14 October 2026

Feeling nervous about your first run club is close to universal, and it does not mean running is not for you. At Hills Run Club the answer to most of those worries is the same: one lap is a full run, walkers are welcome, and nobody is keeping score. Here are the seven worries we hear most from first timers, answered plainly.

Worry 1: everyone will be faster than me

Some people there will be faster. Some will be slower, and some will be walking the same lap. A community run is not a race, and there is no start gun: people set off, settle into their own pace and find their group within the first few minutes.

What matters most is that the distances are options, not totals. On Thursday mornings you can do one 2.5 km lap or two. On Tuesday nights it is one 3 km lap or two. One lap is a full run, and finishing it is the whole assignment.

Worry 2: I will not know anyone

Almost nobody knows anyone at their first run. The group gathers before the start, so the first few minutes are exactly the time when people chat, and a new face is a normal sight every single week.

Registering for the run in HRC+ helps too: it puts your name on the list for the session, so you are expected rather than arriving cold. For a minute by minute picture of the day, our guide to a first time at a run club walks you through what actually happens.

Worry 3: I will have nothing to say

Running does most of the talking for you. Side by side at a relaxed pace, the conversation starters are built in: how the lap feels, the coffee afterwards, whether the lights at the showground make it feel like a proper event. If you would rather just run and listen, that is completely fine too.

And if chatting is the part that daunts you most, we wrote a whole article on ways to belong at run club when you are shy, without the small talk.

Worry 4: what if I cannot finish a lap

A lap is short on purpose. The Thursday Morning Run is 2.5 km or 5 km, the Tuesday Night Run is 3 km or 6 km, and one lap is a full run both times. Walk breaks are normal, and walkers are welcome on the same course.

If you are starting from scratch, jogging the straights and walking the corners is a perfectly good way to finish your first lap. Nobody clocks your splits and nobody minds your walk breaks.

Worry 5: what if I do something wrong

The unwritten rules of a group run are simpler than you fear: be ready at the start time, let faster runners go past, and say hello. Nobody is grading your form, your kit or your running vocabulary.

Every regular at the club broke a small rule once. The group run is the most forgiving place in running to learn them.

Worry 6: I do not have the right gear

Shoes you can already walk in and clothes you can already move in are enough for a first run. Nobody at a community club is checking brands, and plenty of people do their first laps in whatever was on the floor.

For a Tuesday night run, one light layer helps while you wait for the start under the lights at Castle Hill Showground. That is the whole shopping list.

Worry 7: what if it is not for me

Then you have lost nothing. Running with the club is free, one lap takes half an hour or less, and there is no membership to cancel if it does not click.

In our experience the nervous part is usually the waiting, not the run itself. The coffee afterwards is a low pressure way to work out whether the people, not the pace, were the thing you were really after.

Pick your first run and register

Both runs are free with a free HRC+ account, and every run is registered in HRC+. Make your account, then pick the session that fits your week on the runs page: the Thursday Morning Run at Glenhaven Oval or the Tuesday Night Run at Castle Hill Showground.

Seven worries, seven plain answers, and one lap that counts as a full run. That is all a first run club asks of you.