Howdy, Stranger!
Categories
Options
opinions on club runners
The materials in this website are in no way intended to replace the professional medical care, advice, diagnosis or treatment of a doctor, qualified personal trainer, therapist, dietitian or nutritionist Runners's World, Part of the Hearst UK well-being network © Copyright 2017
Comments
You mean this NLR
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Jm70Jx1fU-Y/St7SnIwyp5I/AAAAAAAAB0M/59YKDlJPU7Y/s1600-h/Buytonicboynumber1.jpg
I just found it and I did that little involutary hand to mouth thing when you see stuff you had as a kid, and had forgotten.
But noone calls me Steve. Never. Except my brother. Funny that wonder why?
Oh well..
Yes Never Steve. Ever
I've found our club a bit hit and miss. If you go regularly and find a group to run with it's good fun. At the moment though I'm doing one of our longer routes and as I'm slower I end up running at the back on my own every week. I know that if I send an email out saying I'm doing the run I'll get a few people turning up to run with me but otherwise no one knows about it and everyone probably thinks there's no one running at their pace.
It's much better on the shorter routes and there are regular courses for beginners but it definitely gets a bit more DIY as you increase distances.
I think it's a case of you get out what you put in?
My local club is similar to the experiences of Kwilter or Ginger Furball... anything slower than 8 minute miling is sneered at, and there is no genuine desire to foster and support newbies into the sport. I have heard from others that even when you are reasonably fast, club members are not particularly welcoming of anyone that's "new" per se, and won't ask them when they all go for a drink after a run etc, so generally not a welcoming culture.
However, the other club I knew well, that my ex other half runs for, are lovely!! Proper newbie support, including run-walk groups and 12-minute milers. At awards evenings the guy who manages the beginners, a proper fuss is made of newbie improvement, as much as the whippets who have won races or contributed lots of points to leagues and championships. That 'culture' is also supported by the fast runners and they are just a genuinely nice bunch.
I can see thought what Stevie G said about not having that many people to run with at the very fast end. I know it's hard to have much sympathy with "Poor me I'm so fast I have no one to run with"...
But there was only one guy in the club who was faster (over mara distance) than him I think, but a couple of faster peeps over shorter distances like 10k but not that many.
Seems that the culture and atmosphere of a club probably develops over a period of time, and you just have to find one that suits you... A bit of trial and error then...
We had a couple of older runners at the back who would mop up at the back and look after slower new runners. They took on this responsibility off their own backs and took their task very seriously. This would often make them very popular at the social dos. I think you never forget the person who first made you welcome. BUT.....Sometimes this didn't happen due to people being away, smaller groups, people focussing on their own training. A club is a meeting of like minded runners. It's not LA Fitness. Don't expect to have someone to look after you the whole time.
I think some little grumpy sausages are better off on their own
I'll admit I thought that about running clubs (legions of supermen/women who would drop me in the first 200yards) & leave me where I stopped too exhausted to continue
It's that reason that I ran under the name/colours of my cycling club for a couple of years (plus, I guess I liked the fact that it annoyed the club-runners' when I bet them)
So, after receiving an invite from some members of a local club after talking to them at the 'Trunce' (a short 'cult' fell-race series in South Yorkshire), I tentatively turned up at a club-run night.
It appeared that the tentativeness went both ways, as my 'Trunce' (fell-running, & local 10K) times had apparantly marked me down as a fairly decent (middle-distance) runner
But no, I found the same.... a varied mixture from the 35 min 10K men, to the ones happy to finish it in the hour... .the 3:15 Marathoners, to the 2+ half-marathoners........ members in their early 20's, to the eldest at 78! (& still running)
So I too would say find a good local club.... mine let me have as much time as I wanted to make sure that they were right for me (I guess they were checking me out too!)
I think it often depends on the size of the club. We have about 400 members so we really can support all abilities - from run/walk complete newbies, to sub 3 hour marathoners and all abilities in between.
We also provide specific training for events - Race for Life from May to July, Great South from August to October, Half marathon from October to Christmas and then marathon training from Jan to April. There are also informal groups where people with similar goals train together.
The web site publishes the training plans of those who want to provide specific training so that you can see which group you think you will fit in with, or if you miss a session then you know what they were doing so you can do it yourself at some other time.
One of the constant struggles tht the committee have is to keep the balance. The club wants to support fast runners, slower runners that want to improve, social runners, and those who just want to keep fit and enjoy running. The balance naturally sways around a bit depending on who are the most influencal people (i.e. those who want to put the most into the club at that moment in time) but is generally stable.
As others have said, you get out what you put in. There wasn't a beginners cross country group, which made it difficult for me to get into cross country, so I started one up. It's been going about 8 weeks and we ahve about 7 people who regularly turn up - all who had felt in the same situation as me but didn't realise that they could change it.
Seems that alot of clubs that the posters here are describing, can't decide if they are running clubs or running teams.
There isa significant difference.
If I was joining a club that said it had no entry requirements based on minimum ability and then it be came obvious that they expected me to run each training run at 10k pace. It would be coat on and "taxi"
If you say "all are welcome" then stick to your word.You make the effort to help Mabel who just likes to jog with her dog, and Mike who you suspect once ran county but wont admit it.
If you want to put together a group of runners to compete, you run trials, take times, choose the consistantly best.Make it clear your not an all welcome club. That way no one is left in the dark. Literally come winter runs.
Ours presently has about 110 members, which has increased significantly since I joined, when there were about 80..... it must be me attracting them
There were only 2in it that competed in fell-races, but now we have a good dozen who compete in various events.
My Club?? http://www.ackworthroadrunnersandac.co.uk/
I'll admit I did consider joining Bingley Harriers (circa 550 members??), even though they're too far away from regular training, as I was 'hoping' that some of the Rob Jebb/Alistair Brownlee magic might have rubbed-off
KK
We'd love you even if you were slow!
On which topic, if you're doing the 10K on the 17th, please could you slow down a bit?
Right...well i've signed up to a new 1st claim club, 30+ miles away from me, mostly because they're top dogs in our sunday XC league...and I fancy my result counting, rather than individually coming top 10, only to see it be the very smalltime, difference between whether our club come 9th or 10th out of 13 teams
Joined them for what i see as a very rare appearance at a session, and it was great. Warm welcome from them all, good bunch, with a few around my age, and good quality runners, ranging from the very very fast (32min 10k man), to a few around my kind of pace (mid 30s 10k), to a good supporting bunch.
Seem to have a decent youth set up too...and some of the kids even joined us for some of the races. (the night was a get 6 teams of 4, kind of equal abilities throughout the teams, and everyone does 1 sprint, 1 middle distance and 2 relays event).
Was quite scary lining up in a race with an 8 year old! I think the mad adrenaline that he might be some kind of superstar for his age pushed me on.
I think fear is a new approach I might take
Stevie
Does a "mid 30s 10K runner" racing an 8 year old count as child abuse - or did he beat you?
Is that your club??
If so, roll on November, & the 'Harriers verses Cyclists' race
40mins, having seen a guy who's a decent runner have to put in a hard effort to beat his 15year old daughter over 800m, I did for a second wonder whether this was a club with some kind of amazing youth section
But no...due to the random alloting of people to races, most of the races were ridiculously uncompetitive...ie beating 2nd place by 30seconds over 1000metres!
They did have a guy who's 32mins for 10k though...i'm sure he'd have taken me to school over any distance...but it's all relative aint it.