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The State of Running Clubs in America

An independent count of 3,801 running clubs across 2,104 cities in 51 states — compiled from Google Maps, the RRCA member directory, and organic discovery of clubs that live only on Meetup, Strava, and Facebook. We measured how many clubs each state has per resident, and the share carrying the signals runners actually search for: free to join, beginner-friendly, RRCA-affiliated, women’s, and a no-drop, all-paces “you won’t be left behind” promise. Filtered to genuine running clubs — no shoe stores, gyms, or one-off races.

3,801Running clubs
11.2Clubs per million residents
23.9%RRCA-affiliated
8.2%No-drop or all-paces
3.6%Flagged free to join
4.4%Beginner-friendly

Key findings

Methodology & download

Clubs are compiled from public map and business listings, the RRCA member-club directory, and organic discovery of clubs that live only on Meetup, Strava, or Facebook, then filtered to genuine running clubs and group runs (no sporting-goods stores, gyms, or one-off races). Clubs per million residents uses 2024 US Census state population estimates. The community shares are evidence-based floors, not guesses: a club is only counted as free, beginner-friendly, women’s, or no-drop when its own description, website, or runners’ reviews say so — real clubs without that wording are undercounted, not overstated, so true shares run a little higher.

Download the per-state data (CSV) Free to reuse with attribution to RunningGroups.org.

Running clubs by state, ranked

Ranked by clubs per million residents. Click any column heading to re-sort.

# State Clubs Per 1M % Free % Beginner % RRCA % Women’s % No-drop
1 Montana 22 19.3 9.1% 4.5% 50% 9.1% 9.1%
2 Massachusetts 135 18.9 4.4% 3% 28.9% 3% 4.4%
3 Indiana 128 18.5 0% 4.7% 17.2% 3.9% 5.5%
4 Alaska 13 17.6 0% 0% 53.8% 7.7% 15.4%
5 Connecticut 61 16.6 1.6% 0% 16.4% 4.9% 4.9%
6 New Hampshire 23 16.3 4.3% 4.3% 34.8% 13% 13%
7 North Dakota 13 16.3 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%
8 Oregon 68 15.9 4.4% 2.9% 30.9% 5.9% 5.9%
9 Utah 53 15.1 5.7% 1.9% 3.8% 3.8% 3.8%
10 Colorado 85 14.3 4.7% 8.2% 25.9% 7.1% 12.9%
11 New Jersey 133 14 1.5% 6% 19.5% 1.5% 6%
12 Kansas 41 13.8 0% 7.3% 24.4% 2.4% 12.2%
13 Idaho 27 13.5 3.7% 0% 25.9% 3.7% 7.4%
14 Washington 105 13.2 3.8% 3.8% 26.7% 4.8% 7.6%
15 Illinois 164 12.9 3.7% 5.5% 22.6% 3% 6.7%
16 Rhode Island 14 12.6 0% 14.3% 7.1% 0% 7.1%
17 Maine 17 12.1 29.4% 5.9% 29.4% 5.9% 11.8%
18 Ohio 143 12 4.2% 2.8% 16.8% 6.3% 7%
19 South Dakota 11 11.9 0% 0% 45.5% 0% 0%
20 Wyoming 7 11.9 0% 0% 71.4% 0% 0%
21 Michigan 120 11.8 5% 5% 23.3% 5.8% 11.7%
22 North Carolina 126 11.4 6.3% 4.8% 17.5% 5.6% 7.9%
23 District of Columbia 8 11.4 0% 12.5% 37.5% 12.5% 37.5%
24 Florida 262 11.2 3.4% 6.5% 24% 3.1% 8.8%
25 California 439 11.1 3% 5.2% 21.4% 4.3% 6.2%
26 Minnesota 64 11 4.7% 0% 21.9% 1.6% 1.6%
27 Tennessee 79 10.9 3.8% 3.8% 29.1% 6.3% 7.6%
28 Vermont 7 10.8 0% 0% 57.1% 14.3% 14.3%
29 Georgia 120 10.7 0.8% 3.3% 21.7% 5.8% 5.8%
30 West Virginia 19 10.7 10.5% 10.5% 36.8% 0% 5.3%
31 Virginia 92 10.4 4.3% 1.1% 37% 7.6% 14.1%
32 Louisiana 48 10.4 0% 4.2% 27.1% 6.2% 10.4%
33 Pennsylvania 133 10.2 6% 3% 29.3% 6% 9%
34 Wisconsin 61 10.2 3.3% 4.9% 19.7% 11.5% 13.1%
35 New York 199 10 2% 5.5% 27.6% 5% 11.1%
36 New Mexico 21 9.9 0% 4.8% 28.6% 0% 0%
37 Arkansas 30 9.7 3.3% 0% 50% 0% 6.7%
38 Iowa 31 9.6 6.5% 3.2% 16.1% 0% 0%
39 Texas 291 9.3 4.5% 3.8% 19.6% 4.5% 8.9%
40 South Carolina 49 8.9 2% 2% 20.4% 14.3% 16.3%
41 Arizona 67 8.8 6% 9% 17.9% 0% 6%
42 Missouri 53 8.5 3.8% 1.9% 32.1% 9.4% 13.2%
43 Alabama 44 8.5 2.3% 6.8% 22.7% 4.5% 9.1%
44 Hawaii 11 7.6 0% 9.1% 72.7% 0% 9.1%
45 Nebraska 15 7.5 0% 0% 20% 13.3% 13.3%
46 Maryland 46 7.3 4.3% 8.7% 41.3% 8.7% 15.2%
47 Oklahoma 30 7.3 6.7% 0% 13.3% 6.7% 3.3%
48 Kentucky 32 7 6.2% 6.2% 12.5% 3.1% 15.6%
49 Mississippi 18 6.1 0% 0% 22.2% 5.6% 5.6%
50 Delaware 6 5.7 0% 0% 66.7% 0% 0%
51 Nevada 17 5.2 0% 11.8% 11.8% 35.3% 17.6%

“Per 1M” = running clubs per million residents (2024 Census). “—” means no population estimate was available. Shares are evidence-required floors, so treat them as minimums.

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