runners (and people who run) through social media..

so susan rinkunas has been the woman behind Runner's World's tweets and facebook posts for the past year and a half or so.  as she is now leaving her post as RW's social media-er, she wrote an article about what she learned about runners (or, in my case, people who run) during her time managing RW's twitter and facebook accounts.

susan wrote 6 things that she learned while managing these accounts, the first of which is one of my biggest reasons for continuing to run...

Runners are nice to each other. Cliche but true: Runners support other runners who are total strangers. Even a simple comment like "That's awesome Brian!" on a post about running with asthma warms my heart. Elites like marathon world record-holder Paula Radcliffe offer encouragement, too. And when the errant jerk does say something mean to someone, others swiftly jump in to defend that person. I don't want to point out the meanies, but trust me when I say that I've seen this more times than I can count.

it's true.  if you run in new york, if you run anywhere, you know that there's nothing like the support of other people who run.  it's why i had so much fun cheering on the runners in this years nyc half-marathon, it's why i remind my running ladies how badass they are when we finish a rough run, and it's why i keep going when all i want to do is stop.

maybe it's why i still run even though it's not something i particularly enjoy doing... who knows.  on that note: if you're a psychiatrist or psychologist or psycho-anything, would you happen to know why my friends and i continue to run and sign up for races when we don't like it?  is it the whole "why do i keep hitting myself with a hammer? cuz it feels so good when i stop" mentality?  any explanation would be greatly appreciated.

interested in what else susan had to say?  read her entire article here: What I Learned About Runners as RW's Social Media Editor