2023 into 2024, so I’ll add to the pile of such things with this post. For those of you reading this here, thank you for continuing to follow the Marist Running blog. I started this blog way back in 2007 – which, at the time, was the height of the blog craze.
 
Now, as we enter 2024, blogs seem like a quaint relic from another era – “so 2000s”. Sure, they still exist, but there are many more modern ways to disseminate information (usually involving videos, or other forms of social media). And yet, I plunder along … but apparently, not as frequently as I once did. A quick glance at this blog’s numbers reveals that 2023 had the fewest number of posts for a full year since this blog started (not counting 2007, which was a partial year). In its heyday (numerically, that would be from 2010 through 2019), there were a few years with more than 400 posts – an average of more than one post a day! Now, there is less than half the number of posts. It is what it is, but we’ll posit a few explanations (along with a shameless, personal plug):
 
Part of that is because my writing energy is splintered with the start of my Substack running column, which replaced my now-shuttered Poughkeepsie Journal running column (which was unceremoniously discontinued by Dutchess County’s Finest Daily Newspaper in December 2022). Since the Substack newsletter is subscription-based, I have put more time and energy into that this past year – oddly and ironically, far more time and effort than I did with my Pok Journal column! If you have subscribed to that Substack, I greatly appreciate your support. If not, please consider checking it out and subscribing at the very fair rate of $30 per year – with about 120 posts in 2023, that averages out to a mere 25 cents per post! Yes, I’m very well aware that you can stay here at Marist Running for FREE … but any support of my (other) writing efforts are appreciated. Go to petecolaizzo.substack.com to subscribe. Thank you for allowing another shameless plug.
 
Back to the year-end thoughts: Yes, I will continue to post here at Marist Running. Yes, part of the fewer-posts thing has to do with the Substack, which I hope to maintain and even expand in 2024. And yes, part of the fewer posts is just the natural progression of time. Another year means another year older (I turn 60 in 2024!) and after 33 years of coaching, the gears grind a little slower with each ensuing year. So again, thanks for sticking with this blog and thanks for your patience at the sometimes-seemingly-interminable lapses between posts. Marist Running will continue to be a record-keeping outlet for team news and especially for results, although the details of the results may be more bare-bones than in the past – most results links include splits now, so it seems redundant to re-type them all here … again, I’m getting old!
 
The “team news” aspect of this blog may be centered more around the plans for our much-anticipated track and turf project at NorthField. Yes, we’ll be actively soliciting donations to the cause – here’s a link for you to donate right now if you want! – but we’re also striving for more “alumni engagement” in 2024. We want to get our alumni base excited about this project, for sure, and in the process try to forge connections among the many generations of Marist Running. And really when you get right down to it, “alumni engagement” is about more than generating excitement for the new track; it’s about generating excitement for our current Running Red Foxes track and cross country teams.
 
So there you have it, an end-of-year ramble from Marist Running: A place where we specialize in rambling, run-on sentences, and have for the past two decades. Neat! On to (20)24!