Seven days until a 100km

Last night I got home at about 1am after working the late shift at the Vancouver Sun. By that time I have usually been asleep for two hours already, so I felt tired this morning when I woke up at about 8:15am.

However, meeting my neigbour and her dog for a run was good enough a reason to get up. We recently started running together along the local trails, and we enjoy it just as much as our dogs do.

We decided on a loop that takes us along trails from our area of Valleycliffe to Quest University then along the golf course and the pool back home for a great 90-minute loop on a spectacular autumn morning. I hadn't planned on going for longer than an hour but it was well worth it.

As I checked the Haney to Harrison website I found the 100km start list which to my surprise only has 17 people, including me. Last year there were 37. Hopefully a few more names will be added to the list this week, though registration has closed.

The list of relay teams looks huge, which is fantastic. I look forward to company along the way. The earliest start time for the relay runners is 6am, so two hours after the start of the solo runners.

In the afternoon I worked on my list of 100 reasons to run 100km, which I began compiling in the past four days, aiming to come up with 10 each day until race day. My goal is to write one book page for each one.

I am on schedule, with 40 pages filled with one reason each for a total of a little over 9100 words. Six more days to go, so 60 more reasons to write. Running is such a natural part of my life that it has been interesting to write down all the motivation I can think of.

Tomorrow I am heading to Vancouver to pick up my race package at the Running Room. I also hope to drop by the Vancouver Library to see if I can pick up some new ultrarunning books to read this week.

Other than that, Tim and I also would like to drop in at the opening party of the Vancouver chapter to National Novel Writing Month which begins on Nov. 1. The idea is to write a first draft for a novel in one month, by creating at least 50,000 word. I signed up, and encouraged Tim to do so as well.