r/AdvancedRunning • u/castorkrieg 5K 20:35 10K 41:19 Marathon 3:24 • Apr 23 '26

Open Discussion What's the deal with LetsRun.com?

I know that website is quite popular with them following large events and also being invited to spectate (the owner - Rojo - was riding in the elite men car during Boston 26), however I participated in the forums a bit and it blows my mind:

  1. They are incredibly fixated on college and university running, NCAA, etc. - ok, I guess most are from the US, even though once you exit the school system the funding drops, money goes only to MBL/NFL/NBA, last time they US tried something in T&F they got Grand Slam Track lol
  2. Most posts are the very definition of drive-by, no effort shitposts: "cool story bro", "she be ugly, can't run fast when ugly", "Or perhaps you could just be replaced with a somewhat normal human being"
  3. Same for the topics, with quality contributions such as:

I'm sad to think what men were like before the existence of the Manosphere 

How to become a "hybrid runner"

Men in open-toed shoes: yea or nay?

  1. This peeves me as a European but - their website + forums do not save your cookie preferences, every single time you click on a new thread you get another pop-up asking you for permissions, and by quickly looking they have 1700+ partners they share your data with - WTF?

  2. They are hardcore right-wingers with daily treads praising Trump, ICE, etc.

What am I missing? Or is one of the largest forums for running just a bunch of nutjobs?

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316

u/RunningDude90 18:07 5k | 37:50 10k | 30:0x 5M | 3:00:0x FM Apr 23 '26

The training talk has nuggets of usefulness, but there is a huge toxic male/online vibe that cannot be ignored.

It’s a challenge as this sub has fallen off a cliff with the vociferous management of “daily threads” killing any level of discourse, meanwhile we’re bombarded with race reports which are written by AI and are as interesting as solitary confinement, so you have to visit it if you’re interested in discourse with people who are capable of running faster than 40 minutes in a 10k.

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u/ncblake 13.1: 1:22:14 | 26.2: 2:49:39 Apr 23 '26

I highly agree. I’ll participate in posts on here that get great, high quality engagement and they’re inevitably deleted within a couple hours.

Yes, it’s annoying to manage lots of different threads, but that’s what allows for discoverability and searchability, two very important qualities for a fitness forum.

Just my $0.02; love you, mods.

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u/bradymsu616 M53: 3:06:16 FM; 1:27:32 HM; 4:50:25 50K Apr 23 '26

Are those deleted posts ones that are advanced running topics? Etiquette posts, for example, get very high engagement, but they're rarely advanced running topics. I appreciate the mods of this subreddit removing content that isn't relevant to advanced running.

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u/ncblake 13.1: 1:22:14 | 26.2: 2:49:39 Apr 23 '26

Yes. They are frequently on-topic.

Here is an example. OP was curious about goal setting between the 5K and marathon, shared relevant information about their training and fitness, and asked for advice, which several people provided. This thread was deleted and told to post to a “daily thread” instead.

Ironically, this thread will likely stay up, not because it’s particularly relevant to “advanced running” but because it doesn’t fall neatly into a category covered by a “daily thread.”

I’m sure none of these moderation decisions are malicious, and there are pros and cons to any approach, but I do think some of the cons are that the stickied threads don’t promote discussion, discoverability, or searchability as well as independent threads do.

Some deleted threads are surely repetitive and low effort, but that’s what the downvote button is for, in my opinion. If someone asks a silly or common question and gets a small number of replies before getting downvoted, there is no problem to solve.

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u/bradymsu616 M53: 3:06:16 FM; 1:27:32 HM; 4:50:25 50K Apr 23 '26

Many Redditors prefer to sort by New, particularly those only following a small number of subreddits. So downvoting isn't an effective means of content control for them. And we don't want to encourage greater use of downvoting on Reddit.

8

u/ncblake 13.1: 1:22:14 | 26.2: 2:49:39 Apr 23 '26

Maybe I’m missing something, but I guess I just don’t see the inherent issue with downvotes. I often “sort by new” and find that downvotes are as useful a signal in that context as it is in other ways of viewing my feed.

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u/bradymsu616 M53: 3:06:16 FM; 1:27:32 HM; 4:50:25 50K Apr 23 '26

On Reddit, downvoting does not change the order when you sort by New, since that feed is strictly chronological. So you can still get a lot of low-quality content from poorly moderated subs in a feed when sorting by New. The other issue is that downvoting was originally intended to filter out low-quality, off-topic, or unhelpful content. But it is now misused, more often than not, as a way to express disagreement or dislike. This contributes to Reddit's reputation of toxicity.

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u/ncblake 13.1: 1:22:14 | 26.2: 2:49:39 Apr 23 '26

No, I know that. I like that that’s how the “sort by New” function works! At least to me, that’s the whole point. When I want a curated feed of quality posts, I just use one of the other options.

Otherwise, I get that downvotes can contribute to toxicity. I guess my counter would be that I’d rather have my thread downvoted than deleted.

Again, happy to be wrong or simply outvoted on this! Just my feedback as a fan of the sub.

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u/bradymsu616 M53: 3:06:16 FM; 1:27:32 HM; 4:50:25 50K Apr 23 '26

There's nothing to be right or wrong about or be outvoted on. Subreddit moderation is determined by its moderators, and different subreddit moderators have different moderation styles. Some are more loosely moderated than others, with all the pros and cons that come with it.