The idea began with five friends who began running unusual routes through San Francisco.
Once, they flipped a coin at every intersection to decide which way to go. Then someone got the idea of running the same route as the 1-California bus.
The run — from the Outer Richmond to Embarcadero Plaza — was a hit. They could playfully compete with the buses, and leave the decisions of where to run to Muni. They decided to run more bus routes. One of the friends, Akash Borde, created a group on the fitness app Strava named “Muni Run Club.”
Strava’s recommendation algorithm began surfacing the club to strangers. Over a year later, Muni Run Club has 1,095 members, and has run every Muni route, excluding express and special lines. That is a total of more than 368 miles, or the same distance from the Ferry Building to Disneyland in Anaheim.
On a recent Sunday, I decided to join them. I laced up my tattered five-year old running shoes and tried to summon my cross-country-runner mentality that I hadn’t seen since … high school.
Outside the Caltrain station at King and Fourth streets at 9 a.m., 16 other people in running gear leaned against trees and poles to stretch before taking their first stride. The Strava group may be large, but individual runs are rarely above 30, says Borde.
Today’s run: Follow the N-Judah Muni Metro line along the city’s waterfront, down Market Street, and through the Sunset District before ending at Ocean Beach, a nearly 10-mile route. I was relieved to learn that we would run on the sidewalks and not on the tracks, for safety. And at 9 a.m. on a Sunday, there was little traffic of any kind.
My most recent long run was a 4-mile jog in preparation for my rugby club’s tournament in Boston in 2024. I did not know if my legs, let alone my shoes, would make it.
Muni routes make for good running, said Taylor Lee, one of the co-captains, because the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency’s light rail and bus lines span hundreds of miles, and are designed to reach most areas of the city.
Compared to the other run clubs Lee has been a part of, he said, Muni Run Club offers the most variety, “geographically and topographically.”
Their longest run so far: A midnight endeavor along the length of the 91-3rd Owl bus, totaling 25.2 miles. Borde was still shocked when recounting how more than 30 people showed up at West Portal station for the “insane run.”
Today’s pace was slow enough that participants managed to have enough breath in their lungs to chat.
Topics included their jobs (there were several tech workers and a few who worked for city agencies), excitement for the vintage streetcar parade that passed as we ran, and how to make San Francisco less car-dependent. Borde pondered about introducing more lines or dedicated bus lanes.
A few members said they are supporting the upcoming Muni Parcel Tax and public transit sales-tax measures slated for the November ballot (support, as one might imagine, was high).
Reasons for joining varied. “I like transit and running, so, great combination,” said Ryan Oliver, who moved to San Francisco from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, two years ago.
Borde sees something more profound at work. In a city that has more people “glued to their screens” and fewer spaces to find post-pandemic community, a group like the club “opens the doors to new positive experiences.”
I thought my positive experience would start after we summited the hills surrounding Buena Vista Park and the University of California, San Francisco-Parnassus campus. From there, the rest of the trip would be downhill.
Then co-captain Lee said, “only 45 more avenues to go!”
The runners cheered for the news. I did not.
“I would rather be on a rugby pitch getting tackled than continue for another 4 miles,” I muttered to my running partner, George Padeigis.
He laughed gently and sped up, leaving me behind. Ahead of me, I could see the runners leading the group, waving at passing Muni trains with the same vigor as when we had started.
At the beginning of the run, Lee clued the group in to one of the advantages of Muni Run Club: If you start to fall behind, just hop on Muni, rest, and rejoin the group when you can. When a rock got stuck in my shoe, I decided it was time.
My rental chariot reached the final Muni stop just as the five runners in the lead approached the end. They were no longer chattering.
Co-captain Lee was the first to pass the stop. Before anyone could come to a halt, he yelled, “Around the train! Do the lap around the turnaround point to the ‘Last Stop, First Stop’ mural.”
Amazingly, his cardio-loving compatriots complied. Between their attempts to regain their breath, they sported massive smiles as they high-fived one another and cheered on the rest of the group as they finished.
Borde gathered the group in front of the parked N-Judah train and encouraged everyone to hold out their fingers to make the shape of an N, to pay homage to the line, and a nearby pedestrian helped snap a picture. It was 11:19 a.m.
Mission accomplished, a few strolled down to the nearby Java Beach Cafe to continue the conversation. Others turned their watches back on to track their runs home.
The remaining few, including myself, slowly made our way back to the Muni stop and took the train back, along the same route we had just run.
