Virtual Race Journal Product Review
Guys & Gals, I am so excited to write this post. Recently, with Covid-19, the Sloth and I have been participating in Virtual Races this year to keep ourselves motivated and active. We’ve found that these Virtual Races may be slightly addictive though, just a little forewarning.
We’ve now signed up for so many, that’ we’ve had some trouble keeping track of them all! But now we’re proud to announce the creation of our very own Virtual Race Journal!
Our Races
The first race we did together that we earned was the Best Damn Race Florida Challenge. On this one, we won FIRST place! We did a team challenge on that one instead of doing individual times. Beck and I destroyed our competition and won ourselves a 1st place medal! For both of us, it was the first time we won first place at anything. How motivating is that?!
So anyway, Beck and I were both trying different methods of keeping track of our races and our progress on each. It was a mess, let me tell ya. I had random pieces of paper in various locations of the house with incomplete race information. It was crazy. One night, we sat down and started talking about what we would want in a tracker and we created our own little virtual race journal for our virtual races!
In an effort to be transparent to our visitors, please understand that we get small commissions from purchases made through the links in this article. Please review our full disclosure at the very top left side of this site, next to the date.
The Virtual Race Journal
The journal is a paperback book that you can purchase here on Amazon. Inside, you can log 25 different races.
We have several different journal covers that we published, but the guts of the journal are exactly the same.
There are four primary sections for each of the 25 races within the virtual race journal.
They are:
- Race Information
- Activity Log
- Personal Information
- Workout Tunes
Race Information
The Race Information section allows us to document the name of the race, the website where you registered, the date you registered, the Facebook page, the referral link, the fee, the distance, race gear, race difficulty, user friendliness, interactive features, days to post stats, what you liked, what you didn’t like, what you rate the race, and a conversion chart for miles to kilometers.
I’ve found that for the websites that basically just sell you medals, there are some parts of this section that just aren’t applicable, such as days to post stats. Some of these sites don’t even give you a place to put your times in at all, so you’re essentially just purchasing the medal for yourself. In these cases, I just note that in the appropriate spots and cross out or put N/A in the sections I don’t use for that race.
In an effort to be transparent to our visitors, please understand that we get small commissions from purchases made through the links in this article. Please review our full disclosure at the very top left side of this site, next to the date.
Activity Log
The Activity Log section allows us to document the date we worked out, the activity we performed, start steps, end steps, total steps, duration, and distance in miles and/or kilometers. I actually do track how many steps I take during each workout because I try different workouts and I like to see which ones push me harder. I do this by comparing my step counts and my workout durations.
That said, there are some races where I didn’t track specific step counts because they were longer races that took the full year to complete and there just isn’t enough space to journal each individual workout in those cases. Sometimes I’ve even used white out tape to relabel the columns in this section as needed.
In an effort to be transparent to our visitors, please understand that we get small commissions from purchases made through the links in this article. Please review our full disclosure at the very top left side of this site, next to the date.
Personal Information
The Personal Information section provides space to document the race number, bib number, date completed, pace, finish time, biggest motivators, biggest de-motivators, music that motivated you (or just a small journal spot), race bucket list check boxes, primary activity, number of workouts completed, total miles completed, total kilometers completed, first achievement, next planned race, and music service used.
This section is fairly self explanatory, you fill it out mostly after the race to document what you achieved during the race. The race bucket list includes: Invited a friend, Too Sore the Next Day, Personal Record, Ran the Entire Race, Made a New Friend, Started too Fast, Beat My Personal Best, Cried, Hit “the wall”, Earned a Battle Wound, Had an Epiphany, Sprinted to the Finish, and Swore off Races.
The main thing I’d like to note about this section is that I use the Music that Motivates Me box as a personal journal for each race. I may even update this box in future releases of our virtual race journal if you guys find it to be more useful as a journal section. I’ve found that the Music that Motivates Me section is really just a duplication of the Workout Tunes section on pretty much every race. So it makes more sense for me to use it as a Journal section. But that may not apply to everybody.
In an effort to be transparent to our visitors, please understand that we get small commissions from purchases made through the links in this article. Please review our full disclosure at the very top left side of this site, next to the date.
Workout Tunes
This section provides a space to put which playlist you listened to while working out and sixty spaces to write down specific songs and artists that kept you motivated.
There’s not much more to say on this section, it is literally just a page to document the songs that were most motivating for you during the race.
In an effort to be transparent to our visitors, please understand that we get small commissions from purchases made through the links in this article. Please review our full disclosure at the very top left side of this site, next to the date.
Comparison
Before creating this virtual race journal, we did some searching to find a journal or diary that fit our needs. I found only one journal that came close. It was a pocket sized marathon journal. It looked to be intended for actual marathons where you go in person and didn’t fit exactly what we needed. I also didn’t want anything so small.
We did create two different versions of the journal. There are the paperback version you can purchase on Amazon and the printable version you can purchase on Etsy. I did this because I know many people use printable planners and may want to add some of the activity logs and such to their planners.
Price
The Marathon Journal that I found were $9.99. I made sure to keep the price of our journals less than $10 to keep them affordable.
Our Virtual Race Journal ranges from $6.99 to $8.99, depending on the design, from Amazon. The printable copies on Etsy cost only $4.00.
I definitely think the price range on these are fair and competitive. If you have trouble keeping up with your virtual races, definitely consider investing in one of these journals!
Summary
Overall, I think our journal is absolutely the best. Mainly because I’m biased but also because I haven’t been able to find another one like it! Hey… at least I’m honest!
Seriously though, I’ve already filled one of these journals up with my races from this year. I’ve also already started my journal for 2021. It will probably fill up just as fast! I would love if you tried it out and let us know what you would change. Do you think I should change the Music that Motivated Me section to just a Journal spot? What do you love about it and what don’t you love about it?
Please do let me know what you think of it in the comments below.
~Ki
In an effort to be transparent to our visitors, please understand that we get small commissions from purchases made through the links in this article. Please review our full disclosure at the very top left side of this site, next to the date.