The Canada Day Spud Run is ten kilometres long but in my mind I covered several hundred. Our course marshal led us across the highway to the start and already my thoughts began roaming as they took me back to a few early mornings running various trails behind this same woman. As we rounded the corner at … Continue reading Spud Run Rambles
Location, location, location: In running, as in real estate, it’s all about location -- well, that and a few other details but as I started my most recent trail race, I thought, “If I go far enough, long enough and big enough, I just might win my age category.” This idea occurred to me when I … Continue reading Choose Your Trophies
Way to go/looking good/running strong/you got this/you rock/keep up the good work: so many phrases meant to boost the spirits of runners have often had a disheartening effect on me. It has become part of my training routine to learn to accept the boost that others might offer through their well meaning comments. No doubt … Continue reading Words of Encouragement
I ignored the first black glove but the second one required intervention-I scooped it up and went back for its mate, only to discover that they were not a pair. The almost fully composed posting for the community forum, reuniting some snowmobiler with a favourite, perhaps only pair of gloves, tumbled from the page I … Continue reading Lost and Found
My friends and I were running through the mossy woods, trending up towards the paraglide launch and catching up on each other’s lives when the incline allowed. In the back of my mind was an image: a spiral of moss captured in ice, seemingly lit from within. I had been wondering for days how I … Continue reading Ice, moss and meditations on impermanence with Connie Sobchak
I’ve been thinking of being last. Not planning on it, just ending up in that position. There’s a trail run coming up in Whistler and I had considered entering until I really thought about the speedy, tough field of runners who would likely enter. I told my friends that I was not ready to come … Continue reading Last
This was the year it all came together just right. I knew what the marathon distance felt like, I’d run the course before and I had committed solidly to training. My running buddies and I had covered the distance and then some. I was forty and had three marathons under my belt. It seemed like … Continue reading The Year I Won at the Portland Marathon
When I first started running, I definitely did not classify myself as a runner. In my narrow mind, the only narrow thing about me, a runner was lean and mean and somewhat obsessive. My friend Kathy fit that image, and she felt that I should reap the benefits of running too, so she asked me … Continue reading How I learned to call myself a Runner
The Wellness Almanac 