The association wants to motivate beginners who drop out more slowly if they are accompanied during group sessions. – Urban runners
- The Bordeaux association Urban Runners has met with great success, in particular since the health crisis.
- It offers various running sessions punctuated by green spaces in the Bordeaux metropolis.
- She wants to both promote healthy sport and develop social ties, undermined by health restrictions.
“I am not very motivated but they manage to make me put on my sneakers”, summarizes Constance, 40, who discovered
the Urban Runners association two years ago and participates in the beginner level running sessions every week. While she admits getting tired after ten minutes when she alone, she runs between 45 minutes to an hour, accompanied by the association.
“We start alone but we get bored quickly, especially when we start, confirms Cedric Barreau, national secretary of the association Urban Runners France. We do the same course and become demotivated after a while. This Bordeaux association, created in March 2015 and now national, offers participants a variety of courses to maintain their motivation. Result: the association’s seven volunteers run around 100 people a week in the Bordeaux metropolis and the association is recruiting new organizers to meet the demand. Six years after its launch, it is increasingly popular with individuals, especially since the restrictions related to the fight against the Covid-19 epidemic.
Urban people want nature
The association does not require membership and participation in the running sessions is free. “We create an event on Facebook. It specifies the pace, the distance and gives an overview of the course but without giving the details, so that they can discover it with us, ”explains Cédric Barreau. He organizes sessions himself and considers that it is the facilitator who gets tired of going through the same places first. “Sometimes I will run alone and I trace routes through as many wooded areas as possible, because in urban areas, runners look for nature,” he emphasizes. In Talence, I proposed a session where we went through 14 different green spaces. »The sessions can be thematic and offer to discover graffiti, monuments etc.
“We want to get them off the couch and have them run near their homes,” sums up the national secretary. Beginners are more reluctant to take a little distance to run while the more experienced, who are motivated by performance issues, are ready to do more kilometers.
To join the association’s running sessions, the process is very simple. “The runner fills in the rules for participation in the sessions and does not need a medical certificate. It is his liability insurance that comes into play in the event of a problem, ”explains Cédric Barreau. The successive restrictions linked to the fight against the epidemic have limited social interactions and the association also gives itself the role of recreating them around sporting activity. “We meet people and we run in a relaxed way, in a good mood”, appreciates Constance.