Head out on a Sunday at nine in the morning and start counting. Groups of twenty, thirty, fifty people in brightly coloured trainers jogging together and finishing up at a speciality coffee shop. Running clubs are having a moment. And it’s not one of those three-week fads: this one is here to stay.
The funny thing is that running has always been there. It’s the cheapest sport in the world: a pair of trainers and your front door. So why has half the planet suddenly signed up to run in a group?
Why running clubs have blown up
Our theory is simple: people are fed up with training alone. Fed up with putting in their earbuds, staring at an app and not saying a word to anyone. A running club is the exact opposite: you meet up, you run, you suffer a bit and you grab something afterwards. It’s sport, but above all it’s community.
Some say, half joking half serious, that running clubs are the new dating apps. And they’ve got a point: you meet people with a common interest and none of the pressure of a date. Add to that the fact that everything gets shared these days —Sunday’s Strava gets more likes than your holiday photos— and you’ve got the perfect combo.
But underneath the trend there’s something real: running in a group is addictive. On the day you don’t feel like heading out, you know people are waiting for you. And that just doesn’t happen when you train on your own.
In CrossFit, running is no longer optional
Here’s the part that hits close to home. For years, in a lot of boxes, running was that “punishment” that showed up in the WOD and everyone dreaded. The classic lifter who could shift 100 kilos without breaking a sweat but died after 400 metres.
That’s over. In CrossTraining and functional fitness, running has gone from filler to a key piece. And if there’s one culprit with a name, it’s HYROX.
For anyone who doesn’t know it yet: HYROX is the fitness race that has exploded over the last few years. It’s 8 kilometres of running split between 8 functional stations (sled, rower, wall balls, farmers carry…). Eight. Kilometres. Running. You can be a monster on the bar, but if you’ve got no engine, HYROX will eat you alive.
The result: all of us who came from the iron and hated running have had to get our act together. Running is no longer “what the skinny guys do”. It’s part of the game. A good HYROX or CrossTraining athlete, these days, runs. Full stop.
At BlackBOX we have our own running club
Since we saw this coming, we haven’t sat on our hands. At BlackBOX, in Las Chafiras (South Tenerife), we have our own running club inside the box’s WhatsApp community.
No fuss, no signing up to anything weird: meetups get organised in the group, everyone goes at their own pace and you don’t need to be a marathon runner to come along. It doesn’t matter whether you run a 5K in 22 minutes or haven’t gone past the corner in years: the idea is to rack up kilometres, build your engine and have a few laughs along the way.
And here’s the thing: on top of being fun, running with the group pays off — better recovery between sessions, more endurance to get through WODs without blowing up, and much more complete HYROX prep. You win on every front.
Come from the iron and hate running? Start like this
If you’re the type who lifts double your bodyweight but gets winded going up the stairs, don’t worry, you’re not the only one. A couple of ideas to get going without suffering too much:
- Start short and slow. Nobody’s asking for a marathon. Jog 10-15 minutes easy and build up little by little.
- Run with company. It’s infinitely more bearable when you’re chatting (or trying to chat) with someone next to you.
- Make the most of the running in your WODs. Since the programming makes you do it, squeeze it. Every metre counts.
- Set yourself a HYROX goal. Training for a race completely changes your motivation to get out and run.
The trend will pass; the habit won’t
Running clubs may stop being trending at some point, like everything does. But running in a group, building your endurance and using running to perform better in the box… that’s not a trend. That’s training smarter.
If you fancy giving it a go, the door’s open: come train with us or join the community and drop into the next running club meetup. It’s better to run in good company.