Latest / 12 Months to Marathon / Episode 109 - Is the Running Boom Bad for Running?

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Episode 109 - Is the Running Boom Bad for Running? · 12 Months to Marathon

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Hello, and welcome to the 12 months to marathon podcast.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: You're me, John Hill, the running podcast for the over 35s with Marathon Dreams.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: Episode 109.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: Is the running boom actually bad for running?
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: So, what's going on with me at the moment?
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I'm still training for high rocks as we speak.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and it's going well.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: It's going very, very well at the moment.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: Things are coming together nicely, uh, fitting together all the elements of that, which is good for me.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, as I record this, we're coming towards the end of August as well.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: So people will have to start really thinking about maybe definitely autumn or winter marathon training plans, but I would certainly have one eye on the spring as we head into the end of the year, because it can be a little bit distracting with everything that goes on for us to sort of fall off a bit and then try to pick it back up again in the new year, which is always a challenge.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: Now, what I want to talk about based on that is the running boom.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: And there is actually a running boom, and if we just go off the London marathon alone, obviously I'm based in the UK, so that's the one that's the most local to myself in terms of the majors, anyway.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: And we look at the numbers of the London Marathon ballot, 1.3 million applied in 20 for 2027s.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, this they applied this year.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: And to put that into context, if you haven't listened to my previous podcast, I spoke about when I first applied for the London Marathon Ballot, which was 2015, which was a year after I did it for a charity, there was 140,000 people that applied for the ballot back then.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: So you can do the maths on that one in terms of the increase.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: And across the board, um, there is an increase in the number of people taking up running.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: So this may seem a bit of a silly question coming from a running coach, but I think it's worth discussing.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: Now, before anyone gets angry with me, I'm not saying that fewer people should run, quite the opposite.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I mean, I've spent most of my career, um, particularly the last 17-so years, trying to help people get fitter, healthier, and more active.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: I obviously, and I obviously want more people running.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the main reasons why I want more people running is just because I have seen what it's done for me, not only physically, of course, and mentally, but also from an um a community standpoint.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I've met some fantastic people, uh, I've I've made some online friends, as it were, uh, and I've met some really incredible people doing this podcast as well.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: So I think yes, more people running is a good thing, but I want to talk about a specific thing that happened recently, which you may have seen, uh, which I kind of gives us a little bit of a warning, I guess.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I want to explore that now.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: So, Parkrun.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: If you don't know what Parkrun is, then well done.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but yeah, Parkrun is now sort of a global phenomenon.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: I myself personally, I flirted with it for a couple of years, many, many years ago, when um when I never had kids and I had different sort of things going on, uh, particularly on a Saturday morning, so I was able to do it.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I haven't done Parkrun for a while.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: If you don't know what Parkrun is, it's a 5k run, Rando Park, including the title, and they are they do them all over the world now.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: It originally started, I think, in London.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I can't remember how many years ago, it's a good few years ago, it might be even 20 plus years ago, but I'm not sure.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, recently at one in Weymouth, which is in the UK, uh, they announced they were suspending it for two weeks.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't anything to do with the weather, because of course it has been very hot in the UK for the in terms of the UK and very dry.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: But it wasn't a problem with the weather, it wasn't the course actually, and it wasn't nobody turning up.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: It was in essence because too many people turned up.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: So numbers had increased significantly over the summer, with more than 500 people attending regularly and nearly 600 completing one particular Saturday.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: Something was happening which was quite concerning the organisers, and that basically was there were people trying to overtake other people on narrow sections, and there wasn't enough room.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: So people were being barged, people were being tripped, and also members of the public were being affected as well.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: And there were complaints about some faster runners becoming frustrated with slower runners getting in their way.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: So the event organizers said effectively we need to stop for a couple of weeks, and I find that fascinating.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: Now, personally, I've got some views on this.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's a very tricky one because I have been at park runs, particularly at my low local-ish ones, quite a few in Birmingham where I'm from in the UK, but there's one at a park called Cannon Hill Park, which is quite a big park just outside of Birmingham, not far from Edge Baston Cricket Ground.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: If well I say not far, it's opposite Edge Baston Cricket Ground for those of you who know cricket and know Edge Baston, it's opposite there, and it's quite a big one.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: And there's been up to a thousand people at that one.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I've been there when there's been six or seven hundred, so it's quite a big event.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so of course that comes with challenges.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: There's another challenge which up which is the fact that sometimes in race environments, I have seen it where slower runners have put themselves in the wrong wave, and they've been walking, say, after a you know, a mile or whatever it might be or a kilometre.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this is not a judgment on people walking during a race because you've got to do what you've got to do, but that's a safety issue.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're in a faster wave, you accidentally put yourself in a faster wave and have to walk, and there are maybe tighter bits of the course, then again that's a safety which fits into the next bit, which is sometimes for races, it's very difficult to organise, you know, an entire route without there potentially being any bottlenecks or tight corners.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: I've done many, many races where and big races as well, where there have been sort of tighter corners or bottlenecks.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're trying to get out and get a pace and go for, say, a PB, then of course you're naturally having to run maybe a little bit faster, and that means that you're a little bit more quote unquote focused.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: If somebody potentially has to run walk because maybe they're a newer runner, they perhaps haven't got that maybe PB focus yet, as it were.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: And when I say PB, I mean a faster, faster PB.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: Of course, everything's a PB first time out.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: What I'm saying is there are there is a clear difference in the goals between somebody who's going quite fast in a race and somebody who isn't, and that's just the way it is.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: And that's no judgment on the individual because we've all got to do what we've got to do.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: So the growth of running, of course, has been a good thing.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: We look at Parker in itself, it actually started in 2004 in Bushy Park.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: 13 runners, five volunteers, that's it.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: And now there are thousands of locations all over the world.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: Millions of people have registered.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: There are runners, walkers, children, older adults, buggies, people coming back from illness, people doing the first 5k.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: It is an incredible event.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: All the ones I've done have been incredible.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: And then we look beyond parkrun.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: We've got running clubs everywhere, we've got running crews everywhere.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: I've done a podcast with um Lucy on here who does running tours.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: Marathon ballots are getting ridiculous, like we've said.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: London's enormous, all the others enormous.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: Running content has exploded on social media.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: I would never have dreamed of having the following that I've got on the platform that I've got if it wasn't for running.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: There's more shoe running trainers and shoes than ever before.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: People are traveling all over the world to races.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: People who perhaps wouldn't previously have considered themselves runners are getting involved in big marathons.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's all great, it's all fantastic.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: But there's one question we probably need to ask, which is can the infrastructure of running cope with the popularity of it?
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: Because those are two different things.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: Now, parkrun is a perfect example.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: Parkrun demonstrates the problem perfectly.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: The beauty of parkrun is exclusivity.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's free, you don't have to be fast, you don't even technically have to run it, you can walk it.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: And when I've spoken to people about getting involved in parkrun in the past, I've always said to them, look, you'll go there and you'll think it'll be like everybody doing 16-minute 5Ks and then you at the back.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's not like that.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: The majority of people who have done parkour are quote unquote normal.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I've also marshalled there very many years ago, and it was really, really good fun.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: And you see some incredible things and very encouraging things.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: So everybody though has got the right to be there.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: So because it's a free event and it's inclusive, what we can't do, and this probably might be another podcast on itself, and something I've noticed myself, is that there is an increase in running gatekeeping, but not only from quote unquote faster runners, I've also noticed that there is an increase in slow running snobbery as well.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: And what I mean by that is that people thinking that they can criticize faster runners, which is just for me, is as bad as people criticizing slower runners.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: Runners are runners at the end of the day, and we shouldn't be criticizing anybody.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: And the weird thing, there's a couple of weird things.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: The first weird thing is that if you're gonna start out, well, you've got to start somewhere.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: We all have to start somewhere.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_00: And if you start out at a particular pace, that's gonna potentially be slower than somebody else, and then eventually you'll get better, and then you make a decision on which way you want this journey to go.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: I always say to people, Tom, this journey is yours, and it can look however you want.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: You don't have to be anything.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: The problem is when we get neurotic and start beating ourselves up, and I've been there, trust me.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I look at people who are in a similar peer group to me and think, why am I not as fast as them?
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I've actually got it's sometimes you've got to reassess your goals to say, what am I actually trying to achieve here?
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: Because let's say you do three slow quote unquote, whatever that means, five Ks per week, and somebody annoys you on social media, and then you stop.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: Well, the the what you've done there is stopped a level of consistency, and consistency always wins.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: So we should never stop based on what we think the expectations should be.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, that's a bit of a tangent.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: Back to Parkrun.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: So Parkwan's own code of conduct is very clear, and it talks about respecting everybody's right to participate.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: That's the whole point.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: But that creates an interesting situation where you've potentially got five or six hundred people using a route that potentially isn't designed for that many people.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: Now, the thing about Cannon Hill, like I mentioned, the bigger ones that can cope with that many people because it's a big, big park.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: Some of them can't.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah?
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: Now you look with that, like I've said, you've got loads of different types of people doing that.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: You've got people trying to do sub 17 minutes, you've got people trying to run sub 25, you've got people doing the first 5k, you've got walkers, you've got children, you've got boogies, and potentially you've got members of the public as well.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: Common sense has to enter the equation, which brings me back to gatekeeping because faster runners aren't more important, okay?
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: If you're a faster runner, your personal best is not more important than somebody else's safety.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: I was a I was when I used to do one-to-one personal training, I used to train in a park and I saw a parkrun and I saw somebody say to a dog walker, get out of the swear word way.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, they were a park runner.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: Now that parkrun, whether they're doing a 30-minute 5k or a 15-minute 5k, has no right to say that to anybody.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_00: On the flip side, I understand wanting to get a PB.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: I did my first sub 20-minute 5k at parkrun.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: It's great.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I understand that thought of I am doing it in this controlled environment to hit a particular pace.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely go for it.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: But if you reach a narrow section and there isn't room to overtake safely, faster runners don't have a special entitlement to barge through just because you're five seconds ahead of PB pace.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: You'd have to wait, you'd have to maybe sacrifice that, you'll have to survive and then do another parkour in the next week.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_00: Because the person who's doing a 40-minute 5k has exactly the same right to participate as you do if you're going for a sub-17 minute or whatever.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: And being fitter or faster doesn't mean that you're above other people.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: On the flip side, back to the slower runner snobbery example.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: You have responsibilities as well.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: We need a balanced conversation.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: So it isn't just faster or is bad and slower runners good, which we've said before, because I do see a lot of slower, slower running snobbery, and also, and this is controversial, I also see sometimes slower runners poking the bear.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: As in, you know, poke, poke, poke, poke, poke.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody should be minding their own business and taking responsibility for their own actions.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: If you are walking or running considerably slower than most of the field in a park run or whatever setting, like I've said, that doesn't mean that you can block the entire path.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: If you're running with friends and you're having a conversation while 100 people are trying to get past, again, you've got to have some awareness.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: If organizers tell you to stay on the left hand side, stay on the left.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: If there's estimated finish time markers at the start, use them sensibly.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: If you're expecting to run 35 minutes, standing next to the people that are running 15 minutes isn't sensible.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: That's not elitism, that's organization.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: This goes back to safety.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the exactly the same as I mentioned before about the big marathons and the big races.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: Don't put yourself in the wrong wave, okay?
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: Because you will A annoy people and B create a safety issue.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I had I've heard stories, particularly in 2025, I had a couple of people who I work with fall over because of congestion, because of bottles being thrown on the floor.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and we all have to respect each other and respect that there are different people doing different paces and different things, and other and people are doing different paces, and nobody has got any right over anybody else.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: The problem with inclusivity is inclusivity means consideration from everybody.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes, and I've said this on previous podcasts, we become so inclusive that we then exclude.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: And that's called the horseshoe theory, which we won't go into on a running podcast.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the point.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: So the flip side, has running then become too competitive?
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_00: There's another part which I think is worth discussing here, which is has the running boom made recreational running too competitive?
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: I'll give you an example.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody sent me a message on Instagram the other day saying, Oh, hi John, I'm just running for fun.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought to myself, it's weird how people have to justify that, okay?
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: Because now we've got Strava and Garmin and PBs and carbon shoes and age grading and age positions and age groups, which is my thing, which I always obsess about.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: Segments, social media, race pitches, medals, challenges.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_00: Everything is measured.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: Now I love data.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'm competitive.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: I want to improve.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm doing at the moment training for a very intricate event that requires a lot of focus, and I've got a time warner here.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: And there's nothing wrong with that.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_00: But occasionally we need to remember why most people are out doing this.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: We're recreational runners, we're not professionals.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_00: The people listening to this podcast are not professionals.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: I am nowhere near a professional.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah?
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody's paying most of us to run parkrun.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: And if your pursuit of, say, a 5k PB means you're going to have to barge people out of the way at a free community event run by volunteers, we've probably lost perspective, I think.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're telling people to, you know, swear word off because they're walking their dog in the park, that's poor behaviour.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: That's not competitiveness.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: And let's remember that parkrun's free and there are volunteers who give their time.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_00: And they're forgotten often in that conversation across the board in all events.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: Because when somebody gets barged or fall over, it's not simply an incident between two runners, somebody has to deal with it.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: And the organizers said that every reported incident could create several hours of additional work for the core team and their volunteers.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_00: They're giving up their Saturdays so the rest of us can run a free 5k.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: Remember that.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: Now think about the absurdity of volunteers having to suspend an event because of some people receiving the free because of the way some people receive the free event and can't behave sensibly around each other.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: That should probably make everybody think that does it.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_00: Is this really a running problem?
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the question, yeah.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_00: And this way it gets more interesting.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's a growth problem.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: And anything successful eventually encounters this.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: Something starts small, strong community, everyone understands it, then it becomes popular, more people arrive, and the infrastructure gets stretched.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: Different motivations arrive, and eventually the original culture gets tested.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, now running is going through that process now, which is why a lot of people will criticize people for walking in marathons because originally a marathon was a running event.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yes?
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: So that's why some old school people will say you shouldn't walk during a marathon.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: Now that's not right or wrong, that's just their opinion.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: But it's based on the fact that traditionally a lot of big running events were running events, they weren't walking events, and we have to take that into consideration whether we agree with it or not.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, which means that on that point, different motivations come along.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes the solution we think is gatekeeper and it's not.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: The worst response would be would would be like these new runners are ruining everything.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: And that's not the approach.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: We were all new runners once.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: And somebody doing their first park run is exactly has exactly the same right as anybody else to be there.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: We shouldn't put the ladder up behind us.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: Instead, the challenge is how do we accommodate growth without destroying the things that made running attractive in the first place?
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe some events need to change.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe there needs to be some uncomfortable conversations.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe extremely busy park runs need better seeding at the start.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: Do certain courses simply have a safe capacity?
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: Do we need some events to spread numbers around?
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: Should people be encouraged to use smaller park runs instead of congregating at particularly fashionable locations?
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: Can courses be redesigned?
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: Do we need stronger etiquette around overtaking?
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know the answers, particularly around parkrun or any other event, but some solutions that sound straightforward may create different problems at all.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: As is the law of unintended consequences, as it's called.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: But what I don't think works is pretending unlimited growth can happen without consequences.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: If a course comes to be accommodates 250 people, then 500 rock up.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's a problem, and that's a physics problem.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, as I've said, the same thing is happening with marathons.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: Demand is enormous, particularly for the majors, okay?
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: And running tourism has exploded.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: People want that six, seven, eight, nine stars, and how as it goes.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: Which is great for the sport, but then it also changes the experience.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: More congestion, more expensive accommodation, more difficult race entries, higher demand for everything associated with running and potentially more pressure on us as runners.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_00: Because running starts becoming another thing we're supposed to achieve.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: You've done a 5K, watch your when's your 10k?
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: Done 10, when's your half?
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: When's your half?
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: You marathon your ultra and so on.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I've seen a lot of this gatekeeping on social media in the sense of somebody said, Oh, you run marathons, will I run ultrasound?
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: Or someone said, Oh, you run 5K's, I'll run 10Ks.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: And it creates this elitism that doesn't need to exist.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: There is room for all of us.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_00: So let's not let the running boom ruin running.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: The running boom's fantastic.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: Let's take the good bits from it.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_00: Let's take the community, the motivation, parkrun, the races, the clubs, the technology, the information that's available to us.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: But don't allow everybody else's running to dictate yours.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: You don't need somebody else's PB.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_00: You don't need somebody else's marathon.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: You don't need their shoes, and you don't need their mileage.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: And you certainly don't need to barge someone out the way on Saturday morning because Strava says you're going to get a 12-second PB.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: Let's keep some perspective.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: The running boom isn't the problem.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think the boom itself is the problem.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: More people moving is a good thing.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: More people discovering running is an excellent thing.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_00: And more people finding community is definitely a good thing, particularly after what's happened over the last five to ten years.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: The problem comes when infrastructure can't cope and when entitlement replaces etiquette.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: There is space for everybody, including the 15-minute 5k run out and somebody who wants to walk it in 50 minutes.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: There's space for the PB and the space for the person who just wants to enjoy it and be there and be part of the community.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: And for that to work, everybody has to recognise that the version of their version of running is not as important as everybody else's.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe the way in the situation is an important and a useful warning.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: Running is growing, which is brilliant, but we have to make sure the culture grows with it.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: Because the goal shouldn't be fewer runners, the goal should be more runners behaving better.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: And I'll leave you with that on that.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_00: So let's stop the gatekeeping.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_00: Let's acknowledge everybody and let's work together to find better ways to keep everybody safe so more people can enjoy this amazing sport that we all do.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: So I appreciate you listening as always.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_00: If you're new to the podcast, don't forget to subscribe wherever you get your podcast from, whether that's Spotify or Apple.
• 19:01
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• 19:05
  SPEAKER_00: It really helps and share this as well with your friends.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_00: If you don't follow me on Instagram, hop on over to at 12 Months to Marathon for all your daily content and tips and fun stuff.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: And if you want to head over to the link in my bio and click that, you can subscribe to my or join sorry my free running community for the over 35s.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_00: We can take you away from the noise of social media and we can talk and share accountability and support.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: Now, one thing I want to finish on as well is Parkrun says that the average time is now the slowest in history, which is showing who it's attracting in terms of beginners and potentially walkers.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_00: So remember that, and I'll leave you with that thought.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks very much for listening as always, and I'll speak to you all very soon indeed.