GoToVan photo
Vancouver Sun Run
By Perry Mack
I am not a runner. In 54 years of stumbling across the planet, I’ve run from a momma black bear on the trail with two cubs, and to the concession for a cold beer between periods watching junior hockey (and a couple times to the washroom when games go into overtime).
I’ve enjoyed a lot of sports but it was always with the wind, gravity, 2- or 4- stroke engines propelling me, often with spectacular-for-spectators results. My wife Cindy has similar aspirations when it comes to breathing hard – none. So when she suggested we join a running clinic I agreed, assuming our first night would be the blessed last. Yet here we are 12 weeks later and I am in a group of roughly 50,000 people about to run 10 km. You and I are both asking, ‘What happened?’
It started with the damned well-run running clinic. They made it so easy to start, and so easy to keep going. And I expect they are using the same trickery near you. We were divided into groups of our own choosing; the walk/learn-to-run groups, in either mostly walk or walk with some run, and the run stronger group.
We met Tuesdays, and prior to the run there was an informative/inspirational speaker demonstrating how not to get injured, why we could do this, and what gear we needed to get it done. Sometimes they gave us free stuff, food and liquor to lure us back. I was reminded of the lab rats in school – you only had to give them occasional reinforcement to get them to repeat a behavior. I felt I was growing whiskers, but I kept going.
Every run was different and we were given an easy to follow brochure of the run for the Tuesday clinic, and the two additional runs we were to do on our own, or preferably with others (to make me accountable). We started with walk/run intervals that gradually progressed with longer run portions. Every fourth week was a recovery week so the runs didn’t get harder.
We were always told it’s not a race it is an endurance run. Short steps, at your own pace however slow it is. More of a cha-cha than a run, I called it the prisoner shuffle.
Furthering the psychological indoctrination, group leaders ran with us on Tuesdays, talking to us to take our mind off the run, or providing encouraging words when you really wanted to stop. The routes changed and the distances increased, but alas we never ran past a Tim Horton’s or A&W. They also avoided cemeteries, which I felt was wise, as there were times I would have been happy to lay down for a long rest.
When Cindy and I began this journey, I fully expected to find myself at the side of a road on a weekly basis, coughing up a lung, grey matter leaking from my ears. I never did. In fact, my only discomfort came when my ego lured me into the run stronger group (twice), but I healed. Had I followed the program they laid out for me, I never would have had any issues.
So here I stand in the Vancouver Sun Run, with my wife and fellow 50,000, on a cool morning on Georgia Street. Ready to run ten kilometres when two would have been a feat three months ago. How did I get here? Just a little bit at a time, and so can you.