In Vancouver the Sun Run is a strong part of the city’s culture. Not just because it has a big proportion of joggers. Not just because tens of thousands participate, though that’s part of it. Everyone talks about it too.
When you go downtown the morning of the race, everyone is in running gear. People are in the coffee shop in reflective windbreaker and New Balance shoes or a lulu running skirt and a pink Descente zip. It is like a strange world made up of only jogging enthusiasts. There aren’t any cars around either because they can’t get past the race route.
When I picked up the paper with the race results and reports. Oh yeah, just a note about the Vancouver Sun Run. It’s not primarily named after Sol the star at centre of the solar system. It’s named after a newspaper that sponsors it. Also, that newspaper it is named after is not the the Sun newspapers in other cities.
So, when I got the paper, the clerk pointed to a dot in the thousands of people in the start line photo on the cover and said that’s me. I would have done the same, but I didn’t appear in the photo. I was there though.
The elderly lady behind me told us that she saw the runners and there were so many and it’s a great event. Later that morning people at the south terminal were talking about it.
It is kind of a big deal around here.
Just after I ran the Sun Run in 2005, I moved back to Ontario. In Vancouver everyone I knew was preparing for the run in a pretty intensive way.
When I got here they were advertising I think the Around the Bay run in Toronto. The ads showed a cartoon character going for a run, having pang of pain and thinking “I shouldn’t have had that extra bagel,” or “I should’ve gone for a run that night instead of staying in.”
I feel like it says lots about how different the culture of the two cities is.
Comment by Magda — Wed 23 April 2008; 113 @ 21:24