Running Economy--An Economic Theory

(Caution: the person who wrote this post has only had two economic classes in his life and still has problems managing his own money....so Economists beware!)

Running is a sport that has been a sport since the Greeks. It dates back to thousands of years. However, in America, the sport is relatively new. Our oldest races, Dipsea Trail Race dates back to 1904 or the heralded Boston Marathon dates back to 1896, are only 100+ years old. So, we do not have a long history of running in the USA because we do not have a long history. I say this because having a 100+ year old history is nothing compared to having a 1000+ year history.

   I say all of this because running is a sport that goes in cycles. And I believe these cycles can be traced to the current economy of the country. The term, "running economy", simply means the amount of fitness/running an individual has or is able to endure. However, that is not what this post is about. This is about how running and the economy go hand in hand. I also know I am not the first person to think of this. I haven't read about it anywhere, but I am sure its out there. I am not usually the guy who is ahead of the curve.

   To me, economics can be boiled down to one word: control. Each person wants complete control over every facet of their lives. In order to have control over every facet, a person must control or have control over the basic necessities of life: food, clothing, shelter. I know economics is much more complicated than that, but for me it doesn't seem to be. Economics will always be about control for me. And this is where economics meets running. Running is all about control as well: how far, how fast, where you run, how long, what you wear, against whom, etc.

  America has an economy that runs in cycles. It is always the same cycle because Americans, like all other peoples and countries, do not learn from past mistakes. We have periods of great wealth and the generation that works for it, saves it, but then after about two or three generations the wealth has been wasted and lost and then they have nothing. In recent times, America has had three or four bad cases of the latter bit. The 30's, the late 70's and early 80's, and now. The cycles appear to be happening in less and less amounts of time, which could mean that every generation is becoming worse at teaching the latter generations about saving. Each time Americans lose control of their pocketbooks, they reach for something to control. In the 30's and 40' they reached out to their automobiles and the size of their families, but mostly the automobiles: they could drive wherever, with whomever, and at whatever speeds they wanted. (Some of this still sits in the American psyche.)

   However, in the 70's, 80's, and now there is not much control to be had when it comes to automobiles or most anything else in our lives. If you don't think this, then why are the best-selling material goods in America or even the world all labeled with the first word "i"? It is all about control and people are scrambling for it. Americans reached out to the things that they could control and one of those things happened to be running. Running in America during the 70's and 80's mushroomed into Prefontaine, Frank Shorter, Jeff Galloway, Carl Lewis, Bill Bowerman, the creation of Nike, etc. etc. etc. It seemed everyone was running. It is called America's first running boom. And it stayed that way until Reagan and the growth of the American economy. Running started to trickle away. The runners began to reclaim their control on other parts of their lives. Then came the 90's and about ten years of pretty great economic news. American running, especially distance running, almost disappeared.

  Then enter the years from 2001-2010. The American economy went in the tank and has spent 9 years getting better and then a lot worse. Americans appear to be losing control over or handing over control to every facet of their lives. The amount of choices one has left the population with seemingly no choice. (Example: I hear most of my students tell me nothing is on tv when they have 500-1000 channels. When I was young and allowed to watch t.v. there were only about 10-30 stations and something was always on!) Enter the second America running boom, which may be actually much larger than the first. It seems everyone is running. 5K's are like pennies, everyone has run or walked one and they are everywhere. Everyone is training for half marathons like they just doing some other menial task. The marathon is growing so big that it is hard not to come into contact with at least one person who has run one. When I first started running, I didn't know anyone who ran longer than 3-6 miles. There are more than 2 running magazines! American runners, especially distance runners, have reemerged from a national hibernation and are a force to be reckoned with on the world stages of running. We have Ryan Hall, Dathan Ritzenhein, Deana Kastor, Kara Goucher, Meb, Shalane Flanagan, Chris Solinsky etc, etc, etc. Registration for places like NYC and Boston are filling up in a day or even just 8 hours. Distances like the 50K, the 50 mi, the 100 mi are all being quietly considered when just a handful of years ago, they were considered the stuff of lunatics. Running is becoming so common it even makes its way onto ESPN at times. Americans are losing control of most things, but are latching onto running as if it were their only hope.
    I ran my first non-collegiate race in 2002. It was a 5K. After I finished the race, I had the hardest time telling people what I had spent my morning doing and a common response was, "what did you do that for?". I can imagine the response would be much different now. In college, I tried my hand at the sport of cross country and had an even harder time explaining that. This was in 1998-1999. People now know exactly what that is. I will use this statistic to prove my point and then I will close: In 1999, there were 3-5, 5K's in the city I live in. In 2010, there were somewhere between 20-30, 5K races held in Macon alone. The economy of 1999 has unemployment was 4.2 percent. The current unemployment rate is somewhere between 9.3 and 10 percent. So what do you think? Am I on to something? Let me know.

Running because I'm too poor to golf (JK),
   David