What motivates runners? What gets them to put their trainers on and head out the door on dark, wet, winter days? As an agency working with brands, charities and rights holders, we wanted to better understand this motivation and discover what drives runners to enter mass participation running events.
Working in partnership with findarace.com, we surveyed almost 2,000 event participants to better understand their motivations. Here are some of the headlines:
- For the first time in history, women are starting to outnumber men in recreational running, and as more women take up running, it will be interesting to watch how they influence and shape mass participation running events.
- A new kind of runner is emerging, less focused on PB’s and more concerned with well being, health and new experiences.
- There is a a shift in how running is perceived and practised, from a sport to an important part of a healthy lifestyle.
The report explores and identifies significant opportunities for events to better attract and retain these new runners, helps brands and event sponsors to better utilise events to connect and engage with potential customers and makes recommendations to charities to improve how they retain and convert runners into longer term supporters.
