New Year’s resolutions, whatever…
In 2012, just like the years before and the ones to come,
most will watch while a few will act,
some will judge while others will listen,
believers will pray and non believers will have faith in themselves
dreamers will hope for good while doers will make it happen,
some people will lie to protect and other will tell the truth to hurt
Bottom line is people are people, haters will hate and lovers will love.
One sure thing is that runners are Good People, and in 2012 again, they will run!
So all I know is that like many of you I can already say that in 2012, I am a runner. For the rest, regardless of resolutions, only time will tell us…
All smiles
Martin
GoodPeopleRun’s mission
After we got questions about it, here is a preview of what GoodPeopleRun aims to offer you, runners:
GoodPeopleRun currently allows you, runners, to find the nearest like minded people to share your passion for running.
Overtime though, we aim to offer you a single personal profile from which you can deal with your entire running activity:
- find, interact, join runners and local communities
- organize, upload and share your runs
- find, create, share your knowledge about running, injuries, nutrition, gear and your race reports.
- find, signup and get the results for your races
We hope this matches your expectations and feel free to send us your questions or suggestions at contact [at] goodpeoplerun [dot] com, after all this is your future platform that we’re working on!
— Martin GAFFURI
Et si tout commençait là…
Dear Runners, Friends, Dear GoodPeople,
Long time ago, I ran my first XC race. It was a cold rainy day of winter, I was scared. At the first turn after the starting line another kid stepped on my shoe. I lost it, fell on the rocky muddy ground and cut my knee open. I managed to finish the race with one shoe undone and a bleeding knee, I was 7 years old.
Against all expectations, this still remains one of the best memories I have about racing. Despite the fall, injury and position, my parents, close friends, coach and fellow runners were all there to cheer me up and teach me how to get back on my feet, literally, and stay motivated for the next races to come.
Firsts rarely go as planned in life, but as long as you are supported by the right people, your motivation and passion for the right things will never vanish, and you’ll get better and better along the way.
Two years ago, I took this insane bet that I could gather all the Good People of the world around one passion: RUNNING. I have thrown myself into it full swing, leaving everything behind. I have made mistakes, fell hard, been slapped in the face, taken countless “no”s, yet I learned from all of them. This hasn’t been fun everyday, but deep inside I still have a strong faith in the success of that project, because once again I am well surrounded by three dedicated and qualified friends.
In this quest to make GoodPeopleRun come true, I got the chance to meet you all. And for those encounters only, I am grateful already. You have been running partners, colleagues, advisors, friends and competitors who have all positively contributed to make this project, a better one.
Today, tuesday August 2nd, we publicly release GoodPeopleRun. I must admit I am anxious and scared like I was in the starting area of my first XC race. Only one thing has changed and gives me hope that this first time won’t be as painful. You, you all who stand by my side to help me give the ultimate push that will allow GoodPeopleRun to grow successfully.
If you didn’t get an Email, you can start registering here and become part of the GoodPeople.
We have given our best and put our hearts in it, and with your help and comments, we’ll keep improving it so we can all do what Good People do best. Run together.
Humbly yours,
Martin
After the last post about an article on GoodPeopleRun published in France, disclosing some of the closest partners we are working together with, the word is out. So we figured we better off say it out loud, because that’s exciting news!
French entrepreneur Carlos DIAZ, pioneer within the Web industries of the late 90’s with blueKiwi Software is now officially part of our board of advisors.
Beside his established experience in web social applications, Carlos will assist us in both with the go to market strategy and the fundraising part.
His past experiences in those fields, as well as the professional and personal network he has developed here in the Valley over the past year and a half are as many assets that will add value and credibility to GoodPeopleRun.
Carlos, welcome. We’re psyched to have you on board and hope you’ll enjoy the ride, well… the run!
— The Entreprunners
Martin, Jean and Ed
Suite au dernier post relatif à l’article au sujet de notre projet, et plus notamment des personnes qui nous accompagnent sur ce projet, la nouvelle est sortie alors autant effectuer les présentations en bonne et due forme.
Carlos DIAZ, pionnier français de l’industrie Internet et co-fondateur de blueKiwi Software, fait désormais partie de notre “Board of Advisors”. Il nous apporte ses compétences dans la stratégie de lancement ainsi que sur la préparation d’une future levée de fonds.
Son expérience en création d’entreprise et levée de fonds, ainsi que le réseau qu’il a développé dans la Silicon Valley depuis plus d’un an sont autant d’atouts qui viennent renforcer le potentiel et la crédibilité de GoodPeopleRun.
Carlos, bienvenue au sein de l’équipe, c’est un plaisir de pouvoir bosser avec toi.
— La Team EntrepRUNNER
Dear users,
We just wanted to give you a heads up about GoodPeopleRun as there’s been a slight persisting bug.
When you’ll connect onto your profile, your reaction might sound like “Holly sh…! My feed activity is all gone!”
Well, calm down, breathe and smile, we have it under control :-)
Your beloved comments are not very far. Right now, the best way to get them back is to post an additional one. This way, just like magic, they’ll all appear again, ahhh.
“So why that bug then?” Well, we have uploaded a new version of GoodPeopleRun !
Indeed, after a lot of feedback with the same request, we have decided to address that one: you now have a way to track your workouts. We wanted to keep it simple so we focused on the distance, again thanks to your feedback.
Here are the figures you can now visualize:
- Average distance ran per month/week
- Average number of workouts per week
- History of the distance ran since the beginning of the week/month/year.
We hope you’ll like this new feature and please let us know if there is anything you would like to see added or changed. Because after all GoodPeopleRun is for YOU!
Thanks.
— Martin
Light at the end of the tunnel
When there is nothing you can do about a bad situation, don’t let it bother you. Breath, step back and look at it from a distance. You will find opportunities out of it.
If you focus on the right things, you will always have the ability to make good things happen.
Friday night, 11.30pm another week is ending and I can’t help but having this bitter feeling coming back up to me… GoodPeopleRun.com is still not online.
I can’t complain tough. I know development is going as fast as possible and we’re beta testing the version 1.0.4 already. But still…
When you are injured and can’t run, you have no other option but to rest. So you watch fellow running friends accomplish great things to get inspiration for when you’ll be back. Most important, you plan ahead for when you’ll be able to run again.
What would crying and whining would do anyways ?
So I committed to do it with work as well, no matter what. Smile on my face and full confidence in GPR’s potential, I would give my best to perform. And when you least expect it, incredible things happen… here we go:
Last week: new sponsorship with a running specialty store.
Wednesday, December 15th, as I was officially admitted as Lauréat of the Réseau Entreprendre en Haute Savoie
Thursday, December 16th, major happening for GPR !
— Martin
Good things happen to good people !
Thursday, December 16, 6.00pm
I attended the “conviviales night” organized by the Réseau Entreprendre en Haute Savoie, yes another event but who would complain about too much activity within a network ?!!
As a newbie that was my first proper blending with the professionals and entrepreneurs from this network, very exciting. At some point, a person came to me. He knew about GPR and asked me if I could help him out and share my knowledge of the sports industry with him. Sure ! That’s what being part of a network is all about, right ?!!
But as he explained his activity, I quickly realized something big was happening… let me re-phrase that, something HUGE was happening right there in front of me as I stood with a pice of chocolate cake in one hand and sparkling water in the other one. While he was still talking, my brain was already away, overclocked from eveluating all the opportunities, options, actions to take to make it happen with this guy. It took me a good minute to get my thoughts together and I simply asked: “this is very interesting, when can we meet to discuss this further ?”
I won’t disclose more about it right now but this is how I could best describe it:
You’re a runner and you know you’re competitive and train for a big event. At some point a person comes to you to talk about your passion for running. As the convesation unfolds, you realize he is the global sponsorship manager for the best running brand in the world and says: “hey by the way, would you like to have a full sponsorship with us ?” To be completely honnest with you, this methephore is still an understatement…
Find the best running equipement in the world, check !
I am meeting with the guy tomorrow to figure out how we can pull this off. When this shall come to life on GPR, I don’t want to raise your expectations too high but this might blow your running socks off !
— Martin
