Most runs and running clubs exist to build fitness or, for the competitive few, to chase a finisher’s medal.
But imagine setting a 5 AM alarm not to get in shape or win gold, but to get your hands on deep-fried kachoris or a cup of tiramisu. It sounds counterproductive, like something straight out of a dream, but it’s happening across India as food-themed run clubs pop up city after city.
In Hyderabad, people are jogging behind a moving cart, chasing tiramisu like it’s the last bus home. In Bengaluru, one run ends in a dance party at a bakery. So what exactly is going on, and why is it taking off in India?
What Are Food Runs?
A food run is exactly what it sounds like once you stop overthinking it: a group run, usually 5 to 7 kilometres at an easy pace, built entirely around a food reward that’s either waiting at the finish line or scattered along the route.
According to The CSR Journal, the format varies by city and club. Some offer food strictly as a finish-line reward, while others weave it into the run itself through moving food carts or planned café pit stops.
The craze appears to have started with Bikaner Run Club’s Kachori Run, where, per the same report, participants are handed fried kachoris as soon as they finish. The event was branded a “Sunday cheat day.”
From there, the idea has evolved city by city into something closer to a moving food festival. Bengaluru’s Stride Run Club has created a bakery-hopping format: runners move from one bakery to the next, sampling each stop’s signature item and collecting a stamp that serves as their ticket to the next.
Sidharth Yadav, founder of Stride Run Club Bengaluru, explained where the idea came from: “I had spent days moving from one cafe to another in Bengaluru’s Indiranagar, trying different food. Combining that with running meant participants could discover new places, eat along the way and meet people at the same time.”
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Hyderabad’s version takes a different route, quite literally, with a mobile tiramisu cart that participants chase down over the course of the run. HYD.STRD, a running and social community in Hyderabad, started the concept as India’s first Tiramisu Run, a relaxed 5K.
Mumbai’s Hundred Mile Society put its own spin on the theme, swapping kachoris for modaks.
Karun Aranakkal, founder of Hundred Mile Society, told India Today, “I got inspired partly by the viral kachori run by Bikaner Run Club but wanted something that was light enough to eat during the experience and also felt connected to Mumbai, hence the choice of ukadiche modak.”
Why Are Food Runs Taking Off?
A big reason for their popularity is that running in India has become a social movement rather than a solitary grind. People aren’t showing up at 5 AM purely to burn calories. They’re showing up because the run has become an event: a reason to leave the house, meet strangers and discover a bakery they’d never have found otherwise.
Image Credits: Google Images
Sources: India Today, Firstpost, TOI, The CSR Journal
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This post is tagged under: Run, Health, Fitness, Run clubs, Run Club India, food run, food run India, running, running trend
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