Hi there, welcome back to Breakfast Club, a newsletter for thoughtful movers. My name is Sam Robinson, a former historian-turned-tech-worker who writes about life in motion and the ideas that shape our movement through the world.
A few longer pieces are in the works. In the meantime, here are 10 stories that caught my eye.
1) Do not go gentle (Finite Jest)
Former tennis pro
writes about aging and athleticism with caustic eloquence. Sport is deeply woven into the identity of pro athletes. What happens when the inexorable attrition of time forces them to step away?Old age comes early in a tennis player’s life. While others have just begun their professional aspirations, full of hope and optimism for what the future will bring just before people start framing them as middle-aged, tennis players have already been called “veterans” by TV announcers for a few years. Clearly, I’m not over it. I can forgive but I won’t forget. I was 28!
2) Fast running (Drawing Links)
I stumbled upon this comic from
about a fast run in a park and found myself smiling. When we let go of expectations of what we should be, we can delight in the surprise of what we’ve become. Read now“I’d like to remember that life improves when I let go of ideas of what I want it to be.” —Edith Zimmerman
3) Designing for women’s feet (How I Built This)
Allyson Felix entered the 2018 track season as the most decorated athlete in the sport. But when Nike offered a new contract with a significant pay cut and lacking adequate maternal protections, she broke ties with the company.
Three years later, at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, she won a gold medal in a spike from her own brand, Saysh. Listen now
4) Running around Salton Sea until it disappears (Guardian)
California’s largest lake is slowly receding, revealing a toxic lakebed of agricultural runoff. It’s an ecological catastrophe unfolding in realtime, but one easily forgotten by the hoi polloi in wealthy havens along the SF Bay and SoCal coast.
“‘The plan,’ he said, ‘is to run until there’s no sea left to run around.’”
To call attention, William Sinclair, an ultramarathoner who goes by the nom de course of “Irondad,” circumnavigated the 92-mile seashore on foot, wearing a gas-mask to block out the dust. Read now
5) What comes after the media apocalypse? (Search Engine)
A few weeks ago, I wrote about my ambivalence to a thoughtful column from Trailrunner editor
on the risks of journalism devolving into a chorus of fan service. Turns out she wrote a timely piece. The last few weeks have seen media outlets gutting their newsrooms. LA Times, Pitchfork, Time, Buzzfeed News, and others laid off significant portions of staff.How will media, battered by the shift to digital consumption, survive the end of the low-interest economy?
That’s the topic of this conversation between
and NY Times columnist about journalism and media in a post-social-media, post-zero-interest world. Klein argues we mistakenly understand our relationship to media as essentially passive. Viewing media shapes what gets produced, advertised upon, and shared.So if you want more thoughtful content or want to know what’s happening in your area, opt for a local newspaper subscription instead of another streaming service. Subscribe to want you want to see more of in the world. Otherwise, stop complaining about “structural forces.” It’s a conservative take, but a rejoinder to the lazier forms of doomerism that grip the chattering classes.
For my part, I’m optimistic, especially for niche presses. One can feel the interest bubbling just out of sight—a desire to find interesting work beyond culture war and clickbait.
In the endurance space, models already exist, pioneered by digital outlets like Letsrun, iRunFar, and Citius. In a relatively short span of time, these sites carved out niches with paying supporters. And it’s not hard to squint and see independent outlets like Mario Fraioli’s Morning Shakeout, Alison Wade’s
, ’s , ’s , and others evolving into a rich ecosystem of writing about running and sport. It’s the best of times, it’s the worst of times, it’s exciting times! Listen nowQuick splits
The horrors of walking through Phoenix. “I would like to say we are a better country than this. Richer, more empathetic, and less selfish, but I’m not so sure anymore. There is a profound emptiness in large parts of the US—a purposelessness, hopelessness, and spiritual vacuum, being filled by an addiction to the momentary relief, fleeting felicity, and the dulling numbness of weed, booze, and perc 30s.”
How we live in the United States is not normal. “She asked me how often I saw my friends. "About once a week," I said, even though as I said it, I realized it was much less. She was shocked. "This is not normal," she said. "I see my friends every day."
Adventure on two wheels. On falling in love with riding a bicycle. “On Sunday I biked 22 miles. My ass hurts. My knees hurt. I feel great.”
Wonders of the coastal redwood. “The trees are so huge that they shut you up. Their mass dampens sound, and people in and around them tend to speak in quiet, reverent tones, as often happens when walking among giants.”
Mind and Sport at Black Canyon. Eyeing a Western States start this summer, Bartholomew toed the line hoping for a Golden Ticket result. Follow the ups and downs along with gems of wisdom in this short film from Dylan Harris.
Weekly run
Breakfast Club meets every Thursday for an 8-mile run:
When and Where: 6:30am at Lake Temescal in Oakland, CA
Pace: ~7:00 to 7:40 pace with some hills
For updates, email Katie Klymko at katieklymko at gmail.com to join Breakfast Club’s WhatsApp chat. More info
For more local events, join our Strava club, East Bay Strava Runners
Tweets of the week
Parting thought
“The German word is vorwärts, forward — that’s what you do with your bicycle. You move forward. I know some top cyclists who can do standstill; they do it on the track. I cannot do that, but I don’t need to do that — we go forward. When you go too slowly with your bicycle or nearly stop then you fall off, so it’s better to go forward. That’s what we’ve tried to do.” — Ralf Hutter
Sam, thank you for linking to my newsletter. I can't wait to read all the other stories linked above. Which gets me to your point about feeling some optimism—I share some of that. When I read about the decline of journalism, especially local news coverage, I try to square that with the fact I'm reading more quality long-form articles, newsletters, and books than ever before. I also get a great deal of news from the radio (NPR and our local community station). Traditional newspapers need to realize that their online format is incredibly reader un-friendly due to pop-out ads and clickbait. I recently ended my subscription to the Denver Post, for example, because it's so annoying to read, and I get high-quality state news from Colorado Public Radio plus the Colorado Sun, which is an award-winning online paper fully based on a subscriber and foundation revenue model, not ads. I think it's the wave of the future.