CLANCY OVERELL | Editor | CONTACT
It appears that after spending their early adulthood in lockdown, and their teenage years staring at a phone screen, Australian millennials have discovered the gratification that comes with immersing oneself within a local community.
In all the noise and messiness that comes with the post-pandemic hangover, one seemingly positive social trend is the popularity of running clubs across Australia.
What was once considered an exercise of torturous and lonely self-flaggelation, ‘running’ has suddenly become a vehicle for vibrant community movement.
Before sunrise every morning, people of all ages and shapes are meeting in local suburban parks and hitting the road as one. It’s a healthy, social and very horny phenomena that nobody should be upset about.
That is, except for our society’s ‘complaint class’ – the people who don’t like noise too late at night or too early in the morning. The Boomers.
Right across the country, the extra long cues at cafes and cheerful morning chit chat that comes with running clubs is driving post-war Australians up the wall. Some have even gone as far as saying that running clubs should be outright banned unless it can be proven that they directly increase local property prices.
However, the young people just keep running – as they grip onto the same zest for life that the boomers found through causing major traffic delays when they discovered roadbikes.
Many view the millennial run club trend as the poorer version of the early 2000s lycra phase that their middle class parents went through.
Without a couple grand to put down on a carbon fibre, titanium, or even aluminium bicycle – let alone the thousands more dollars spent on the must-have accessories and cyclewear, young people are doing what they can with a pair of runners and old footy shorts.
And they are doing it without the picturesque suburban hillsides or coastal roads that the boomers were able to live near for 75 grand in 1992.
Who knows!? These running clubs might even help some of them find a partner and have KIDS – as the first generation to raise a family in a high rise apartment with no parking.
