Running is becoming a popular way to pick up a date. Photo / Getty Images
Hannah Evans has tried all the conventional dating apps, with no luck. Then the single 28-year-old signed up to Strava, designed for runners to compare their stats, and found it had unexpected benefits.
“Come on, it’ll help us get in shape for summer,” my housemate said in the lockdown days of spring 2020, when the only outings permitted were for daily exercise. “It’ll be fun.”
I’d never thought of running as fun. I rarely ran for the bus and, while I did go to the gym, I avoided anything aerobic that might break a sweat.
Fast forward three years and things look dramatically different. I now run six times a week, have one marathon under my belt and am running my second in April.
If that weren’t devotion enough, today I’m out of bed at 5.30am, complete with a full face of make-up, to head outside for a run in temperatures of minus 10C. And I’m doing this on holiday, in Michigan, and I’m about to run with a bunch of people I’ve never even set eyes on. But that’s largely the point.
I’ve been told by single, sporty friends that running is now their most successful way to pick up members of the opposite sex. They’ve been on dates, got laid, found a partner, and all from putting one foot in front of the other.
My friend Harriet met her boyfriend in the queue for a Portaloo after a half marathon in London last spring. I realise the loo queue doesn’t scream romance, but they exchanged numbers after he made a flirty comment about how fast she was. The following week they went on a first date: a 5km run.
You can be much more obvious with your intentions. My friends Ben and Hamish, two very fit lads, insist on running shirtless, even in January. They say it’s because they get hot. Even in January. Others might say it’s because they are ripped and love the attention.
Many friends have met dates through running clubs, and I don’t mean elite groups where you have to be Paula Radcliffe to join. There are hundreds of small groups – free of charge – that now meet weekly in local parks for a few laps before ending at a coffee shop.
But this being 2023, alongside the clubs and the random running encounters, there’s also an app for that. It was created as a way for runners (and cyclists) to track and record their progress, but today Strava has inadvertently also become a dating app.
With more than 95 million users, the free fitness app is where exercise devotees brag about their PBs (personal bests), upload maps of their routes and give each other “kudos” – a sweaty, sporty, virtual thumbs-up.
You can follow people whose routes you like the look of or whose times you are impressed by. And when you go on a jog with other users, Strava will automatically put you together in a virtual group, so when you next open the app, you get a notification with their names and profiles. This means you don’t even have to ask for someone’s number while you’re busy getting your breath back.
“Strava is the new Tinder,” says my friend Charlotte, who met her current fling, Jason, also known as JayWillBeatIt93, via the app. Charlotte had spotted Jason on the line-up at a fun run in her local park and decided to run behind him. That afternoon, she opened Strava and there was his profile. She gave him a follow. He gave her kudos and left a flirty comment on the results of her last run. The rest is Strava history. “Think of it as like connecting with someone on LinkedIn after bumping into them at a conference,” says Charlotte.
Some of my friends use Strava and the stats it provides as a way of vetting potential suitors. Chloe runs ultra-marathons and, when she gets asked out on a date, will look up their profile on Strava to see how fast they run. “My top priorities are height and a solid 10km time,” she admits. “I want to know if he’ll be able to keep up with me.” And if he’s too slow? Well, jog on.
I’m 28, newly single and curious. I understand that not everyone might fancy getting chatted up when they’re sweating, but it makes sense to me that if you’re looking for love (or even just a one-night stand), there are worse places to start than the finish line of a race. Endorphins are high and adrenaline is flowing, creating an ideal atmosphere for flirting. I witnessed it myself last week after a 10km race in central London; the short walk from the finish line to the lockers felt like a speed-dating event.
I’ve tried plenty of apps in my dating history, from Hinge to Tinder to Bumble. From the comfort of the sofa you can set up a date from a catalogue of strangers without actually having to put yourself in any uncomfortable real-life situations.
But I’m increasingly feeling that the men I end up swiping right are rarely a good match. As a friend of mine admits, left to her own devices she is terrible at choosing a partner online. “I pick dreamboat men who look great in pictures, but that doesn’t mean we’re compatible or that they make a good partner,” she said.
At least with the men I could meet on Strava, we have one big thing in common. Of course, just because they love running doesn’t mean we’ll make a great match, but a shared, passionate interest isn’t a bad place to start.
“Running is my idea of a perfect weekend,” said one friend recently as she filled me in on a race she’d run and the people she had met afterwards – a group of four twentysomething guys. “You have an early start, get high on endorphins, make some new friends and then everyone ends up at the pub together. I’d much rather a weekend spent running than a weekend clubbing.”
All this is why, this morning, I’m battling through Michigan’s Arctic conditions to meet a group of strangers for a run club: could I walk the walk and get a date from my beloved running app? I don’t feel desperate – I am training for a marathon, so I did need to run today. And I’m far enough away from my home in London that it doesn’t matter if nobody laughs at my jokes or finds me too awkward and British.
When I arrive there’s good news: lots of people, no other British accents and everyone is going for coffee afterwards. The downside is that the cold means we’re all wearing hats, scarves, balaclavas and gloves, so I can’t spot who has a wedding ring on. And I’m not exactly dressed to pull myself, in two pairs of gloves, four thermal layers and a head torch.
But five miles, a Strava follow and ten hours later, I find myself in a bar on a date with a man I had met on that morning’s run.
And it was great. Kudos for me. We ran together and got talking. When I opened Strava later, it had done the grafting for me. Up popped a notification: you ran with Will.
That evening, I discovered, Will is 36 and works in tech. And happily, along with running, we had plenty more in common. We went on a couple more dates and he even dropped me at the airport at the end of my trip – thank you, Strava, for an unexpected holiday running romance. That final morning I did slightly regret having drunkenly signed up together for a Michigan marathon later this year.
Of course, like most modern technology, Strava has some potential drawbacks too. My friend Martha became suspicious when her boyfriend began logging regular one-way runs from his flat in south London to another neighbourhood seven miles west. Was it just an innocent jog on a route he really loved, or something more sinister? In the end, she couldn’t bear not knowing and confronted him. Sadly, thanks to Strava, he is now her ex.
Written by: Hannah Evans
© The Times of London
The former England rugby star has been married to King Charles’ niece since 2011.