He Runs, She’s a Runner

A lot of my friends are runners. “My runner friends,” I call them. They run fast, slowly, every day, only on weekends, since January, since 1995, on roads, trails, or both. They have somewhere between one pair of running shoes and a wardrobeful. They participate in races or don’t.

None of that is why I call them my runner friends. What makes them runners is something else entirely.

✤ ✣ ✥

My runner friends don’t all like to call themselves runners. “Why the hell not?” I asked one of them recently, deftly blending affection and antagonism. Her response was as baffling as it was predictable: Her “shuffling” was too slow to qualify as running, she felt. As if speed is relevant in any way. As if being a runner can somehow be measured by the same metrics we use to measure running itself.

We runners are a supportive bunch, as demonstrated by how supportively I rolled my eyes at her. But if you want a more articulate example, there’s this famous quote by John “The Penguin” Bingham:

❝If you run, you are a runner. It doesn’t matter how fast or how far. It doesn’t matter if today is your first day or if you’ve been running for twenty years. There is no test to pass, no license to earn, no membership card to get. You just run.

Now there’s encouragement eloquent enough to put on a coffee mug, throw pillow, or whatever household object one prefers one’s validation to come from. Of course, Bingham’s philosophy is not without its critics. Their principal objection, as far as I can tell, is to the “doesn’t matter how fast” bit, as they, like my friend, have chosen speed as the gatekeeper of what does and does not count as running. Their coffee mugs say things like “covering 26.2 miles in more than five hours does not constitute running a marathon.”1 To me, that kind of thinking is rather one-dimensional.

But so is Bingham’s. While generously listing all the things that don’t make you a runner, he fails to mention any of the things that do, but one: the physical act of running. Is that really all there is to being a runner?

That friend I mentioned. She goes out for a loop around the park every single morning, in all weather, while most of us are still in bed. She says it’s her favorite way to start the day. She doesn’t race, but often volunteers and crews at races. Of course she’s a runner—because of the place running has in her life, because of what it means to her, and how it has changed her.

But not merely because she runs. Such a characterization would be no less narrow than one based on performance metrics.

While no doubt meant to be encouraging, Bingham’s words inadvertently devalue what it means to be a runner. Yes—pace, distance, and time in the sport are not it. Race results and VO₂ max are not it. But if one‘s identity shouldn’t be reduced to quantifiable data, then neither should it be reduced to a mere physical activity. To be a runner, you don’t “just run.” The bar has to be higher than that.

Because you see, I have this other friend who also runs regularly. No idea how fast or far, because we never talk about running. I know he does it as a supplement to his primary sport, calls it “roadwork” (?), and is constitutionally incapable of enjoying it. I’ve seen him run—once—and he mimics a runner perfectly: one foot or fewer on the ground, arms bent at the elbows and swinging, ankle rolling painfully because he didn’t see that pothole. He undeniably looks the part.

But he would never call himself a runner, and neither would I (especially to his face—he’s kind of weird about it). He has no interest in running, no curiosity for it, no connection to it. If swimming were more convenient, he’d do that and be perfectly happy not being called a swimmer instead. It’s all interchangeable “cardio.” So it doesn’t really matter that he happens to engage in the same physical activity, or that his calves are the envy of our little social group. He runs. He’s not a runner.

What does it mean, then, to be a runner? A satisfying definition continues to elude me. Perhaps there isn’t one. Perhaps there isn’t just one—running is what all runners do, but being a runner is what we each interpret and embody differently.

But no, that can’t be measured in minutes per mile, or measured at all. And it’s a pity to flatten it to a mere activity, which, taken by itself, is no different than washing the dishes or commuting. Stripped of the meaning the runner attaches to it, running is purely instrumental. A sum of parts. A thing we do. There is so much more to being a runner than that thing we do.

And I happen to know the perfect example. You met her in the third paragraph. I will never not roll my eyes (supportively) at her fixation on speed, but despite her vehement objections, she is what a runner is. I still don’t know what that is, but looking at her, knowing her, this is what I see:

Regardless of what motivates her—health, community, personal challenge, all of the above—her connection to running is even deeper, her intention with it even larger. Its rhythm seeps into her days; its terrains become metaphors. She keeps no distance from it, interacts with it, seeks answers from it to questions that are deeply personal. And, more than merely putting in the effort, she is willing to learn from it and make a deliberate attempt to extrapolate its lessons to her everyday life.

What is running, then, but an expression of who she is? A kinetic manifestation of her curiosity, a sweaty enactment of her values, a bodily dialogue with a world in motion blur.

So it’s not what she does, not even her why, but her how, that makes her a runner. To do with your whole self is to be.

✣ ✥ ✤

They’re married. My friend who doesn’t call herself a runner but is, and the one who doesn’t call himself a runner and isn’t, have been together for 12 years. And both have been running for the last five (started during the pandemic). To my knowledge, they’ve never run a single stride together—not because their paces differ, but because they do. They couldn’t be moving in the same direction if they wanted to.

As always: Thanks for reading, and please consider sharing this post or leaving a like or a comment.
As just this once: Go celebrate something that doesn’t have its own holiday.

​