Are Big City Run Clubs Worth the Hype? An Honest Review

My mom has been telling me, sorry not telling, suggesting I join a run club basically since the day I moved to San Francisco. And to her credit, it was a good suggestion. And I told her that, repeatedly.

She may have thought definitely thought I was brushing her off because my response was always the same, “I agree with you that’s a good idea, I just haven’t had the chance to yet.” And in my defense, I was telling the truth; I was either knee-deep in my own training program or busy every weekend.

Until I wasn’t.

Run Club Day

Finally the weekend came where my Saturday morning was wide-open. I officially had no excuse not to go to this infamous run club. I had been hoping that I would have a buddy to join me (aka Curd Thief) so I would not have to brave the wilderness alone. Attending any new group activity alone is intimidating. Attending a group activity centered around your physical fitness alone? That’s terrifying.

When Curd Thief was out of town that weekend, it made the option of staying in bed and not getting up at 7am on a Saturday to go run with strangers sound very enticing. But then, as you have probably come to expect, my Megan-ism kicked in and I felt an overpowering need to go just to prove to myself I could. 

It is truly amazing how many uncomfortable situations I have found myself in purely because I needed to prove something to someone.

So I lay in bed thinking, be brave Megan, you can do this. You can go run a few miles and maybe even build up the nerve to say hi to someone. You’ve got this. 

Also as I’m sure you have come to expect, it didn’t go quite as planned.

Miles 0 – 2, The Prerun

The series of unfortunate events began with a grave underestimation of the time it would take to walk from my apartment to the run club meeting spot. Even at this point, out of bed, dressed, walking to the thing, I was seriously contemplating bailing. “Well, if I get there late and they’ve left already, it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world if I just ran by myself…”

But then, once again, that annoying little part of me emerged saying, “you’ve made it this far are you really going to chicken out now?” Responding (to myself) with a resigned sigh, I begrudgingly began to jog.

I hope people know that I use my powers of persuasion just as much on myself as I do on others. We’re really all in this together when it comes to dealing with me. 

So by leaving late, I now subjected myself to almost a mile of running…before my actual run even began.

The Arrival

I arrive at the meet spot, talk to a few people until their actual friends show up, and then stand there pretending to be busy until the run begins. The way it works, I find out, is that they have 3, 6, and 10 mile options you can choose. I was firmly set on the 3 mile option. 

Then I hear a guy from the crowd say, “I didn’t wake up before 8am on a Saturday to only run 3 miles. I’m going to do the 6.”

I should have ignored him. I should have just stuck my fingers in my ears and hummed All Star by Smash Mouth and run my 3 (+1) miles. 

But of course I didn’t. 

Instead I thought, hmm, he makes a convincing argument. If I’m already here, I might as well do 6.

 I can actually feel you, reader, shaking your head at me through the computer screen. 

Miles 3 – 4.85

So the decision was made and I go off with the 6 mile crew. And it wasn’t a bad start. I found a couple people who were also new and made light small talk as we ran towards the Golden Gate Bridge. I have to be honest, I was pretty proud of myself at this point for getting up and doing the thing and talking to the people and putting myself out there. 

Then we reach the bridge. The instruction was to run to the first post of the bridge and turn around. As I arrived, I noticed two things. 1) My watch wasn’t quite at 3 miles yet and 2) there were some people who continued running past the first post.

I had a split second to make sense of these two facts and came to a clear conclusion: the people who went ahead also wanted to finish out their 3 and then turn around so they would ultimately run an even 6 miles. It’s the only thing that made sense.

So me, being the try-hard we all know and love, made an equally split decision to do the same. 

It’s like, you don’t even know where this story is going but you know it’s not going to end well for me. I do know where it’s going and can confirm it’s not going to end well for me. 

Miles 4.85+

I run past the post and line up with another girl running, and we start talking. As she’s telling me where she’s from and what she does for work, I notice one crucial detail about the situation. She’s not turning around. A brief glance at my watch shows we are well past what should have been the turnaround point with no signs of stopping. She notices this, and says, “oh yeah, the group ahead of us are all planning to run 9 miles, is that your plan too?”

Miles 5 – 11????

Um, no. That was most definitely not my plan. So if you’re counting, sports fans, my casual 3 mile run I hyped myself up for has just turned into 10 miles, if you take into account my previous…misjudgement.  

She immediately sees it on my face, the “oh I messed up. I messed up real bad” look that I’m sure was clear as day in the SF gloom. I apologize that I can’t continue with her and quickly turn around to make my way back.

Miles 5.5 – 9

But then another unfortunate realization settles in. Not only did I run 1/2 a mile further than I needed to on the bridge, I also situated myself directly between the 6 milers and the 9 milers, meaning there was no one within eyesight in either direction.

After all of that, all of the convincing and womaning up I had to do to force myself to run with other people, I have somehow found myself on a solitary run in the end anyways.

I make my way back the 3.5 miles to the coffee cart finish line, and by the time I arrive all the 6 milers had already gotten their coffee, completed their post run small talk, and went along their merry way. And the cherry on top of it all, I still had an almost 2 mile walk back to my apartment.

Miles 9 – 11

If all the numbers being thrown around are hard to follow, I’ll break it down for you. On the day where I really just wanted to go for a 3 mile run, I ended up with:

8 miles running

3 miles walking

1 bruised ego

All self-inflicted of course. Later that day I went on a 3 mile walk with a friend and finished the evening at a Giants game. It was a very good sleep that night.

Run Club, Revisited

Despite my first attempt at joining a run club not going quite to plan, I decided I needed to give it a second chance before I completely discredited the club and everything it stood for. Which brings us to today. While the course was more challenging than I was expecting, and I ran much faster than I was planning, and I cursed living in such a hilly city at least 100 times, I can happily confirm I stayed with the group the whole time and even met a few new people! The whole coffee-after-running thing is surprisingly conducive to talking to people (who would’ve thought?) and everyone was very friendly and welcoming to me, the newcomer. 

They said, “oh, you’ve run with us before? I don’t remember seeing you!” and I just sighed and nodded in agreement, saving them the time and myself the embarrassment of an explanation. I still had a 2 mile walk back after the run, but this time with a warm coffee and scone in hand, and a feeling that maybe, just maybe, I can really start to belong in this big city.