The reluctant run club founder
Koreatown Run Club is one of the most firmly established Los Angeles institutions, but, in the beginning, founder Duy Nguyen didn’t even see himself as a runner.
Koreatown. It’s the bustling and diverse beating heart of Los Angeles.
Situated slap bang in the middle of central Los Angeles, it’s a neighborhood defined by everything from beautifully grimy dive bars and world-class Korean BBQ to strip mall speakeasies and neon-hued karaoke. It’s got it all.
So how did a 200-mile run across Haiti in 2016 inspire the creation of Koreatown Run Club? Over the seven days he spent filming a documentary of the event, Duy Nguyen saw first-hand how much more there can be to running.
Nguyen already knew that he wanted to build a new community in his neighborhood, but it was while capturing the emotions of everyday people traversing a country that he knew it needed to center around running. Upon his return to L.A., he informed his friend Michael Pak that they were to start a run club.
“Let’s just post on Instagram.”
At that time, however, they “didn't know that running clubs were a thing,” so they simply settled on a time and date, and posted to Instagram. 28 people showed up - mostly good friends (who were not runners) trying to support Duy and Mike’s new endeavor. That was a one-time offer of goodwill. For future runs, they were on their own.
Pak was already deep into blending community and culture through the popular @koreatown handle that he’d owned since high school, so they had a leg-up building the run club’s digital following. This was a time when Instagram was an open, seemingly democratic place to organically find your tribe, and Duy’s creative instincts and professional background in visuals meant that the KRC Instagram posts were beautifully curated at the perfect moment.
“What you see on Instagram is just how I like to make things. There wasn't a plan of, ‘We should do this because people who like running will like it.’ If I do anything I want it to look and feel a certain way, and if you go all the way back, you can see it was a little rougher; you can tell we didn't sit down and plan the identity and the brand guidelines and colors.”
“I remember people would message me asking what app I use? It was Photoshop… on my laptop.”
Everything’s easy when you know how to do it, of course, but that extra bit of time that Nguyen invested into building a proper visual identity for the run club - in the mold of his own mind - really separated KRC from the pack. It meant that they looked slick as well as being an organized community hub. They talked the talk, but they also walked (ran) it.
The non-running run club founder
Neither Duy nor Mike were big on running when they started their run club, but timing is everything. Nike Run Club was a big player, but was gradually pulling out of the Los Angeles running community at around the same time as Koreatown Run Club was founded. With a visual aesthetic that wouldn’t look out of place in a Nike promotion, and a commitment to providing a schedule, Duy and Mike accidentally cornered the market by giving people a reliable place to run.
It took time for them to feel like they were part of the wider running community, but by regularly attending larger events they got there.
“Nike did a 10k in Santa Monica, and I went to that. This is when Nike was the only brand doing things out here, and everyone was head-to-toe in Nike. It was pretty intimidating - everyone already knew each other.”
“I never thought about how long it took to fit in because I would just come back to KRC and be back home.”
“I guess that’s how people might feel coming to a run club for the first time, where everyone already knows each other.”
The rest is history. With the rigor of four runs scheduled every week and a fully-laden merchandise store that oozes cool, Koreatown Run Club is a full service operation. Now, other L.A. runners and run clubs try to fit in with them.
About Duy
Tell us about your first run
“The first one was when I was still back in Richmond, Virginia before moving out to L.A. and I had just gotten a pair of running shoes. I remember coming back home, and I’d just run so hard. For what? I had never run before, and for whatever reason I just ran so hard that I got home and I almost passed out. I remember laying on the floor spread out, just panting. It was the hardest thing I had ever done. I probably ran a mile and a half.”
“The second time was when I moved to L.A. and I did it again. Usually, I just ran a mile because that was all I ran in school, right? I would get tired at the end of it, and for some reason I thought, ‘Let me just try to run a little more than a mile.’ Basically, I warmed up for that mile, and then after I was like, ‘I feel better!’”
What part of running sucks the most and what is your solution?
“Even though I've been running for eight years now, the hardest part is still just starting.”
“So I surround myself with so many people that I don't even think about it. I don't know how to run by myself. It's weird. With KRC, you show up, you look for parking for 30 minutes, and you talk to your friends for 15 minutes. The run was supposed to start at 8pm, it's 8:45 now, you start running, and then it's over.”
Why do you run now?
“I trapped myself. I started this thing and I feel like I have to continue to do it. I do plan on having a year-long break and just run once a week, though.”
Duy’s very questionable idea of what a break entails should tell you a lot about his work ethic.
The future
Forever starting new projects - we’re sitting and talking in his latest project, Love Hour, a smash burger restaurant - Nguyen talks about the ever-looming threat of burnout. Once he’s done running the six major marathons (again) he’ll receive his second Six-Star Finisher medal (yes, he’s doing the whole thing twice). That might mean the never-ending journey of marathon training - that break from the relentless constant of running might take place.
Personal goals aside, KRC is now correctly seen as one of the most established and important pillars of the Los Angeles running community. Over the eight years of its existence, however, the global landscape has changed in terms of running clubs.
“There were so many before us. We're just babies over here compared to New York and other places around the world. They've been going so strong for so long, and we look up to those guys.”
Nguyen speaks fondly about New York’s Bridgerunners and their non-mainstream evolution as they pioneered modern day run crews: how they wore whatever sports apparel was available 20 years ago, and how modern day runners have a wealth of options available to them in terms of both clothing and social run clubs to join.
“The world is trying to find community, and running allows you to do that so easily.”
“I think people have figured out that they can start a run club now - there's a path that they can see. Whereas before you would start a run club, kind of unsure of what it would lead to. Obviously, people might not know the path but there are people that are aware of it and do it for that reason, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.”
How, then, does Duy feel about being a leader in the Los Angeles running community?
“I'm not like the mayor or anything [laughs]. It's like the boiled frog. You throw a frog in boiling water and it’s going to jump out, but if you put it in lukewarm water, you turn the temperature up, it's going to slowly die. It’s a weird analogy, but we just started from zero and slowly, slowly grew. It feels like a natural progression.”
After eight years, he’s built Koreatown Run Club organically to a position where it can sustain itself without Duy’s direct and constant input.
“I feel like it already is controlled by the runners. You can go to a run and not know who started this thing. You can not know who I am for years. Everything is in place for it to go on and evolve if I were to move on.”
From only starting to run regularly after starting a run club and building a marathon training plan for his community and contributing 170 club members to this weekend’s Los Angeles Marathon (the third most of any L.A. club), to becoming a six-star finisher in the World Marathon Majors twice over, Duy Nguyen’s running journey is as leftfield, altruistic, and inspiring as his creative brain dictates.
Ways to make running suck less covered today
Find a run club to take your mind off the difficult parts
Travel the world and run 12 consecutive major marathons
Accept defeat: you’re a runner, so go run
Running Sucks Haiku of the Week
When injuries strike
It’s necessary to rest
I miss running, though
I looked at my Strava fitness chart last week and it was looking great, which meant that I was due an injury or illness. It turned out to be a pinched nerve in my back. It’s quite painful, but at least I can blame any errors on the heavy duty meds I’m on.
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I didn't even get round to talking about their merch, which is ultra cool!
I’m always fascinated by which running clubs take off and which ones don’t.
Sounds like KRC had a very real element of something cool and different.
But also, perhaps, a case of right place at the right time?
Either way, more power to them! Extraordinary number of athletes to be entering into a big race.