Robert Skrob recently forwarded me a report from RunSignup (RSU) that chronicles race trends for 2025. I found it pretty interesting and will summarize some of the findings here and contrast what I can with my perceptions of our local experience. RSU estimates that around 50% of the U.S. market uses its software for race sign up, so it is fairly comprehensive. If you have ever been involved in surveys, you will agree this is a very high response rate. So assume extrapolation and generalization for trends across all races.

Generally speaking, race participation grew last year, but at a slower rate than in recent years (5%). The general assumption is that the post COVID resurgence has passed in terms of race growth. RSU captured data from close to 100,000 races. Over half were 5Ks, with 10Ks and the half marathon rounding out what amounts to about 75% of all races captured. The balance are marathons, ultras, tris, and others. Registrations through RSU for the above races numbered over 12,000,000. Given that, it was estimated that there were 20–25 million registrants for races in this country last year.

Personally, I see race growth occurring here in some of our larger legacy races, such as the recent Marathon/Half, Springtime, Palace, and the Turkey Trot. I am not necessarily seeing some of our other smaller races experiencing much, if any, growth. Of particular note, nationally, in sync with our local experience, the strongest race growth rate is the half marathon distance. The data show all regions of the country experiencing similar growth rates of between 3% and 8%.

The distribution of events by month shows that, nationally, the spring and fall are the most popular times to stage events, as expected. I believe our local distribution is less affected by winter and more affected by summer than some, so we are a bit more evenly distributed through the winter and have fewer races than the rest of the country in the summer. In sum, nationally, more than a quarter of all races took place in September and October.

The report notes whether monthly participation matches the number of events offered. The answer is yes, with the same outlier we have locally: the Turkey Trot. Turkey Trots across the country are heavily attended, skewing the November participation numbers.

Fifty three percent of all race registrants are female. Apparently, there is a slight trend that the gender gap is narrowing in recent years, as females were a bit over 55% in 2021 (but possibly skewed somewhat by COVID). By way of our local example, and for just the Springtime races, as I write this, 61% of all registrants are female.

Nationally, 20% of all racers were in the 30–39 age demographic, but the largest uptick from the previous year was among those aged 19–29, with a 10% increase. Age group participation followed fairly evenly, but note that only about one fifth of all registrants are over 50 (now I know why I do okay in my age group). Forty four percent of all races have fewer than 100 participants, and another 41% have between 100 and 500. Hopefully, this will provide some solace to our race directors who lead smaller races, as they are in the strong majority compared with what occurs nationally. Most races are smaller community events attended by a loyal following.

Interestingly, 24% of registrations occur the week of the race (me). I know for Springtime we experience very heavy registration race week as well. Increased prices as a race nears do not appear to be much of a motivator. This stat is much lower for the marathon distance (7%) for obvious reasons. Average race prices nationally range from around $21 for the 1 mile, $31 for the 5K, $43 for the 10K, and $68 and $98 for the half and full marathon, respectively. These prices are fairly close to local race prices and are rising very slowly, about 2–5% nationally. I know this is a frequent topic at race director meetings. For the Springtime races, we chose to survey similarly sized markets four years ago and set our prices accordingly. They have remained unchanged since that time.

I have touched on some of the key areas that our membership may find interesting, but this annual report goes into even greater detail on race churn (races that do not recur), virtual races (mostly a COVID era trend locally), shirt types (unisex vs. women’s cut), marketing, merchandise, payment processing, donations and sponsors, RaceJoy (participant tracking—David Landis introduced this for our Marathon/Half this year), and more. Should you wish to view the entire report, it can be found at info.runsignup.com under Knowledge Base, Industry Reports.