As you may well know by now, one of my great passions is personal finance. I love building lifelong streams of income that will take care of me even when I no longer work myself.
What you may not know about me is that I also love running. It has become, over the past few years, one of my great passions. Just over two years ago I picked up the sport on a more serious basis and ran my first half-marathon in April 2013. Since that time I have run two full marathons and accumulated a total of four half-marathons including running the Ottawa Army Run just yesterday. My girlfriend is a runner as well and did the race with me yesterday. We had a good time walking around in Ottawa and snapping pictures and enjoying some quality dining.
I always love running the Army Run as it features Canada’s military, including many ill or injured soldiers who take on the course. It is a great motivation to see the people who defend this nation and all that they often have to sacrifice to do so. I am forever grateful for the work they do each and every day.
As for my race, I set a goal of under 1h40m and my chip clocked in officially at 1h38m57s. Beating my goal time by over a minute feels good.
I believe one of the great things about running which appeals to me is that you get out of it what you put in. If you train intelligently and fuel your body with the proper nutrition in the weeks leading up, there’s a good chance you will achieve results you can be proud of. The obvious corollary to this in personal finance is that long-term financial success is not achieved by cutting corners and gambling without doing research on one big stock. Results are best achieved by steady accumulation over a sustained period of time.
Fitness success builds upon steady gains. Working out regularly and staying away from greasy, unhealthy foods, allows the body to work itself into peak form. A portfolio grows as dividends are reinvested over time.
Long distance running is my favourite type as it requires an extra level of grit relative to shorter distances. In a full marathon, for instance, most people will be out there for over three hours grinding it out. Challenges abound over the course of 42.2km (26.2 miles). There is a huge amount of time for something to go wrong and all a person can do once they’re running the race is to trust their preparation and keep their mind strong. This is the same process we go through as dividend growth investors; we do our research, put the hours in ahead of time, and then trust that the process will deliver results. It is an absolutely beautiful thing when it all comes together in the end.
I would like to share some pictures from this past weekend with all of you:
There were crowds everywhere we went throughout the exhibition. The Army Run had 14,500 registrants (sold out) in the 5k run and another 10,000 or so runners in the half-marathon event.
The cannon (left) used to signal the start of the race.
I have a bit of a thing for taking pictures of banks. Here we see Bank of Nova Scotia (BNS) and CIBC (CM) located side by side.
A big thank you to the sponsors. Bank of Montreal (BMO) even set up a portable ATM!
The Supreme Court of Canada is undergoing some renovations. I was considering taking some pictures of the Parliament buildings for this post but decided against it since virtually the entire building is covered in scaffolding as it is also under construction.
Last, but certainly not least, we stopped in at a “Les 3 Brasseurs” location for a bite to eat in the afternoon. Race or no race, if you are eating a restaurant that brews its own beer, a drink is all but mandatory. Have to say I enjoyed it!
Thank you for reading about my race weekend!
– Ryan
Full Disclosure: Long BNS and CM