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Going the Extra Mile - Meet Our Founder

by Lucas Hathaway 21 Feb 2023 0 Comments

Going the Extra Mile
Meet Our Founder

 


Our founder Lucas Hathaway doesn’t just talk the talk. He’s an elite runner with a whole wall of race medals to prove it. He’s put in the hours pounding pavement, working his way up from a casual cross-country runner in high school to a dedicated ultra-marathoner. He’s finished three 50 milers and a 100 miler, with more to add to the list shortly. To top it off, Lucas plans to complete his last of the six World Marathon Majors series in Tokyo next month.

 


A driven entrepreneur, Lucas has a brain built for ingenuity and innovation. Launching one business would be enough for most people — but in addition to Runur, Lucas operates three others. Runur started with just a seed of an idea, built on a powerful personal mission to create comfortable running gear that could go the distance. Over the past two years, it’s come to life and helped build a running community in the process. If you already own Runur gear, you know there’s no turning back: Once a Runur, always a Runur.

 


Let’s pick Lucas’ brains and find out what a Runur can do with hard work and intelligent training — and what an ambitious entrepreneur can do with a little determination and vision. He shares the lessons learned from the ups and downs of his running career and how learning how to channel adversity helped him cross the finish line — both in business and on the race course.


Q: What does running mean to you?


The thing I’ve loved most about the sport is the greater good that it does in my life. Yes, it has health benefits and you receive some cool medals at races. But if you find a connection to running and you’re excited to run at 5 a.m. or midnight, on hot days and cold days, you know you’ve found something that supersedes. I love what running has done to me as a person —I used to be a traffic fool, honking the horn, and experiencing road rage; now I stay calm and collected. Once you fall in love with doing hard things, it seems to improve the overall quality of your life. Running clears my mind and overall makes me a better human.

 


Q: What is the story behind Runur?


I ran cross country in high school and I always just liked the act of running. But I can trace the start of Runur directly back to the home stretch of my first New York City marathon in 2017 — the last 10K to be exact. I was actually crying while running; it marks the moment I finally connected emotionally with running.

 


The community became real to me in those moments. My love for running is forever etched now. The course takes you through all five boroughs, with the cheers of three million spectators. You have that experience of being absolutely wrecked physically and everything hurts. But at the end, when you get to Central Park, turn the corner, and hear the roar of the finish line and feel the pull toward it, there’s just nothing like it. It becomes less about finishing that race, and more about the start of a new love. Since that day, I’ve logged an additional ten thousand miles and I still come back to that moment — it was a special one because it was the first of many moments that enforced my love of the running community.


Q: Can you tell us about some of those other defining moments?


Running with people constantly brings unexpected joys. JFK has no headphones, so you get to meet dozens of people and build potentially lifelong friendships. I’ve made new friends at races and I’m very much the chatty runner. As much as you can focus externally on other people, it gets you out of your own mind. It helps you finish the race. Whether that friendship is for 10 miles or for a lifetime, it’s fantastic to connect through a mutual hard experience and come out the other side. You have opportunities at every run to build a lifelong friendship.

 


Q: What motivated you to bring Runur gear to life?


From a practical standpoint, I just couldn’t find the gear I needed to succeed. I have a background building companies, so it became a challenge for me. I thought: how can I do this better? Can I build something that doesn’t exist in the marketplace? I went on a year-long prototype journey to create the best pair of running shorts I possibly could create. Every product we try to produce must be founded in a practical, utilitarian approach — this product really does solve a need. We don’t want to just be a fashion brand, with apparel that doesn’t hold up on long runs.


Everything we produce, I’ve personally tested, and my family of runurs has tested. We want to build products that work for the race you’re doing. It was such a fun group effort to build the brand with my family and friends. The ethos was built via community, and we want to continue that ideal.


Q: What do you appreciate the most about working in the running apparel world?


Running apparel brands really add to the community in a deep way. It’s not about a business making a profit or creating a fashion product that feeds into consumerism; it’s an industry that gives back to the community. The gear that is created encourages people to enjoy the sport at a different level — it helps you dive into the sport.

 


Q: What does the future hold for Runur?


From a practical standpoint, there are more products that we want to improve. I think we already have something superior, but in the future, we also want to actively disrupt the status quo and home in on apparel that fits everyday runners, from 5Ks all the way up to ultras.


The running world seems to be dominated by shoe companies that happen to make apparel, too. Apparel tends to be an afterthought. Yes, you need good shoes, but the rest of your running gear also needs to be up to par. We want to help you reach your goals and cross that finish line with a smile on your face — or, at least, legs that aren’t chafed!

 

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