If you did not notice this past week following the state meet that the site was pretty inactive and dormant on the front page of flrunners.com as well as our social media accounts. It was due in part to being the start of a 3 month paid sabbatical was awarded by MileSplit's parent company FloSports at a company convention this past December to myself, Brandon Miles, as not only the state editor for the state of Florida for the last two plus years but an milestone award bestowed upon me for actually 21 years working for MileSplit since June of 2001 including full-time for since December of 2005.
I've actually worked longer for MileSplit than any individually presently or in the past including the site's founder as well as the flrunners.com creator in Jason Byrne, so the resident "OG" of MileSplit might be an understatement in my title. I was blown away by giving such a generous award with such strings attached, but also conflicted cause knew how year around the sport has become to actually take a lengthy break when needed to be accessible for the community almost 24/7 year around.
So while many have seen my borderline unhealthy grind and hectic work schedule and travel locally all over the state of Florida on a weekly and almost daily basis for the last few years, the tread on these tires long precedes my move to Florida and position change as was the state editor for my home state of Virginia from 2001 to 2013, national editor from 2014 to 2015, various roles from 2016 to 2021 including state editor of Maryland and producing live events and managing numerous states across the country.
The forced hard break mentally and physically from my career that I'm so deeply passionate about is welcome and needed to recharge to hopefully a long-term and highly motivated next 20 plus years in my role covering the sport of Florida high school cross country and track & field. I have thoroughly enjoyed my time in Florida and even though I have lived here only 26 months feel like I was born to be a "Florida man" to work in this great and talented community and enjoy life here.
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While I can still be contacted for urgent matters that I might only be able to address by email and those that have my cell phone number, we do have a customer support team can reach here as well that can address a lot of questions or requests during my absence and would be preferred to reach out that way instead of contacting me. A workaholic like myself needs to create some barriers for the temptation to not just jump right back into the action.
I'll be ready to roll come the 2023 cross country season in mid-August (sabbatical officially ends on August 15th, 2023). Thanks for your understanding in advance if the site updates and content producing during this offseason in the summer of 2023 might be lighter than years past and definitely will be in comparison to the off-seasons to come. Hopefully some of my co-workers will be able to pick up the slack and fill in adequately during my absence during the next 12 weeks.
Thank you all for allowing me to cover this sport that I love, especially paying subscribers to the site as you are what makes this engine run with the budget to provide the level of coverage and contributors across all corners of the state at so many meets during all 3 seasons of cross country, indoor, and outdoor track.
Sincerely,
Brandon Miles
Florida Site Editor, MileSplit.com