The Trials and Tribulations of Running YouTubers

A $140 pillow is about as close as you're gonna get.

I've been getting multiple ads per day (despite blocking it) on facebook for bester coaching. He must have quite the budget for self promotion.

It seems to be Skechers week amongst the influencers!

Running YouTubers World Cup series:

Continuing the new feature on this sub which I will sporadically post over the next few weeks/months. Lots of big match ups of 32 ‘influencers’.

*****Earlier matches on previous pages. Will collate the first round results when all matches played to see who has made the next round (so still time to vote) ******

Culminating in the crowning of our favourite YouTuber. We like to mock and laugh at many on here but who do we actually like? Who escapes our ire and gets to be crowned champion.
Vote either up or down depending on your choice.

Round 1 - match 10/16.

Feel free to comment as to why you came to this judgement.

Aubrey (biggerthanrunning) vs JourneyOfLee

Vote up for Aub or down for JoL

How do you distinguish between people downvoting to vote and people downvoting because this is achingly cringey?

this isn’t the bachelor subreddit… the shoetubers are embarrassing enough without holding contests about them. Not to mention how everyone is willing to talk their smack until one of them actually shows up in this thread, and then suddenly it’s oh yes Mr Canaday oh certainly Mr FODrunner like, get a grip.

lol. Stopped listening to FTK ages ago cause JTB became way too annoying. Sub elite runner with a big head always talking a load of junk and never backing it up. Hurt more often than not. Just checked out a recent episode and saw Brett isn’t involved any longer. Wonder the story there. Anyway, funny to see JTB finally trying to step up to the marathon and still failing as he was at 10k and 1/2 distances. But yeah Joel your big boy training and racing without a watch work wonders keep doing what you do

Welsh Runner is back telling us how he is "going all in" on "Heat Training" as he's seen professional runners and triathletes doing it.

This man is coaching people yet can't see that his own downfalls are not his lack of heat training, it is that he runs too hard too often. It doesn't matter if he measures his lactate or does heat training or follows whatever fad is out there, without reviewing his training and realising why he's constantly getting injured he will get nowhere in the long term.

Do you know why you've got faster recently Matt? It's because you've not been injured for 8 weeks and have some consistency. It's nothing to do with any fad you're following

Maybe I need it tattooed on me, next to: On Steroids So You Couldn't Anyway 😂

Have to admit, not as catchy as Go One More

I wonder what benefit huawei gets from getting someone like Bester to advertise their watches - especially given some of his recent grifting. He puts out one reel, does one run with it on for said reel - then you can see he's straight back to a Garmin looking on his content or Strava.

Sure the watches sit at slightly different price points - but for the beginner runner once you're spending like £300+ on something that's kind of moot, and for a more keen runner you'd go with the better kit. In both cases I'd assume that Garmin makes better watches than Huawei and go with their stuff.

He's barely recovered from a massive infection that almost caused him to lose his arm, and we see him running a 30k to the point of almost collapsing from exhaustion - and he still doesn't even stop until he's finished the distance.

Genuinely uncomfortable to watch someone so clueless about the damage they are doing themselves.

I must admit; I've felt the same. Jake is great. But his recent videos make me feel very uncomfortable - I could not watch them fully.

He's sort of backed himself onto a corner. The Japan/UK cross over element doesn't bring in views. It's his crazy mileage which has got him attention. If he was based anywhere in the world I think people would watch.

Without stupid mileage what is his channel? It is his gimmick now

I tend to agree but he just ran a 67 half in a 125 mile week already so I think he's just fine. He's fun to watch and true example of YOLO.

Is he even DOING the Japan/UK cross-over, tho? He talks a lot about how he is in Japan, but has he joined any of the myriad of run clubs in Tokyo? Has he hooked up with a coach/coaches to either set up his training, or run compare-and-contrast on coaching philosophy? Has he managed to touch on running as a culture and a social scene? Because my, admittedly cursory, glance at his stuff is uncoached influencer stuff, the only difference is the backdrop.

He's talented for sure, and chasing a pro contract, but I can't help but think of the commentary sports physiologists make about a lot of the ~genetic freaks~ at the top of various sports - they're there despite the stupid stuff they do, not because of it.

Did you expect him to not finish the 30k back home when running an out and back in the middle of Japan?

The running youtubers world cup has been excellent so far but sad to see two of my favourites eliminated in round 1 (Bester & Bowden). Fingers crossed that Ben Parkes or FOD goes all the way!

Definitely cursory. Have you watched his videos? He trained with a bunch of sub 2:20 guys from Tempo running japan. He spent a month in Nagano (at altitude) at a running camp with 40 local female pros.

Also you say this like it should be easy for some ginger gaijin to just up and join a local club in Japan, a place notorious for not opening up to foreigners.

If you disagree with his volume method just say that, but he's outlined his reasoning and methodology really well in pretty much all of his videos. (Also he handles the criticism really well) just seems like a great guy to me. Of all the youtubers to hate, you pick RTJ?

He seems to do things smartly. The vast majority of his running is super slow for him.

It is nuts how fast most YouTubers do their slow running. Ben Parks runs everything at his recent marathon pace or faster and Bester hardly ever does anything above 7-min miles!

Ben Parkes in notorious for having his activity time 5/10 or even 15 mins more than his moving time. He never answers questions when asked about it. He can't be filming for that long on every run