What is 816 Run Club?

816 Run Club is a true non profit neighborhood running club located in the heart of KC's Midtown. Westport is the starting place for most of our runs, but we travel by foot all over the city.

Our club is participant supported both financially and by volunteers doing all of the work!

Our club is open to anyone, all paces, all distances and all disciplines of running are welcome to come get some miles in, meet some new friends and have a great time.

Our Saturday long runs start from 10 Westport Rd. KCMO 64111 at 7:30 am (rain or shine). Follow our social media for details about each run. 

These long runs are fully marked (bright signs at every turn) and supported (water stations every two miles).  The routes vary in distance from week to week (make sure your follow us on social media or get on our mailing list for details), but are typically between 10 and 20 miles with the first few miles marked out and back so you can make it as short or as long as you would like.

After the run you are welcome to hang out for a bit. Great friendships are made between the people that train together!

In addition to these Saturday morning long runs, we have other running or community based activities to expand the benefit to the club supporters as well as to the surrounding neighborhood.

How One Little Run Shop Became A Community

816 Run Club was founded on the idea of an open-door running club where everyone is always welcome. If you run a 5-minute mile or 25-minute mile, you are an equal part of the club. If you just ran your 50^th marathon or you just ran your first mile, you are an equal part of the club. All paces, all distances, EVERYONE is always welcome at 816 Run Club.

These all-accepting group runs started in March of 2015 at Run 816, a run specialty store located in the Westport neighborhood in Kansas City, MO. They started modestly and averaged 2-5 runners for the first several weeks. But then something started to grow in Westport, a running movement that drew in runners from all different backgrounds and abilities. By the time the weekly runs had been taking place for 6 months, they were consistently drawing 50+ runners on a weekend morning. The runs growing was great, but the community that was spawning from it was truly incredible. People were developing friendships and bonds that would not have been possible otherwise

In January of 2016, the inaugural Team Run 816 was introduced as the only race team in the area that had no speed qualifications. The only requirement was that you must be a nice person. The 100+ members of Team Run 816, many who had already been coming to group runs, started filling up Run 816 on the weekends.

The group runs exploded and 200 people was not an uncommon occurrence. The participants of the runs embodied the ‘Everyone Is Welcome’ mantra, showed ownership of the weekly events, and continued to make the runs something that became more than running some miles on the weekend.

While the runs were wildly successful and the largest in the city, the retail landscape was drastically changing. Run 816 made the decision to close in early 2020.

It quickly became clear that the loss of the group runs and the open-arms community that flourished out of Run 816 is what people were going to miss most. We could buy shoes somewhere else- but recreating the special sauce of those group runs and replacing the friendships was going to be impossible. The group had lost a location, had lost funding, but had not quite lost hope.

816 Run Club was founded in 2020 by Randy (a race team member) Steve (a former Run816 employee) and Nick and Tracy Pigg (former Run816 owners) (along with the help of many others!) and has kept the dream alive! Now, Nick and Tracy have restarted in the entrepreneurial spirit with a coaching business (PR Project) and have some exciting things in the works. They are no longer running the ship, it has taken off as a true non profit community Run Club led by its members and board.