Understanding Your Running Friends

Jennifer Bonn
2 min readJul 12, 2024
Photo by Omar Tursić on Unsplash

When you are not a runner, it can be difficult to understand the people who are so passionate about it. Some of the things we do sound crazy even to us, but they always seem glorious, and they make amazing stories. Here are a few of the typical things that runners do that non-runners might not understand.

· You think we are crazy to run five miles, but we run five miles to burn off the crazy.

· We cannot throw away the 60 race T-shirts because each one is a memory.

· We do care about winning a medal because it proves all the long hours of training are working.

· We will probably never be able to plan anything with you on Saturday because that is race day.

· We understand that you are shocked by how many running shoes we have, but a runner needs shoes, for trails, roads, marathons, waterproof ones if it rains, and we struggle with throwing them away because they also carry memories.

· When you ask a runner, “What’s your goal for the race?”, and he answers that he only wants to finish, he is lying. He wants to crush the competition and win in his age group while earning a personal best.

· Be cautious if you decide to try a race and the runners around you include you in their conversation. If you hear them all telling you that they…

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Jennifer Bonn

My specialties are education, running, parenting, and self-help. My book 101 Tips to Lighten Your Burden can be found on Amazon. My blogwww.jenniferswriting.org