A Guide to Running Clubs on the Upper West Side; ‘There’s a Group for Runners of Every Level’

By Tracy Zwick

It’s autumn, the weather’s getting crisp and you can’t walk into a park without seeing runners. We live in a runner’s paradise on the Upper West Side, with routes galore, varied terrain, and dozens of clubs and teams for runners at every level. Whether you want to improve your fitness, lift your spirits, break a personal record, meet new friends, seek out love and community or a new challenge, there’s a running group for you. To create this guide, WSR has done the legwork, getting out and running with these clubs, all of which have runs on or near the UWS.

Running can feel intimidating. It did to me when, amidst some major personal upheavals three years ago, I decided to run the NYC Marathon. I’d been a two-to-three-mile recreational runner for ages, but I’d never run a race in my life. I didn’t know a tempo run from a progression run, and I still can’t convert kilometers to miles.

If that resonates, take heart. When I went out to run with the groups below, they were patient, instructive, supportive, and fun. Click on the links to learn more about each one.

UWS Running Clubs and Teams

UWS Run Club

I showed up near the the American Museum of Natural History one evening this August to meet with UWS Run Club and immediately connected with some other first-timers. The vibe was warm and neighborly. The run was detailed ahead of time on an app called Heylo that a lot of running clubs use, so we all knew to expect a 3-4 mile run. But before we took off in pace groups ranging from about 8-minute to 11-minute miles, an announcement was made about where to go after the run for drinks.

This group skewed younger – the oldest person I chatted with was in his 40s. UWS Run Club has a vibrant Instagram presence, so if you’re not on Heylo or Strava, you can connect with them through their Insta, and you can read more about them in this recent New York Times story. They have runners training for big races as well as casual runners, and they offer social events in addition to three runs a week.

Central Park Track Club 

CPTC is the club I joined when I was brand-new to the running scene. It’s a competitive running team and, while you don’t have to be a seasoned racer, you may not find like-minded runners here if you aren’t and don’t care about getting relatively fast.

But if you do feel a need for speed, CPTC offers world-class road and track workouts, race guidance and special sections for sprinters, mid-distance and long-distance runners. They compete hard, and win. There are always club members making their way to each of the world ‘s major marathons and loads of other races, so it’s easy to find company at far-from-home competitions. And while it may be restrictive in terms of speed, of all the groups I visited CPTC is the most diverse and robust in terms of age. There are recently-graduated collegiate runners as well as a squad of “masters” runners, which includes athletes in their 40s through their 80s.

CPTC’s coaching staff includes former Olympians, world-record holders and Olympic Trials Qualifiers. They offer workouts just about every day of the week, with options to meet in the early morning or after work hours. Membership dues are $35/month.

Great Hill Track Club

GHTC, named for the Great Hill in Central Park near 106th Street, usually runs in Central Park on Tuesdays and Thursdays, with morning and evening options. But I joined up with them one night when they happened to be running at Riverbank State Park near 145th Street.

The head coach and founder of GHTC is Stuart Calderwood, former head coach at New York Road Runners (NYRR), which runs the NYC Marathon and most of NYC’s major races. He provided insightful guidance and encouragement to the fastest and slowest runners that evening, and so did the other coaches. The ratio was exceptional — about a dozen runners and three coaches — and it was one of the few times that I had a coach running alongside me, coaching and chatting as we ran. I rode the subway home with most of this friendly group, and they told me they often go for coffee after morning sessions in Central Park, and after night runs they like to hit up Juice Generation on West 72nd Street for juice and smoothies. You can find GHTC on Instagram or via their website. The first workout is free. After that packages run from about $22-$28 per workout.

New York Harriers

Tavern on the Green was the meetup when I ran with the Harriers on a pretty night in September. I knew going in that the Harriers are a competitive running team of nearly 200 dues-paying members, having seen runners in races and on podiums wearing Harriers gear. This group also skewed young, but maybe that’s just the cohort that showed up on this particular night. I ran with a recent MIT grad who’d run in college. Another woman in her 20s was returning to running after seven years. The Harriers started at 7:00 p.m. on the dot with a warmup and a speedy tempo run. The pace was quick, but we were able to chat during the run, and everyone was invited for beers after.

Nice Jewish Runners

Nice Jewish Runners was founded by Ezra Feig after October 7th last year. I ran with them recently on the anniversary of those attacks, in a moving community run that met near the Central Park Reservoir. NJR is “a social club for nice Jewish runners and their friends.” But that doesn’t mean there aren’t serious runners. I ran with a woman who finished the Chicago Marathon in under three hours last year. But I also chatted with two charming sisters, leisurely runners in their 20s and early 30s, who were there both for the community and some potential matchmaking. Pace groups ranged from eight minutes up to around 12 minutes, but all are welcome regardless of speed. They often go for coffee and babka after morning runs.

NYRR Group Training

 NYRR Group Training offers structured workouts of about an hour and adjusted for every pace. When you sign up, you’ll choose the meeting place that works best for you; I chose Columbus Circle just outside Central Park. NYRR has a corps of experienced, dedicated coaches and athletes who care about helping runners improve and meet their running goals. These tend to be 16-week sessions that you sign up and pay for online, with socializing limited to during the training sessions.

Nike Run Club

This is the only virtual club on our list. My sister Ashley discovered Nike Run Club and its charismatic head coach, Chris Bennett, last year through a couch-to-5K program that got her physically and psychologically ready to run her first race last Easter, a “Beach Bunny 5K.”

There’s a huge library of free “Guided Runs” on the NRC app, from 5-minute runs to a 26.2-mile run with Coach B in your ear the whole way. NRC offers free structured plans too, from the four-week “Get Started” through a 5K, 10K, half-marathon and the big kahuna, a full marathon. Coach B’s enthusiasm is infectious. And you don’t need any running experience to get on board. Coach Bennett often says “there are two kinds of runners: Runners who run. And runners who don’t run … yet.”

There are plenty of other running groups in NYC, many of which also offer UWS runs, including Dashing Whippets, the NY Fliers, Reservoir Dogs, UWS Runners, and West Side Runners. A more complete list of running clubs can be found on the NYRR website.

Coach Bennett often says: “We’re not running so that running becomes easy all the time. We’re really running so we can take on harder and harder things, and we do that by making things that were once hard for us easier. Not easy. But easier.”

These running clubs help, and I thank them!

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