The social running movement giving people a second wind in life

The first few steps of anything are difficult. Whether you are writing a magazine feature or letting those pair of trainers that have been guiltily staring at you from the shoe rack meet the pavement for the first time since that ill-fated New Year’s resolution. Running is one of the most popular participation sports in England but there are several reasons why those first steps of a run aren’t made. The nine-to-five, a lack of places to run, safety or not knowing what’s out there within reach of your own two feet.

The benefits of running are well documented with the term ‘Runner’s High’ alluding to the endorphins released by the activity and the positive impact the sport can have on mental health. The number of mental health issues and cases of loneliness have risen in the last decade. One of the best ways to combat loneliness can be getting outdoors and meeting people. Many social running groups and schemes have emerged to do just that, bring people together and get runners both physically and mentally fit.

One of these running groups, the Midnight Runners of London, began in 2015, when a couple of friends wanted to exercise more and decided to run together to maintain their commitment. Due to their odd working hours, as the name suggests, they mostly ran at night, and after inviting more friends along the group expanded.

Now, the Midnight Runners has become a global brand with groups on three continents and 18 cities from Amsterdam to Hong Kong to Toronto. For the London Chapter, last summer saw record numbers as over 500 people attended each event. To keep the close-knit community feel they introduced an event cap of 250. Overall, the group has several thousand members in their total community.

London Chapter Leader, Michelle Waring says: “The definition of Midnight Runners is equal parts community, equal parts exercise, we are a group of friends who sometimes like to run, not the other way around.”

Michelle started off by attending an event herself. She moved from California to London to study and signed up for a 10K bootcamp with one of her classmates.

“I’d never ran that distance before but because Midnight Runners breaks it up into exercise stops it makes it more approachable and everyone is so nice and chatty that you forget how tired you are. I just kept coming back and got plugged into a new group of friends.”

The exercise stops assemble all the event’s runners to complete a partner-based exercise to help foster interaction between people who haven’t met before. The exercises are bodyweight ones like lunges. The stops help to bridge the gap between runner’s ability with those who reach the stop earliest getting more of a workout at the stops. The group try to find ways to make the exercise stops fun and sometimes use music that fit the workouts to keep things interesting.

“We use Roxanne and every time you hear red light you do a burpee and you do that until the song is over and you realise that there is a surprising number of red lights in that song.”

The fun isn’t exclusive to the exercise stops, the two main events on the Midnight Runners calendar are the bootcamp run and the party run. The party run just like the bootcamp run

incorporates a run around five to eight kilometres with exercise stops. However, with the party run comes the addition of a theme and an afterparty involving fancy dress and sometimes glow sticks.

While the bootcamp runs initially brought the Midnight Runners together, many make friends for life outside of the running and gain an appreciation for the city around them. Michelle herself is an indictment of this.

“This is where all my friends in London have come from. It’s where I met my other half actually, my other taller half.

“I got to see a different side to my new host city and I’ve been looking for ways to give back to it ever since.”

Two years after Midnight Runners, in January 2017, MileShyClub in Manchester was founded. The group have fifteen running clubs across Manchester and focus on beginner runners helping them to complete the Couch to 5K and maintain their progress. The club’s founder and CEO Jane Dennison started the running club after she found running was helping improve her mental health.

“I got into running because I was smoking 20 cigarettes a day. I was going through a really messy divorce and I was a single mum. I was originally trying to find out time for myself through swimming. But I looked at running and it looked really easy.

“I thought I could do it and it was hard to get into it on my own. I wish I had a club like the MileShyClub around because it would have really helped me go easy on myself and take it gradually. It was seeing other runners that was really inspiring.

“In my own personal circumstances, I had really poor mental health. Once I realised how much happier I was feeling because of running the way I was feeling not just physically but mentally. I realised it was having a profound impact on me. I had to share it with other people.”

The MileShyClub aims to have an inclusive and welcoming environment for runners taking away from the stresses of their work lives.

“We don’t want to put people under more stress. We want people to look forward to coming to the club not necessarily to run but to be part of something.

“I personally know what it’s like to experience loneliness. We have a lot of people come to the club who might live on their own and this for them is their family.

“We really are aware of it because of the need we’ve seen in the club for people to be supported. We work with other organisations in the local VCSE (Voluntary Community and Social Enterprise) sector and make referrals to other organisations for people who are in need. That’s why it’s important to us to have a controlled, safe and comfortable environment for people.”

Additionally, as a club they aim to incorporate socialisation into their runs to further combat loneliness. One example is their fish and chip shop run where the group finishes a run with some fish and chips in the park. There are managed WhatsApp groups for members to join and away from the trainers, there are socials throughout the year.

“We try to do something every month. We have a big summer social, and we have nearly a hundred people coming to it. Last year we had Bongo Bingo, and each club has a Christmas party.”

The MileShyClub are one of a number of groups affiliated to RunTogether. A national scheme also introduced in 2017 by England Athletics aiming to reach casual runners missed by traditional clubs.

England Athletics Participation Programmes Manager, Tracey Francis, says: “The main driver was around safety, being social and running at your own pace with your own tribe. 

“A concept around health and wellbeing, mental health, social fun and like-minded people where it wasn’t too competitive.”

In their commitment to mental health, RunTogether have over 1500 mental health champions and host ‘Run and Talk Week’ to help people open up about how they are feeling.

“Our mental health champions are out all the time supporting our groups.

“While having a jog in that safe and neutral space it’s easier for somebody to feel comfortable enough to open up about their mental health and running is a really good antidote for poor mental health.”

RunTogether has around 3000 live groups across the country housing around 200,000 runners. These runners’ range in ability and there are groups for all levels. Firstly, there is Get Me Started for those learning to run and completing Couch to 5K, then Keep Me Going for social runners completing park runs between five to ten kilometres respectively and finally Challenge Me for running over ten kilometres. The runs made by RunTogether groups fit around the busy city lifestyle. 

“We have lots of groups that are early morning runners between 6:30 to 7:30. We have lunchtime groups, and we have evening groups. On the weekends they’ll go off and do Parkruns. There is always a group for somebody.

“If you access a group and there’s half a dozen of you who want to run before work. There’s no reason why you shouldn’t go out and run right?”

With the RunTogether campaign and the number of social running groups in the country, whether you are within ten kilometres of the Midnight Runners or the MileShyClub, there should be one for you. Even if the running group for you doesn’t exist yet these groups have proven that a supportive community may only be a few steps away.