Runners World has hit its nadir

People that jog for fitness/losing weight/social situations who enter the odd 5k or survive a marathon for bucket list purposes greatly outweigh competitive runners. By a ridiculous margin. If you owned the magazine, who would you decide to be your primary audience? I know what my answer would be.

lollerama wrote:

greatly outweigh

I see what you did there

Yes, Bicycling magazine. Now they may have a little stuff on elite racers, but that magazine is painful to read, and it is full of charts and graphics that draw in the FB generation. It sucks and has sucked for a long time. I would have to read (or look at) a current RW to see who is more egregious.

FWIW, Bart Yasso has a 2:37 PR I think. So he was not a terrible runner, but he would not have beaten me ... when I was 16.

Did you see the article with their “gear of the year”? No joke, it includes $300 sunglasses, a $9000 treadmill, and a $200 pillow. Are they trolling? What the hell is going on?

lollerama wrote:

People that jog for fitness/losing weight/social situations who enter the odd 5k or survive a marathon for bucket list purposes greatly outweigh competitive runners. By a ridiculous margin. If you owned the magazine, who would you decide to be your primary audience? I know what my answer would be.

Correct. These people have a lot more disposable income

Hobbby Joggger wrote:

Can anyone imagine a magazine devoted to any other sport being like this? There's no better example of the disconnect between participatory running and competitive running.

Funny. I was just looking at getting a subscription to a climbing magazine at a discounted price. I was reading critiques about how Climbing magazine was targeted at beginners, while Rock and Ice and Alpinist have more of a real climber readership.

And when I Google search it right now, the first recent article that comes up from Climbing is 3 Tips for Safer Bouldering Falls:

Relax

Look Down

Stick the Landing

RW has a new editor. I believe this was her 2nd or 3rd issue. The changes from the old regime amplify everything Letsrunners complained about RW anyway. The credits even acknowledge that the woman on the cover is a professional model. The staff has been almost completely purged.

Fatbody wrote:

Did you see the article with their “gear of the year”? No joke, it includes $300 sunglasses, a $9000 treadmill, and a $200 pillow. Are they trolling? What the hell is going on?

The only item I would remotely consider buying is the $15 socks and that is only if I won a gift certificate to a running store that carried them.

The treadmill article was decent. I usually run over a 1,000 miles on the treadmill in the winter and am always in great shape when the warmer weather arrives. Still haven't figured out why they call it the dreadmill. If I was going to dread a run, it would be a 15 miler in 6 inches of snow at 15 degrees with 20 mph wind. After doing that exact run, I switched to a 24 hour fitness center so I would never have to do another.

Besides that, the mag has gotten worse if you are actually interested in any sort of competitive running.

That magazine is now nothing more than advertisement for running gear manufacturers. They are promoting products for their advertisers to increase ad revenue and trying to pull in novice runners to grow their customer base.

Good marketing plan to grow the revenue of the magazine but there’s no longer any quality running coverage. You won’t learn anything new there anymore.

I am still getting RW because RT once had some insane special, so I had several years left on my subscription when it folded.

The last several issues of RW have gone from mailbox directly to recycle bin.

Triumph wrote:

That magazine is now nothing more than advertisement for running gear manufacturers. They are promoting products for their advertisers to increase ad revenue and trying to pull in novice runners to grow their customer base.

Good marketing plan to grow the revenue of the magazine but there’s no longer any quality running coverage. You won’t learn anything new there anymore.

I believe its called making a profit, which is tough to do for any print publication. Look at ski, golf and Outside magazines, the gear makers bang the drum that their editors dance to. Nothing new.

Has A New wrote:

RW has a new editor. I believe this was her 2nd or 3rd issue. The changes from the old regime amplify everything Letsrunners complained about RW anyway. The credits even acknowledge that the woman on the cover is a professional model. The staff has been almost completely purged.

I was going to list these exact points. I thought the direction of the magazine was exemplified by the two page feature on the three moms (all different races of course) and their favorite running clothes -- one noted that trucker hats were her "look".

David Willey, where did you go?

Unfortunately, print magazines are a dying breed. But how are there several ultra/trail magazines but no distance/road magazines?

Has A New wrote:

RW has a new editor. I believe this was her 2nd or 3rd issue. The changes from the old regime amplify everything Letsrunners complained about RW anyway. The credits even acknowledge that the woman on the cover is a professional model. The staff has been almost completely purged.

Great point. Also, to the guys who counted Bart Yasso as sub elite, this month was his last. He's gone now too.

Agree completely but can’t they hire a decent writer or two and still make a profit.

It’s a smart business plan to generate new revenue streams but we used to see some decent ideas from their writers and a little elite coverage in the magazine also.

Even in the online community forums there were several members with very helpful training advice, but they killed that off too in the last 2 months as a cost savings.

If they wanted to cover elite running they should at least cover doping. I mean write about how and where to buy good juice, dosages, doping cycles, testing cheat tips, etc.

Hobbby Joggger wrote:

Yes, I know that Runners World has always sucked and been aimed at the hobby jogger crowd.

Visit your local library and discover back issues with the names Anderson, Henderson and Higdon on the masthead and you will find you don't know much about the publication. With electronic media there is no need for print periodicals as practically everything distance running can be found on the internet machine. Why are you complaining?

Totally agree - mine is a gift subscription and it’s been a disappointment. Not one article for runners. I actually have their mags from 78-80, and I saw hints of the decline back then - but, at least races were covered at length w/ good profiles on serious runners. Running (Nike sponsored), The Runner, Running Times, all good reads in their day. Surely, there are those who prefer the print media - I subscribe to trail runner just cause I like the race coverage and I like a cup of coffee and a good read before a run. But, RW - it’s a goner - Yasso was the last runner on their staff.

Reading Coach wrote:

Hobbby Joggger wrote:

Yes, I know that Runners World has always sucked and been aimed at the hobby jogger crowd.

Visit your local library and discover back issues with the names Anderson, Henderson and Higdon on the masthead and you will find you don't know much about the publication. With electronic media there is no need for print periodicals as practically everything distance running can be found on the internet machine. Why are you complaining?

Haven't read Anderson, but I remember the stuff in RW from Higdon and Henderson. They certainly may know about running, but the tripe they posted in RW was always watered-down, obvious crap for the masses like the 10% rule and "how to run a tempo." Nothing even remotely relevatory.

Dirtpoor wrote:

Totally agree - mine is a gift subscription and it’s been a disappointment. Not one article for runners. I actually have their mags from 78-80, and I saw hints of the decline back then - but, at least races were covered at length w/ good profiles on serious runners. Running (Nike sponsored), The Runner, Running Times, all good reads in their day. Surely, there are those who prefer the print media - I subscribe to trail runner just cause I like the race coverage and I like a cup of coffee and a good read before a run. But, RW - it’s a goner - Yasso was the last runner on their staff.

Amby Burfoot still writes articles on RW Online every once in a while. Here is a great article from him from about ten years ago about his 1968 Boston win: