Relentless pace of the running boom shows no sign of slowing down

If there were certain news events which caught you by surprise this week, rest assured the announcement by Athletics Ireland that its club membership has reached another record high is continuing along entirely predicted lines.

Indeed, when set against some of those unlikely headlines from around the world – Trump’s Republican downfall in the US, Bob Dylan meeting the Pope in Rome – this may not even be much of a story. Except that it does further reflect not only the healthy growth of athletics in this country, but also the relentless pace of the global running boom.

The November registration – and the point at which Athletics Ireland counts its annual membership – now sits at 76,507, another milestone for the governing body of the sport which has existed under various guises going back to the Irish Champions Athletic Club, founded in 1873.

This time last year, membership surpassed the 75,000-mark for the first time (75,078), which in turn represented a seven per cent increase on the 2024 registration figure of 70,320 – at that time the first to surpass the 70,000-mark. If the growth appears a little more modest in 2026, it’s because many athletics clubs all around the country are turning away young athletes in their droves, in part because there simply isn’t enough room.

Athletics Ireland are aware of this challenge. With 380 registered clubs, also a record high, throughout all 32 counties, many resources and facilities are already stretched to capacity. After another summer where so many Irish athletes broke new ground on the international stage, the profile of the sport has never been in a better place. That’s all part of the big draw here too.

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“With this growth comes a responsibility,” says Dermot McGranaghan, national club development manager at Athletics Ireland. “Our clubs are the foundation of athletics in Ireland, and every week, thousands of dedicated coaches, volunteers and club administrators give their time to create opportunities for people of all ages and abilities to enjoy our sport.

“While we rightly celebrate the achievements of our international athletes, it is equally important that we recognise the tremendous contribution of those working tirelessly at grassroots level. Our ambition is to build on this momentum, and ensure athletics remains accessible, welcoming and enjoyable for everyone.”

In Dublin, most athletics clubs now have a waiting list of various lengths, particularly at juvenile level. Dundrum South-Dublin AC, with around 1,200 members, is the largest in the country, and now boasts its own splendid club grounds just behind Marlay Park, at the foot of the Dublin Mountains. So, space is not necessarily the issue there, but the sourcing of coaches and other volunteers required to keep all those younger club numbers in check.

In recent years, there’s also been increased demand for club membership from more recreational runners. Or at least from those with less interest in the traditionally competitive end of the sport. As the relentless pace of the global running boom shows no sign of slowing, this will only put more pressure on athletics clubs to balance the needs of younger versus older membership.

Which is why many clubs have established some sort of subsidiary running sections, such as “Fit4Life” or “Meet, Train & Race”, which naturally require less coaching and supervision than their juvenile sections.

This is further reflected in some of the findings from last month’s Dublin Marathon results, carried out by data analyst Peter Staunton, which showed club-affiliated runners produced significantly faster times. Particularly among male club runners, who finished with a median time almost half an hour faster than their non-club counterparts.

Across all club-affiliated runners, the median finishing time was 3:45, versus 4:06 for non-club runners, which is again of no surprise – but is possibly going to put yet more pressure on club membership.

Staunton’s analysis also found that 20 per cent of the Dublin Marathon runners also specified a club affiliation, up from 15 per cent in the post-Covid years since 2022. It’s interesting too that since the pandemic there’s been a steady increase in the percentage of younger runners completing the Dublin Marathon; the under-35 age category doubled from 16 per cent of runners in 2022 to 33 per cent in 2026.

If more of these younger runners start looking to clubs as a way of further improving their finishing times, as well they might, then the squeeze on juvenile sections might well become greater again.

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Another running number that continued along entirely predicted lines is the 61,146 finishers in last Sunday’s New York City Marathon. With that it became the first big city marathon to exceed the 60,000-mark – breaking the previous record of 59,830 finishers set in the 2026 London Marathon last April.

In recent years, New York has always set out to beat the previous record, and amazingly, these 61,146 finishers came from a starting field of 61,529, making for a particularly low dropout rate, by any distance-running standard.

However, New York’s latest record won’t last for long. Next April, the London Marathon is set to surpass the 100,000-mark, after deciding to stage its event over two days, and with two separate events, known as “The Double”. This followed the announcement last May that over 1.3 million people applied for an entry through their ballot system, including more than 21,000 from Ireland.

The Dublin Marathon will get its latest test of this demand-versus-supply when the ballot for entries for the 2027 event opens at 9am next Thursday (November 12th), before closing at midnight the following Tuesday (November 17th).

This time last year, the Dublin organisers announced there were 47,000 ballot applications for the 22,500 available entries. While that entry number remains the same for the 2027 event, it will be no surprise to anyone if the number of ballot applications increases once again, leaving a lot more runners disappointed.

Any resulting sense of anger will also be entirely along predicted lines.