7 Stats That’ll Make You Proud to Be a Runner in Vancouver

The Vancouver Sun Run takes place this weekend—are you ready to go the distance?

Hear that pitter-patter in the dawn and dusk? That’s the sound of 42,000 people hitting the streets to train for the 34th annual Sun Run on April 22. As they work on their lung capacity, we take a look at other ways Vancouver’s fit folk are pounding the pavement.

1. Participation in B.C. ultramarathons increased 27 percent in 2017; altogether, 2,536 people finished a 50K+ race in the province last year.

2. Overall participation in running races was down 7 percent across the province in 2017, partly due to fire- and snow-related cancellations.

3. Runguides.com lists 147 running races across the Lower Mainland this year, together totalling more than 2,296 kilometres.

4. Want a foam party to go with your runner’s high? A 5K in Abbotsford this June features 2.5 million cubic feet of suds.

5. 11 percent of Vancouverites in a 2015 StatsCan survey were runners, compared with 23 percent who hiked and 25 percent who biked. Twenty percent, meanwhile, did nothing.

6. 15 km: That’s the longest—and most popular—route at City Running Tours, a new company that combines sweat and side stitches with guided tours of Vancouver neighbourhoods.

7. 159,575 runners finished races across the province in 2017.