Why do people pay $50 to walk a 5K saturday morning?

#MedalMonday

I have wondered the same thing...

Is this country just so damn rich they can't help themselves to spend that much money for essentially the experience I guess.

It's a good question. My local running scene has no fast people, so I would win literally every single race I lined up to if I entered. To me, there's no point in paying money and spending extra time on a Saturday to tempo a 5k or 10k by myself, yet people seem confused when I try to explain this to them and why I don't have any interest in running the local races. I already run 6 miles per day and do one or two workouts per week. Why would I pay money to do something I'm already doing for free? People are strange.

Donate to a charity and then write it off on their taxes?

Bandit those events. Literally no reason to pay the RD or "timing" company since half these events arent even timed.

Road racing is a joke nowadays. Just fat idiots looking for IG likes

The same can be said about 99% of college runners. Why do people wake up early for practice and dedicate their life to training when they’ll never accomplish anything worthwhile? By the OP’s logic, any college runner who can’t break 3:37 for 1500, 13:10 for 5000, or 28:00 for 10000 is wasting their time and there’s no logic behind the decision.

I do it for the shirt. I then wear said shirt and race bib throughout the weekend -- to Einstein's bagels after the race, to Lowes later to pick up some stuff, whatever.

You could go to Good will or another thrift store, buy race t-shirts that were donated. The thrift store near me used to have t-shirts for $1, they had so many donations; so for example, you could buy 50 individual race t-shirts for $50 and then pretend that you ran each of those races.

Look at the savings. Plus, then those t-shirts don't end up in the landfill!

You people need Parkrun.

If you get swag, then you shouldn't write it off.

I would imagine it's the exercise and the social aspect of it. I bet a lot of the walkers were walking in groups of friends and new friends. Why do you care? Would you rather them stay in bed or sit on the couch all day, perhaps go to a breakfast place and eat 2000 calories before noon without much movement. Get fat. That's gross.

guess what bub, walkers are obviously supporting most these races financially. If they go away do you think the vast amount of choices you have on a weekly base's increases or decreases?

So y'all paid $50 each right?

And they got to race about 3-4x as long as you did, right?

Imagine how dumb they think you are paying $50 to run alone for less than 15 minutes when you could have been enjoying good convo with friends for an hour.

I don't get why you'd pay $50 dollars to run a 5k with 1000 walkers when u could do it by yourself from your front door? Who's weirder?

Agreed! Also when you enter an event you’re committing yourself to turn up and exercise. If you’re new to exercise and trying to get in shape doing it all by yourself is tough for most people. Having an event with a social aspect gives them something to look forward to while doing something good for their body.

Without the walkers and slow joggers footing the bill for the race, there would be no race to begin with... Unless you have a deal that actually pays you to run, you have more in common with those walkers than with the pros...

what country are you from? UK has free park runs every week all over the country.

There are a couple reasons why you might not get it:

1) You might be too poor to realize that for many many people, $50 is nothing and well worth the pleasant experience of participation and later talking about it, just like going to the movies or on a group hike.

2) You don’t understand some basic things about a running race, like that it does not prohibit walking.

3) You are just a jerk looking to mock people slower or less fit than you.

I don't get why you'd use the $ AND say the word "dollars."