The Weakly #2: running for fiction, Global Running Day, and new podcast
This week, I dive into running's effect on the fiction-writing process of Clancy Steadwell as well as a little look at the Nike Pegasus 41 and more creativity. It's fun.
What is The Weakly about? Highlighting more cool stuff around the internet that is also tangentially related to running. Enjoy. Please.
This week, we’ll dive into the process of one of my favorite literary fiction writers on Substack. The creator of
is a runner.Writers Who Run:
I like short stories. I always have. While I’m here, ostensibly sending out my soft news missives in the world of running, I take more time to read the oodles of fiction work on Substack. It’s a less popular genre, perhaps, but it fills a hole in my soul that nothing else can.
Clancy Steadwell, then. A nom de plume, if it wasn’t clear. Clancy writes with a not dissimilar tone to me - a soupcon of fun, embedded in a much more serious subject. They run similarly to me as well: primarily solo - a way of life most writers are well accustomed to. Running became an integral part of Clancy’s life in 2020. COVID and increased isolation led to exercise-oriented desires. Clancy ran and ran.
What do you feel when you run?
“I’m a proponent of the in-through-the-nose-out-through-the-mouth running technique, which is similar to the “pot-bellied” breathing of many meditation methods. The result is a quasi-meditative state; my normally directionless, rapid, and daydreaming mind gets its energies channeled into my legs and reaches a somewhat more controlled state from which can arise any myriad of ideas.”
“When I run, I feel at my most human, like I’m doing something only humans can do, much like writing, but in a physical sense, like it’s something that is at the core of our physiological expression.”
“Also, running makes me feel small and insignificant in the grand scheme of the universe, which is comforting. I think we forget how vast and huge the world is when we step inside our metal combustion and flying machines to virtually teleport over such great distances. Running a half-marathon distance that you could drive in 20 minutes gives me perspective.“
Clancy “engage[s] with running culture in the same way that most consumerists in developed nations of the world today engage with any culture they identify with – buying the shit they tell us to buy: Hokas, nice running shorts, headbands,” but running really is a part of their writing of fiction.
How does running help your creative process?
(This is an unedited answer, because it is my idea of beauty.)
Running is part of my creative process.
I cannot imagine writing without running. In the harsh wintertime where I live, I can substitute running with walking or indoor biking or some other aerobic, cardiovascular exercise – if I need to. Generally, only sub-freezing temperatures or a large amount of snow will keep me from the roads.
In such times, my writing productivity dips.
This is because when I am running, I do not wear ear buds. I wouldn’t even bring my phone if it weren’t for the plea of my Significant Other, for safety reasons.
In this earbud-less, undistracted state, combined with the meditative trance I described before, I can find and formulate the structure of my stories, whatever memories they might be based on bubbling to the surface of my silent mind and either expounded upon or discarded as I see fit.
I’ve said elsewhere that part of my writing process is to write whole sentences in my head before even putting proverbial pen-to-paper, honing them from memory, the better I can remember them the better they are.
Running is the optimal activity during which to do so.
Sometimes I wonder, would it be more productive to listen to novels when I run? Albums? Podcasts? Could I learn another language? How much knowledge am I forgoing by insisting on using running as an elaborate daydreaming session?
One thing is for sure: I will run for so long as I am able, until I can only walk, and if I can’t walk, maybe I will be dead.
And as long as I write, I will run.
As a bus kid myself, I highly recommend you read the hilariously insightful bus kids - it’s the piece that got Clancy recognized enough to be a Featured Publication on Substack.
I hope you enjoyed this insight into the mind of a great writer. You won’t, of course, find Clancy Steadwell on any other social media, so you really ought to sign up here to receive more stories from them. That’s your only option. Lucky for all of us that it’s a good one.
Global Running Day 2024 with Nike
Last Wednesday, June 5th was #GlobalRunningDay. Nike celebrated threefold. First by unleashing the latest edition of the Pegasus (which I collated a bunch of reviews for over on Yahoo!), secondly by taking over part of Santa Monica Pier with a mini festival of running, and lastly by doing a cool marathon relay in Greece with all their influencers. I can’t find anything about the last one anywhere but Instagram, though, so whatever.
There will be more about Greece in this Thursday’s piece, funnily enough. The OG marathon might not have been accurate! Intriguing.
Last week on Running Sucks
I wrote about David Miller, who only took up photography in 2020, but took some outstanding photos at the Barkley Marathons in March, including one of the most iconic images of 2024. Take a read. It’s fascinating.
From lockdown hobby to capturing 2024's most iconic running moment
A picture tells 1,000 words, right? A good picture can, anyway. That’s the only type of picture that David Miller wants to deal in. I first happened upon his work when I was immersing myself in Allie Bailey’s wonderful book late last year. He took the wonderfully brash cover photo of Allie sitting in a deckchair on the beach in Dorset while smoking a cig…
I also reinvigorated my audio offering. Now it’s a commentary on the article, with a few more views and opinions from me, rather than a straight commentary. I’d love to know your thoughts! Please tell me them in a comment or email.
If you like reading about running, you’ll love
and I started writing our newsletters around the same time, in Spring 2023. Nico posts five articles every Monday, and they’re always great choices. Go check out this week’s post, and sign up to get more next week.
Running Sucks Haiku of the Week
I’m not so comfy
With a camera in my face
I’ll keep my keyboard
I hosted the fourth or fifth Substack Running Writers’ Meetup last Thursday 6/6. A few of us who write about running came together, including the marvelous
, whose daily poetry inspired me to write my weekly haikus. We all wrote one. Here is mine. We’d been discussing the pressure as writers to start creating video content. We all said, “No, thanks.”Please, write your own haiku in a comment. Tell me what other products you might like an explainer on. Link your favorite running-related articles. Do something cool.
Housekeeping
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Thanks for reading
- Raz
thanks for the mention! 🏃🏻♂️
Absolutely right. Running just clears your brain and brings you new ideas.