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Sociodynamics
Reference:

Urban running practices, their determinants, transformations and influences

Kannykin Stanislav Vladimirovich

PhD in Philosophy

Associate professor of the Department of Humanities at Stary Oskol Technological Institute named after A. Ugarov, branch of National University of Science and Technology "MISIS"

309516, Russia, Belgorod Region, Stary Oskol, micro district Makarenko, 42

stvk2007@yandex.ru
Other publications by this author
 

 

DOI:

10.25136/2409-7144.2022.5.38037

Received:

11-05-2022


Published:

06-06-2022


Abstract: The hypothesis of the study is that running in urban space has a specific socio-cultural dimension, containing both an invariant part inherent in urban running in general and a peculiar set of value-normative attitudes of the individual. The subject of this research is a two-pronged process: the influence of the urban environment on the social and existential parameters of running, as well as the reverse influence of mass urban running in all its varieties both on the urban environment and participants, and on society as a whole. The methodological basis of the research is the socio-cultural approach. The social institutions that currently determine the regular group running of citizens belong to all spheres of activity in society: economic (running tourism), social (holidays with a carnival-game component), political (campaign runs), spiritual. Street running can be considered as a way of "appropriating" urban space; urban running allow one to clarify the depths of one's "I", prepare for activity in a highly competitive urban environment, provide a bodily and emotional completeness that is unattainable outside of running. Mass running practices create their own semantic fields in the context of each city, marked with monuments, names, events and legends; street running is a form of synoikism, linking urban areas into a single spiritual space, carries out a festive transformation of the city, makes a significant contribution to the development of the economy, contributes to the gentrification of territories and branding of the city. The habitus of modern urban running as a social practice can be represented by the following dispositions: solidarity, healthy lifestyle, women's emancipation, socialization, involvement in the environmental movement.


Keywords:

city, running, urbanistics, city marathons, existence, virtual running, carnival, synoikism, healthy lifestyle, running tourism

This article is automatically translated. You can find original text of the article here.

A striking element of modern urbanized society are sports and recreational and competitive races along city streets, the popularity of which is evidenced by both their large number and a large number of participants. For example, the six most prestigious city marathons ("majors"): Boston, London, Berlin, Chicago, New York and Tokyo are not able to accept everyone, while more than 50,000 runners start in New York alone. Many citizens consider these marathons to be the main events of the year and provide them with volunteer support, proud of their involvement in world-class events with huge humanistic potential.

Of course, representatives of social and humanitarian knowledge did not ignore the multidimensional phenomenon of urban running. Thus, within the framework of the "critical geography of sports", a study of urban running was carried out by Natalia Koch [31]. She considers one of her goals to be overcoming the Cartesian dualism of mind and body, according to which sport in academic geography is attributed exclusively to the sphere of the corporeal and is associated with both the "frivolous" (play, entertainment) and the "non-spiritual" (commercialism, physicality, primitive emotionality). In contrast to this position, N. Koch points out that sport is a global phenomenon, part of geopolitical strategies and an important component of nation-building. The geographical dimension of sport is manifested in the fact that its infrastructure occupies a prominent place in modern society, transforming both settlements and natural landscapes. "Places" for running produce a specific quality of urban space, being a concentration, on the one hand, of the power and strength of athletes who temporarily "appropriate" the urban environment and dictate their rules to it, and on the other – its points of growth (economic, cultural, etc.) by attracting significant resources to these segments of the city and giving the space of running an emotional and volitional dimension.

In [36], using the example of urban half marathons in nine countries located on three continents, cross-country tourism is studied as one of the fastest growing sectors of the tourism industry worldwide and its impact on the socio-cultural transformations of cities conducting mass races.

"When we run through a city or through it, can we metaphorically "manage" it, that is, experience a sense of ownership and autonomy?" – Kai Sing Tan asks this question [35], attracting to the search for an answer to it not only the reflections of rationalist philosophers, but also the provisions of "psychogeography", his own artistic practice, etymological research concerning English idioms with the word "running", as well as the poetics of the "mind-body-world" of Chinese Taoists. As a result, the author receives a classification of urban runners, the basis of which are the elements of their spiritual needs involved in running, and also explores the "poetic consequences" of urban running, considered as a method of comprehending oneself when interacting with the cultural environment of the city. In line with the "geography of the city", Chris Gratton and Ian Henry consider the economic and political prerequisites and consequences of mass urban races [30]; the attention of researchers is also attracted by such a socio-cultural aspect as the problem of organizing races in divided cities (Brussels, Belfast, Beirut, Jerusalem) [27], including a discussion of those values that allowed I would like the participants and the audience to feel their unity, despite the acute political and religious differences. Interdisciplinary works at the intersection of philosophy, sociology, geography and psychology should also be noted, exploring the potential of the urban environment, which allows finding strength both for unhurried regular runs and for overcoming pain and fatigue at marathon distances [24, 33]. The ethical aspects of public marathon running, especially for non-professional runners deprived of financial motivation, are investigated by S. Gozzano [29]. The scientist comes to the conclusion that this running has to do with virtue, opposed to selfishness, because watching the running of amateur marathon runners, viewers get an example of the possibility of overcoming their own limits and developing willpower, which can help them in non-sporting fields of activity.  An unusual perspective on the understanding of urban runs is offered by P. Phillips [34], referring to their carnival component, in which the researcher sees manifestations of neoliberal ideals of personal development, self-improvement and charity as an alternative to state programs largely focused on professional sports. The study of American marathons as cultural events was carried out in the work [26], which focuses on their unifying potential and the opportunities provided for personal growth. The author draws attention to the influence of the Cold War, the situation of which made good physical fitness and endurance a matter of national pride in America, and the book also highlights the history of women's participation in city marathons and the influence of sponsoring corporations on their development.  The study of Dick Ettema [28], who conducted a survey of 1,581 novice runners, is devoted to the problems of urban runners (poor lighting, dogs off the leash, meetings with cyclists and cars, threats from other people) and motivation to overcome these problems. The charitable aspects of city marathons are analyzed in the article With . Nettleton and M. Hardy [33], offering a four-part typology of runners in terms of their orientation to both mass running and charity. Scientists have come to the conclusion that institutional marathon charity is carried out on the basis of the interrelationships between philanthropic institutions, sports and individual achievements. The question of the conditions of attractiveness of large cities for organizers of mass runs is raised in [25]. The study conducted on the example of Valencia showed how changes in three types of elements of social practices (materials, competencies and meanings) and their interrelationships contributed to an increase in the number of participants in urban running events.

Turning to domestic scientists, we note the works of S. S. Rykov [16, 17] devoted to clarifying the socio-cultural foundations of amateur marathons. Their author identifies the reasons for the increasing popularity of marathon running among fans of physical culture and non-professional sports and offers his classification of competitions, highlighting, in particular, city-related performance races, as well as historical and urban marathons.  A. S. Adelfinsky [2], using the results of the case study, also analyzes the factors that caused the running boom of our time, focusing on their economic component, which causes the researcher's interest in an expressive model of mass sports, especially effective in the urban environment as the focus of a large number of consumers (ordinary athletes and spectators) of entertainment and event running. M. V. Averina [1], E. V. Klimkovich [12], M. Makusheva [Makusheva M. Running for overcoming] pay attention to the specifics of the motivation of urban runners and specific aspects of the organization of urban races, including the analysis of their problems. // Vedomosti. 2020. September 23. URL: http://vedomosti.ru/opinion/articles / (date of address: 01.05.2022)], D. Mammadova [Mammadova D. Everyone ran. Who earns money at the Moscow Marathon and how? // Kommersant. The secret of the company. 2014. No. 11. p. 30], V. Kogan [Kogan V. Running day and night. The Moscow Marathon will take place along the main streets and boulevards of the capital // Novye Izvestia. 2013. No. 60. April 4], V. Vyakhoreva [Vyakhoreva V. Running in Moscow. What will be the new Moscow Marathon // Afisha Daily. 2013. April 4. URL: https://daily.afisha.ru/archive/gorod/archive/kakim-budet-novij-moskovskij-marafon / (accessed: 01.05.2022)].

Thus, we can state the considerable interest of the scientific community and the widely understood public in understanding the specifics of urban running. However, in our opinion, the question of the metaphysical specifics of the city as a space for running and the peculiarities of its running existential-phenomenological "experience" remains unclear, i.e. the philosophical aspects of urban running locomotion as a cultural event have not been sufficiently investigated. At the same time, it is important to note that running as a type of movement inherent in a person in a city does not essentially change, still being a way of walking with a "flight phase". However, the social environment in which it is carried out, as well as the goals of runners, determined both by their biological characteristics and socio-cultural factors, certainly influence both the choice of running activity as an activity, and its forms, intensity, goals, etc. In this regard, the philosophical register of the study of running movement in an urban location becomes clear. First of all, this is due to the fact that the city and running are universals of culture: as the most widespread type of settlement in modern society and as a basic way of transportation for most sports and physical culture and recreation activities. Their association gives rise to the phenomenon of urban street running, which covers millions of people around the world and forms its own subculture, noticeably influencing both the transformation of the urban environment and the participants and spectators of urban running events. The hypothesis of the study is that running locomotion in urban space has a specific socio-cultural dimension generated by this environment, containing both an invariant part inherent in urban running in general and a variable part due to the unique "genius of the place" and a peculiar set of value-normative attitudes of the individual. In connection with the above, the subject of the study is a two-pronged process: the influence of the urban environment on the social and existential parameters of running locomotion, as well as the reverse effect of mass urban running in all its varieties on both the place of its implementation and participants, and on society as a whole. We believe that a philosophically oriented socio-cultural approach can provide the completeness of the vision of urban running in these registers [3, 20]. Within the framework of this approach, which provides for the study of social and cultural relations in their tensions and correlations, the following tasks are set:

- identification in the historical perspective of social institutions and the peculiarities of their determination (in terms of generation and rationing) of regular group running activity of citizens;

- determination of invariant components of the existential dimension of modern urban running;

- disclosure of the features of transformation by the most popular running practices of urban settlements and the attitude of their inhabitants;

- study of the axiological parameters of the running activity of the urban population;

- explication of some features of urban running in the conditions of information civilization.

 

A brief history of the running development of the city in Europe and the USA

Turning to Greek Antiquity, at the first thirteen Olympiads of which running was the only type of competition, we emphasize that "theaters and stadiums were built <...> outside the city" [14, p. 146], were part of the frontier. Antiquity did not practice running through city streets, because the Olympic competitions overcame the boundaries of profane urban routine: they had a ceremonial character, were dedicated to the gods and took place in those places and at that time that were associated with religious events. It is no coincidence that Olympia itself as a sacred center "is located in a special place. From all sides, it is as if natural barriers separate it from the world, creating an isolated space in which a person constantly feels, even visiting Olympia now, a sense of detachment from worldly vanity and worries" [19, p. 9]. During the period of the first – purely running – competitions and somewhat later, Olympia was uninhabited, there were no permanent residential buildings in it, and athletes and spectators who arrived at the Olympics, until about 300 BC, when the first hotel was built, spent the night in huts, tents or under the open sky [Kozlenko A. Abode of the Gods and heroes. URL: https://warspot.ru/20079-obitel-bogov-i-geroev (accessed: 05/06/2022)].

We owe the birth of competitive and entertaining city running to the carnival tradition of the Middle Ages. As you know, carnival involves a short-term "turning inside out" of the dominant culture of its time. And since the culture of the European Middle Ages was theocentric, the time of the carnival allowed everything that did not correspond to the rigid canons of the "correct" behavior established by Christians to escape from under the bushel of religious piety: bodily joy of life, double-faith, ridiculing everything and everything, play, vanity, etc. It is important to note that urban culture is characterized by the exit "...traditional ideas about life beyond the calendar cycle, mythical forces, patriarchal-authoritarian attitudes" [14, p. 150], generally speaking – greater ideological freedom compared to the culture of rural settlements. Also, an ironic attitude to life and death in all their manifestations is more inherent in citizens: "Ancient rhetoricians considered the educated ability to irony to be a distinctive feature of a citizen, the very concept of irony was connected by them directly with the image of the capital city" [6, p. 18]. A vivid expression of the carnival leveling of religious values, laugh culture and actualization of ancient humanism is the medieval running through the city streets, since the stadiums declared pagan temples were destroyed. For example, during the festivities dedicated to the coronation of Wenceslaus II (1298), the inhabitants of Prague competed in running naked, like ancient Greek athletes. Starting from about 1207, the inhabitants of Verona also fled naked. This festive race was called the Corsa del Palio – "the run for the green robe", it was the winner who received it, and the loser – the rooster, with whom he had to walk through the city under general laughter [Gutos T. The history of running. M.: Text, 2011. 251 p.]. We add that the narrow streets of medieval cities, sometimes not allowing two riders to miss each other, created the need for walking delivery of mail and important news, which were announced by messengers in city squares. This led to the applied measurement of urban running.

In the Renaissance, it is interesting to note the women's races, which are very popular in some European cities, echoing the Herean Games of Antiquity, in which only pious girls who claimed the status of a priestess of Hera in their polis participated. Carnival shapeshifting made prostitutes and beggars the heroines of the races, some of them ran partially or completely naked or in clown costumes for the amusement of the public, hoping both to attract customers and for a cash or clothing prize to the winner. The "high" forms of urban running in the XVI-XVIII centuries were represented by "master" runners-men who provided excort to the noble persons who moved in carriages, informing the city residents about their approach. Such runners were quite wealthy and had many privileges associated with proximity to those in power, besides, the nobility liked to arrange competitions between their messengers, sometimes allowing the winners to dispose of part of the money won on the sweepstakes.

It should be noted that urban running as a form of entertainment and earnings was widely practiced in Europe before the advent of sports competitions and even for some time with them. "So, the Leipzig Illustrated Newspaper wrote in 1881: "Berlin has turned into one big city of runners. <...> almost every street now organizes a race for men and women for the prize of the quarter" [18, p. 67]. The development of urban space by runners with physical culture and sports goals takes place at the turn of the XIX-XX centuries. under the influence of the Olympic movement revived by P. de Coubertin.  The beginning of the oldest of the now regularly held city marathon in Boston dates back to April 19 , 1897 . It was a local level event with the number of participants, according to various sources, 15-18 people. Its goal was to popularize physical culture and humanistic ideas of Olympism, and the winner until 1986 was awarded only an olive wreath. It should be noted that the modern marathon distance of 42 km 195 m owes its origin not to Ancient Greece (the distance between the Marathon and Athens is about 34.5 km), but to the topography of London. At the first three Olympics revived by P. de Coubertin, athletes ran 40 km, the same distance was planned for the London Olympics in 1908, but the royal family of Edward VII expressed a desire to watch the start of the marathon from the windows of Windsor Palace, so the organizers were forced to increase the distance by 2 km 195 meters. The massization of urban running takes place in the 20-30s of the twentieth century, which was associated with the promotion, first of all, of the eugenic achievements of competing political systems. City sports festivals (primarily in the USSR and Germany), propaganda races, running street relays, including mixed ones, had a mass character due to the availability of running and were supposed to demonstrate to the whole world the outstanding physical and strong-willed qualities of the "new man" in the transformed cities. During the Second World War, the city run mainly performed ideological and memorial functions, testifying to the fortitude of the spirit of the fighting sides. In the second half of the last century, marked by the beginning of the scientific and technological revolution, running became a mass means of improving the health of citizens, mainly engaged in sedentary intellectual activity, often uniting in various clubs of running enthusiasts. The growth of popularity and social significance of urban running in the period under review is clearly evidenced by the history of the Berlin Marathon, a group of organizers and the first participants of which initially ran for recreational purposes in the city park; in 1974, a marathon was held along the secondary streets of the suburbs of West Berlin, in which 286 people took part; 1981 – a race along the central streets of West Berlin Berlin (3,486 runners from 30 countries). "On September 30, 1990, the dream of a marathon that would be held not only on the territory of West Berlin became a reality. The race track was laid all over the city and three days before the reunification of the two states of Germany and the GDR, the runners covered the entire distance through the territory of both East and West Berlin, finishing through the symbol of the unification of the two Germanies – the Brandenburg Gate. That year, more than 25,000 people took part in the race" [Kozlov A. The history of the Berlin Marathon. The fastest on the planet. URL: https://www.kant.ru/articles/1741937 / (accessed 11.05.2022)].

The attractiveness of running for the townspeople is also due to the fact that "for swimming, skiing, cycling, you need equipment, special platforms to which you need to get through traffic jams. And to run, it's enough to put on sneakers, go outside and run" [Mammadova D. Everyone ran. Who earns money at the Moscow Marathon and how? // Kommersant. The secret of the company. 2014. No. 11. p. 30], besides, the cult of physicality inherent in our time and the powerful development of visual culture led to the fashion for a "run-out", lean, athletic body. In the wake of the popularity of the physical culture and wellness movement, running events are becoming components of sports tourism and the event industry, as well as citizens participate in mass races with charitable, nature-saving, inclusive and other socially significant goals.  In the pre-pandemic 2019 at the six largest city marathons in the world ("majors") a total of approximately 252,000 people started (within strict limits), there were participants from more than 100 countries of the world at each of these marathons, and the number of specially arrived fans numbered in the millions. Today we can rightfully say that in many countries there is a developed culture of urban street running that unites a large number of people and has a significant impact on the urban environment and its inhabitants.

 

The Existential dimension of Modern Urban Running

The "ideal type" of the city as a social form of space organization is characterized by the maximum concentration of the achievements of civilization, in this regard, the mission of the city is to create conditions for comprehensive human development. Since the trajectories of personal and professional growth are different for people, they choose cities "for themselves", while personal development priorities are largely determined by the cultural environment of the city. The uniqueness of the urban environment provides a dialectical unity of natural (various natural facts) and cultural ("the spirit of the city", "the genius of the place"). The activity of citizens (especially residents of large cities) is not determined by the agrarian cycle and is free from the rigid attitudes of traditional societies. This creates the need for self-design and the associated "burden of freedom" caused by the weight of constant responsible choice. The way to get rid of existential anxiety for many citizens is to aspire to Man, a situation where "by fleeing from freedom, a person dissolved into the anonymity of the crowd, lost the subjective and personal beginning and became a "thing of the city"" [7, p. 182]. Awareness of the inauthenticity ("automaticity" and depersonality) of one's existence makes one look for ways to fill life with personal meanings. Here is how one of the most famous ultramarathoners of our time, a resident of almost one million San Francisco, Dean Karnazes writes about it: "Suddenly I felt exhausted, realized that I didn't care <...> I did not strive for anything of my own free will and did not feel satisfied with the work done. At first, money mattered because I didn't have it before, but now that I managed to make small savings, I realized that there must be something more in life than a constant desire to replenish these reserves" [Karnazes D. Running without Sleep. Revelations of an ultramarathoner. M.: Mann, Ivanov and Ferber, 2018. p. 49]. The severity of existential longing motivates a person to actively release from it. Considering that the representative of postmodern political geography E. U. Soja distinguished three dimensions of existentiality: historical, social and spatial [21, p. 130], it becomes clear one of the ways to overcome this crisis is the "appropriation" of alienated ("prison city" by V.Y. Bryusov) urban space, its transformation from an impersonal "nemest" (M. Auger [15]) in a phenomenologically described mastered, filled with meanings and individual experiences "place" (A. Lefebvre [13]). Initially, this took place in the form of walking – moving around the city for the pleasure of contemplating urban life in all its diversity. Flanking became fashionable in the second half of the XIX century and is associated, according to T. Veblen, with an increase in the number of representatives of the "leisure class". A person's desire for maximum fullness of sensations, coupled with the need of citizens for physical activity, in the second half of the twentieth century generates such a mass phenomenon as running around the city, which partly became a continuation of the practices of walking and city festivals, but also began to be used by some citizens for sports and fitness purposes.

What human needs does urban running satisfy? Firstly, the comfortable everyday life of the city practically excludes borderline states in which a person manifests his essence, does not allow him to reach the depths of his "I". But this opportunity is provided, for example, by a city marathon run at the limit of its capabilities. Secondly, running together at mass city events has a competitive nature, which corresponds to the psychotype of a citizen, aimed at success as a victory in a highly competitive environment. It is also important to note the fullness of the experience of the city in running, which is achieved by the expressed participation in the awareness of the urban space of the body-affective sphere of the subject, for which the type of covering of city streets, the steepness of turns and ascents, the protection of the running track from winds and other factors that are not always paid attention to by those moving mainly on public transport begin to have special significance and private transport citizens. Let us also mention the satisfaction of recognizing the right of runners to the city, who for a long time were considered as a kind of urban lunatics. The city as a symbol of a sedentary lifestyle, whose residents like to get to a place sitting, has long been characterized by sedentarism – a disdainful attitude towards walking (and even more so ? running) movement, which "was thought of as the lot of commoners, and the ability to get to the goal by other means testified to a higher social status" [21, p. 197].  Temporarily legitimized the mass street running, as already indicated, only turning everything upside down carnival. Mass urban running was associated not only with urban pariahs, but also with shameful animal herd running, and was also associated with petty-bourgeois contempt for nomadism in general, no wonder wanderers were pejoratively called "tumbleweeds". Philistines were particularly opposed by female athletes and athletes running around the city, clearly going beyond the "norms of decency" and gender stereotypical behavior, since free mobility in the city has always been considered the prerogative of men. That is why in many families of urban aristocrats of China, until the beginning of the twentieth century, girls from an early age broke the bones of their feet and bandaged them so that they deformed, over time practically depriving an adult woman of the opportunity to move independently outside the house. In this regard, it is not surprising that when in 1976 the organizers of the New York Marathon received permission to organize a route through all the main districts of the city, the 1972 Olympic champion in stayer running F. Shorter triumphantly said "that he would come just to see the streets blocked for marathon runners in five districts of New York" [Fierce S. "People rushed to the streets." The story of Russian runners who survived the collapse of the USSR and the dashing 90s, but did not give up.  URL: http://lentka.com/a/992286 / (accessed 03.05.2022)].

It is important to note the special popularity of urban marathons in democratic, open societies that support fair competition and cultivate a person's reliance only on their own strength, appreciating him, in Pushkin's words, "self-standing".   That is why the terrorist attack on the Boston Marathon on April 15, 2013, which killed three people and injured about 280, was considered by the Americans, who organize three of the six majors, as an attempt on the values that fund society.  "Of course, because a marathon is not just a very long distance run, but a manifestation of the individuality and free will of each participant. This is the identification of the winner in the most open and honest way. And in this sense, the marathon is an ideal model of democracy" [Bessrebrenikov A. New Marathon.   URL: https://petrovka-38.com/component/zoo/item/novyj-marafon (accessed: 09.05.2022)]. The "courage to be", existential rebellion against the most difficult circumstances, loyalty to their ideals and values were vividly demonstrated by Adrianna Haslet, Patrick Downes and Celeste Corcoran, who lost their legs due to the explosion at the Boston Marathon, but in the following years continued to participate in this competition using prosthetics and running strollers.

 Running practices and urban transformations

How does urban running transform the city? First of all, running forms a special symbolic space of the city, its own semantic field. In the words of A. Lefebvre, running becomes a way of social production of urban space, its "places", which are marked with monuments, names, events and legends. So, in Boston, at the mark of the first mile of the major running distance, there is a statue of the "Spirit of the Marathon" in honor of Stylianos Kyriakides, an anti–fascist runner from Greece, who, despite the famine and hardships during the war, won the Boston Marathon in 1946 and, in the wake of this success, reminded the whole world of the plight of the situation of Greece, ravaged by the invaders and the civil war, having managed to collect significant donations in the United States for the restoration of their native country. Upon his return to his homeland, he was greeted by hundreds of thousands of compatriots lined up along the route of Kyriakides in Athens. His American friend John Kelly participated in the Boston Marathon 61 times, reached the finish line 58 times and won the race twice, for which he was also awarded a bronze monument. A sculpture of its organizer, Fred Lebow, has been installed in New York's Central Park, where the most numerous marathon in terms of the number of participants originated. Every year this statue is moved to a place where it becomes visible from the finish line of the race.

Turning to the legendization of urban places by running events, first of all we note the Boston Heartbreak Hill – "The Hill of a broken Heart". This is the hill on which, in 1936, Rhode Island runner Allison "Tarzan" Brown overtook John Kelly in a dramatic struggle, depriving the latter of hope of victory and "breaking his heart," according to newspaper reporter Jerry Nason. There is also a Scream Tunnel in Boston – a "Tunnel of screams", which is formed by Wellesley Medical College students during a marathon, past which a running track passes. They so fiercely support the runners with their ringing voices, humorous posters, and sometimes hugs and kisses that they have made the place of their annual "pain" world famous. Also in this regard, the marathon in Rome is indicative, which was sensationally won by a barefoot runner from Ethiopia, Abebe Bikila, at the 1960 Olympics. Bikila broke away from the leading group in front of one of the symbols of his homeland – the Aksum obelisk, which the Italians took out of this country during the occupation of Ethiopia and installed in front of the building of the Ministry of Colonies in Rome. It is noteworthy that if Ethiopian runners win the annual marathon in Rome by a significant margin, they take off their shoes before the finish line to finish running barefoot, thereby paying tribute to their great compatriot.

Running not only creates memorable "places", but also connects urban areas into a single social space. Many large cities are segregated on ethnic, religious, property and other grounds, which generates a certain tension in these territories for "outsiders" and sometimes stigmatizes their residents. As V.Yu. Darensky notes, "the city becomes a real embodiment and collision of the most extreme ontological and value opposites of human existence, jointly and very tightly localized in a single enclosed space, which creates a special tension, tragedy and antinomianism of the existence of the urban man, unknown to the man of the village" [9, p. 29]. In this regard, the city marathon, which takes place in all or most of the main districts of the city, is a kind of synoikism as a way of coordinating the interests of differently oriented settlement groups: "The marathon unites residents of London regardless of age, gender, religion, nationality, social status, party affiliation" [Run, fat man, run, or What you need to know about London Marathon. URL: https://lingua-airlines.ru/articles/begi-tolstiak-begi-ili-chto-nujno-znat-o-londonskom-marafone / (accessed: 06.05.2022)]. This is partly due to the fact that running, unlike many other sports, especially contact sports, is practically devoid of aggressiveness, it does not generate an extremist subculture of fan groups. Territorial aggression, inevitable for any biological species, is gently sublimated by running and generates a state of spiritual community: "Come to the finish line of any mass run – and you will be amazed by the atmosphere of goodwill, universal consent, everyone's willingness to share everything with everyone, even a complete stranger – from the last precious sip of fruit juice in the heat to advice on the most important questions of life. Perhaps you have never met so many kind people at once. Running gives us the opportunity to put ourselves through a difficult test, and after enduring it, a person feels stronger, better, more confident in relationships with others, and therefore more friendly" [Stankevich R. A. Wellness running at any age. Tested on myself. M. [et al.]: Peter, 2016. p. 22]. Also, mass city runs promote the unification of professional athletes and amateurs, celebrities, opinion leaders and ordinary people run together.

The transformation of the city is also connected with the entertaining nature of the races, transforming the attitude of citizens. During city marathons and a few days before they start, the city lives in a special rhythm, in the dimension of expectation, preparation and celebration.  A. Lefebvre also believed that "in the new city, the functional role of the center should be revised. In the center should be the game (ludo), understood in the broadest sense: from sports to theater" [5, p. 52]. The game is the most important component of festive events from time immemorial. Obviously, in long runs, the beginning of the game is not pronounced, no wonder there is a joke that watching the marathon is as interesting as watching the paint dry. However, urban marathons differ from purely sporting ones in that they inherit the carnival beginning of the European Middle Ages and Renaissance. If professional runners are aimed at winning and a solid monetary reward, and "semi–professionals" want to improve their personal result and also give their all, then the bulk of participants in city races run for entertainment purposes: for bright emotions, fun and good mood, turning a marathon into a "marathon" for themselves and the audience (from English fun - "fun").  Therefore, carnival costumes and extravagance of locomotion of some ordinary runners are absolutely appropriate: running backwards, running people handcuffed, running with chasing a ball, clothes of fairy-tale heroes, characters of popular films, a 50-kilogram real diving suit, as well as running in the image of Christ with a cross on his back, fish, insulin pump, In this case, ordinary lovers of running can amuse their vanity and achieve a victory, even if it is carnival: having no chance of a sporting championship, they become the best runners in a certain costume, which is sometimes registered in the Guinness Book of Records and provides the attention of the audience and the press both during and after the race. Richard Florida, an American researcher of urban economics, believed that "in the global competition, those cities that are able to produce new business ideas and commercial products win <...>. This ability depends on the concentration of creative people ? the creative class <...>, it is these people who turn cities into attractive for many" [21, pp. 258-259]. It is obvious that the cities organizing world?class marathons have not only significant economic potential and political influence, but also concentrate within their borders the vanguard of the modern post-bourgeoisie - the liberal creative class, whose diverse demands ensure the existence of urban marathons as both sports, fitness and recreational global events. 

A significant contribution to the economy of cities hosting major international marathons is made by running tourism, which is one of the fastest growing sectors of the sports tourism industry worldwide [36]. The organizers of city runs are doing everything possible to attract running enthusiasts to their events, the vast majority of whom, without setting themselves the goal of earning money from running competitions, are in fact tourists. "The Chicago major helps his city earn money. This is largely due to the tourism industry. So, in a survey in 2010, more than 10 thousand runners indicated that thanks to the marathon, this is their first visit to Chicago. About 6 thousand of them came from 100 countries" [Korotich S. Guide to the Chicago Marathon: history, records, registration, route. URL: https://marathonec.ru/chicago-marafon-gid / (accessed: 05/06/2022)]. "This year the marathon brought the city 192 million dollars. <...> Boston benefits from the marathon, the city appreciates it and invests in it" [What makes the Boston Marathon special? URL: http://run-and-travel.com/bostonskiy-marafon-1 / (accessed: 01.05.2022)]. "For New York, the marathon has become a real lifesaver. In the mid-70s, due to the economic crisis, the city was on the verge of bankruptcy. Unemployment and street hop-stop flourished, because of which Central Park was emptied - citizens were simply afraid to go there. In 1976, the organizers of the New York Marathon, with the support of the mayor's office, decided to hold a race not only in the park, but through all the main districts of the city. It will take only ten years, and the marathon will become one of the main sources of income in the city treasury, attracting tourists and running enthusiasts from all over the world" [Lyutykh S. "People rushed to the streets". The story of Russian runners who survived the collapse of the USSR and the dashing 90s, but did not give up.  URL: http://lentka.com/a/992286 / (accessed 03.05.2022)]. Ordinary runners can be guaranteed to get to the most prestigious limited city runs by buying a very expensive sports tour from an official tour operator. The special pleasure of combining running and tourism is emphasized by the creative director of the Moscow Marathon A. Boyarskaya: "... to see the city on the run ? it is very interesting. For example, it was more interesting for me to run a marathon in Paris than just to go there" [Vyakhoreva V. Running in Moscow. What will be the new Moscow Marathon // Afisha Daily. 2013. April 4. URL: https://daily.afisha.ru/archive/gorod/archive/kakim-budet-novij-moskovskij-marafon / (date of appeal: 01.05.2022)], it is not for nothing that marathon tracks run along city attractions, and the races themselves actually turn into running excursions, for which the organizers set a time limit for overcoming the distance of 6-8 hours.

It is also noteworthy that the running activity of the population marks urban areas as belonging to the most "advanced" and successful part of the population, increases the prestige of these places ("... in those areas where more people run, housing is more expensive, because this is one of the criteria for safety, comfortable environment and generally causes positive associations" [Fierce S. "People rushed to the streets." The story of Russian runners who survived the collapse of the USSR and the dashing 90s, but did not give up.  URL: http://lentka.com/a/992286 / (accessed 03.05.2022)] and the city as a whole.

 

Urbi et orbi

It is important to note the assertion of universal values with the help of urban street running, to determine the humanistic message that the participants of the races address to the "city and the world". This is due to the fact that urban culture is directed, according to A.V. Gorokhov [8] "... not only to the spatial organization of the environment of society, but also to the consolidation of social values, norms of behavior" [Cit. according to: 23, p.170]. In this regard, the mass urban run, carried out with a large crowd and widely covered in the media, is an effective tool for promoting the values for which P. de Coubertin revived the Olympic movement, considering it primarily not as a competition of higher bodily achievements, but as a pedagogical, educational, socializing project, forming through a fair-based play sports the best human qualities. A historical example of the promotion of higher values through urban running is the ancient Japanese practice of acquiring primordial enlightenment (hongaku) with the help of kaihege, a type of asceticism when a Buddhist monk quickly walks or runs from 30 to 84 km every day for 100 (and sometimes more) days every year for 7 years. The monks who passed this test conducted the last hundred–day race along a route that included the streets of Kyoto, the ancient capital of Japan. The bodhisattva's run through the city is a kind of quintessence of the Mahayana spirit, when the final kaihoge ritual blesses the citizens and inspires them with its example of achieving enlightenment.

What ideals does modern urban running affirm and broadcast? First of all, solidarity is formed on the basis of the community of activities and universal values that ensure it, centered around the concept of "humanism" both in existential and social perspectives. That is why the runners who started the marathon in Berlin a few days after the terrorist attacks in the United States on September 11, 2001, held a large banner "United we run" before the start of the race. The value of solidarity is most clearly shown by the transformative influence of running as a social practice on the cultural type of the citizen, whom G. Simmel described as an insensitively indifferent person [10], which is due to a large number of internal and external impressions, as well as their continuous change, to which the citizen simply gets tired of reacting, closing himself in a cocoon of his private life. "Emotional energy would be exhausted too easily and in vain if city dwellers wanted to take to heart the numerous contacts to which the city condemns them. Ignoring others and avoiding contact with them are much more psychologically economical" [21, p. 50]. The solidarity of runners has many manifestations: these are the "draw" finish of the first winners of the London Marathon in 1981, American Dick Beardsley and Norwegian Inge Simonsen, and joint runs of residents of urban areas isolated from each other by state borders (in "divided cities" [27]), and the creation of conditions for people with disabilities to participate in competitions, receiving the enormous support of the audience throughout the running track. The manifestation of solidarity should also include the charitable activity of urban runners, which is unique for sports and physical culture activities in terms of mass and collected donations: attracting quite significant funds for charitable foundations supported by the organizers of major marathons is a guaranteed way to become a participant in a prestigious run. So, "in 2016, 9,000 people fled to charity programs in New York. They managed to raise 36.1 million dollars" [Keitany M. New York Marathon ? 20 facts about the race. URL: https://www.sports.ru/tribuna/blogs/triitru/1462132.html (accessed: 05/06/2022)], and the record for fundraising belongs to Baptist minister Steve Chalky, who raised 2.32 million pounds for charity as part of the London Marathon 2011. The feeling of solidarity with the runners also covers the citizens-fans who, for example, at the Moscow Marathon in 2015 "... sincerely supported the marathon runners throughout the entire distance, and at the last, hardest kilometer in Luzhniki <...> lined up in one big corridor. Many runners, accustomed to feeling like outcasts, could not stand it and just cried from such unprecedented support before. Their palms raised in greeting touched the palms of hundreds of people" [Fierce S. "People rushed into the streets." The story of Russian runners who survived the collapse of the USSR and the dashing 90s, but did not give up.  URL: http://lentka.com/a/992286 / (accessed 03.05.2022)]. We also note the tradition practiced at some marathons of a solemn meeting of the last runner, whom the audience patiently waits for and greets as enthusiastically as the winner, paying tribute to the fortitude of the finisher finishing the list.  Attention is drawn to the mass nature of urban running events, which is unimaginable for other types of sports activity, when tens of thousands of athletes start simultaneously in waves for several hours.  This requires not only the spirit of competition from the participants of the race, but also the spirit of cooperation, mutual respect both in heavy traffic and at food points, and the very "need to find a balance between oppositely directed vectors of group solidarity and competition hones a person's adaptability to a complex urban environment" [6, p. 18].

A healthy lifestyle achieved by physical activity is also a universal value, which is especially important for citizens who are prone to physical inactivity. The promotion of running as the most accessible type of health improvement is carried out primarily by the races accompanying many city marathons, including "sweet strata" for children, as well as quite affordable distances of 1,3,5 km on the day of the main competition ? a marathon or half marathon, which neophytes run in a festive atmosphere: "When a person gets into this atmosphere, there is no going back turn, because at the exit he gets incredible emotions" [Smirnova A. Andrey Krichmara: "Running is an attribute of a successful person." URL: https://yarreg.ru/articles/20160617163352 / (accessed: 08.05.2022)]. Having overcome a short distance, a person is inspired to achieve the following running goals, providing regular training to improve their physical and mental health.

In the sixties of the last century, city marathons became a means of female emancipation. According to the ideas of the first half of the last century, long running was considered harmful to women's health, so the maximum running distance for women at the Olympics was only 200 m (since 1960 ? 800 m), while men had access to five more running types of longer length, including the Olympic marathon. In order to achieve equality, it was important for runners to prove their ability to overcome the marathon distance at official competitions, which would allow them to qualify for inclusion in the Olympic women's competitions and shorter running distances, reaching parity with men. The problem was that it was forbidden to allow women to participate in a sports marathon, because it was believed that even one such run could cause irreparable harm to her health. Therefore, women started running sports marathons illegally. The first woman to run the Boston Marathon in 1966, despite being refused registration, was twenty-three-year-old Louise Roberta "Bobby" Gibb, who, masquerading as a man at the beginning of the race and starting from the bushes on the side of the road, eventually beat two-thirds of the participants of the race. The following year, at the same city marathon, Louise Gibb's achievement was repeated by Catherine Virginia "Katie" Schwitzer, who signed her application without specifying her full name as K.V. Switzer. She was registered with the issuance of a number, since no one suspected that these initials denote a woman. It is important to note that the audience actively welcomed the participants of the marathon, because their running resonated with the urban spirit of freedom and equality of opportunity, male marathon runners supported them on the track, and L. Gibb and K. Schwitzer themselves became honorary and legendary personalities for Boston. Another example of emancipation is the women's running club in the city of Jeddah (Saudi Arabia). The runs of its participants around the city (as opposed to training at stadiums closed to men) in an ultraconservative country, where until 2017 it was forbidden to teach physical education to girls in public schools, make them visible to society and indicate a humanistically oriented transformation of gender stereotypes inherent in it.

Urban street running acts as a means of socialization, forming the experience of both freedom (the choice of trajectories of runs) and subordination (running competitions according to the rules). It is the city that generates running etiquette, which sets patterns of behavior, compliance with which allows runners to carry out their activities in ways acceptable to citizens. It is obvious that not all of them share the values of runners, residents are often outraged by such phenomena accompanying mass runs as streets blocked for transport, an abundance of garbage on the running track and along it, not all accept street training of men with a bare torso, cleaning of mucous membranes by runners on sidewalks, overtaking pedestrians causing them inconvenience, drivers they are afraid of people running on highways with headphones, cyclists are outraged by runners on bike paths, etc. All this requires discussion, formation and popularization of the culture of urban running, it should have a reflexive etiquette component. At the same time, there is no doubt that urban running as a social practice demonstrates a powerful educational potential, not only introducing adherents to humanistic values, but also forming, using the terminology of Aristotle and Kant, components of practical reason that allow runners to achieve their goals in a multidirectional modern society, taking into account the interests of other residents of the city.           

Urban running is also an effective tool of the environmental movement, as exemplified by the "Green Marathons" organized since 2012 by Sberbank, whose participants in many cities of our country can overcome distances from one kilometer to a classic marathon, and the money collected for registration goes to planting trees in various regions of Russia. This at least partially compensates for the alienation of the city from nature as "its other", and runners become agents of the development of urban ecosystems.

 

Urban Running in Information Civilization

As Franziska Furtay rightly believes, "in the conditions of information civilization, the city loses two of its fundamental features – the square and the walls, i.e. signs of a special historical and existential space, fenced off from the natural cyclical village" [22, p. 129]. The values generated by the urban topos are virtualized and detached from their material carrier due to globalization and digitalization of modern society. This makes urban running culture world-wide and provides an opportunity, even virtual, but participation in the most massive and prestigious city runs with the help of technical means and their software. This specific form of urban running culture has acquired particular relevance in the situation of the recent pandemic. So, in 2021, online races were carried out within the framework of the London Marathon (Virgin Money London Marathon) - 50 thousand slots and the Boston Marathon – about 28 thousand slots, and runners aged 18 to 91 from 108 countries registered to participate in the last competition. Virtual marathons involve running in the time period specified by the organizers in any place other than the premises using technical controls. At the same time, the participants of the races receive official starting packages, and the successful runners receive authentic medals and finishers' T–shirts.

Cosmonauts also run city marathons on simulators. In 2007, Sunita Williams, having been selected a year earlier by the high result of the marathon in Houston, ran the Boston Marathon in near-Earth orbit, attaching the number 1400 to the simulator and starting in time with all the participants of the run. In 2016, British astronaut Tim Peake ran the London Marathon on the ISS, watching his rivals on a television broadcast transmitted to his monitor.

Thus, in the information civilization, running as an expression of the values of the urban lifestyle is virtualized and decentered, overcoming not only settlement, but also earthly boundaries, thereby making the elements of the spiritual space of urban life associated with it accessible wherever a person finds himself.

 

Conclusions

1. As a regular social practice, group urban running in Europe arose in the Middle Ages as part of festive events. Its formation and development were facilitated by both external factors (the frequent narrowness of city streets for riders, the absence of stadiums, the transmission of information to citizens through runners ? postmen and heralds, running excorts of the urban nobility), and internal ones related to the socio-cultural features of the urban lifestyle: relative independence from patriarchal traditions, carnival-ironic attitude to dominant values, a variety of forms of activity and leisure.

2. The massization of urban running is carried out in 20-30 years. The twentieth century, which was primarily due to the propaganda functions of physical culture and sports. Since the second half of the twentieth century, under the influence of NTR, street running has been widely practiced by citizens for health purposes, and is also considered by them as a tool for personal growth.

3. The increasing popularity of running has led to a new phenomenon of urban culture ? mass marathons. The most prestigious of them ("majors") are held in megacities focused on humanistic and democratic values, which are economic and political centers of a global scale, concentrating the "creative class" and providing ample opportunities for development. The spirit of innovation and success of these cities makes their running events globally in demand.

4. The social institutions that currently determine the regular group running activity of citizens belong to all spheres of society: economic (running tourism), social (holidays with a carnival-game component), political (campaign runs), spiritual (socialization institutions that use running activity as a way of introducing humanistic values).

5. Given the existence of a spatial dimension of human existence (E.U. Soja), street can be considered as a way of "appropriating" alienated and often hostile urban space. City marathons allow you to enter a borderline state to clarify the depths of your "I", prepare for activity in a highly competitive urban environment, provide the completeness of the bodily and emotional experience of the city that is unattainable outside of running, and are the realization of the existential "right to the city".

6. Mass running practices carry out significant urban transformations, which include the creation of their own semantic field in the "text" of the city, marked with monuments, names, events and legends. Street running is a form of synoikism, linking urban territories sometimes rigidly divided by ethnic, property, ideological and other barriers into a single social space, carries out a festive transformation of the city, makes a significant contribution to the development of the economy, attracting numerous tourists and sponsors of races, contributes to the gentrification of territories and branding of the city.

7. The habitus of modern urban running as a social practice can be represented by the following dispositions: solidarity, healthy lifestyle, women's emancipation, socialization, involvement in the environmental movement.

8. In the information civilization, running as an expression of the values of the urban lifestyle is virtualized and decentered, overcoming not only settlement, but also earthly boundaries, thereby making the elements of the spiritual space of urban life associated with it accessible wherever a person finds himself.

 

 

 

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First Peer Review

Peer reviewers' evaluations remain confidential and are not disclosed to the public. Only external reviews, authorized for publication by the article's author(s), are made public. Typically, these final reviews are conducted after the manuscript's revision. Adhering to our double-blind review policy, the reviewer's identity is kept confidential.
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There are many social practices in a person's life, is urban running one of them? Perhaps not – a person individually solves this issue, especially it does not matter where he runs – in the city or on a country road, etc. Nevertheless, social practice is a continuation of one or another social institution, therefore, the author of the article should present sufficient arguments in his work in order to consider urban running a social practice, i.e. one that is inscribed in social relations and manifests a number of its social functions. Meanwhile, in the content of the presented article, we see that its author focused primarily on the identification of urbanization processes, probably according to the author's plan, which are of fundamental importance for understanding the topic of running. I would like to emphasize once again that regardless of the localization of time and space, running as such may not lose any of its inherent properties, but on the other hand, it is likely that the environment still affects running, but rather from a situational, and maybe even a physiological point of view (for example, rural snowdrifts are clearly they will not contribute to the spread of running practices, etc., and the fast rhythm of the city will "spur" the mechanics of running in an urban location). The focus on urbanization is understandable, but why it should work on the research topic is not clear. The author lacks argumentation. It is also unclear what the scientists and sages who are listed by the author at the very beginning of the article have to do with the topic, for example, what Plato and Aristotle have to do with the topic of urbanization or the topic of running, etc. The author clearly superficially and thoughtlessly gave a list in which different names from different eras appear – and the picture does not clarify at all, Moreover, it is clearly getting worse, because, probably, the author did not fully realize in what theoretical and methodological way the question should be solved. Due to the resulting confusion in key concepts, the complexity of the perception of the material increases progressively. For example, the author of the article writes: "A striking element of an urbanized society are competitive races along city streets, the popularity of which is evidenced by both their large number and the large number of participants." Obviously, "urban running", stated in the title as a social practice (here I put a bold question mark), is not the same as "competitive races" (according to different criteria, they are definitely social practices). In short, there is some confusion of the author: he clearly cannot concentrate his attention on a certain subject area, and in general such "throwing" looks extremely out of place precisely in the format of scientific material (articles). In the "problem statement" section, the author appeals to sports, but I emphasize once again: urban running, when I went outside or to the stadium and ran with headphones in my ears, is not at all the same as running a marathon or cross–country along city avenues in a crowd of athletes. It is strange that the author does not take into account such a pronounced dissonance. Everything goes to the fact that the proposed topic will be difficult to disclose, if at all possible to implement it. The problem statement actually looks vague so much that it is difficult to grasp at all what is the priority area of research for the author – in the beginning, for example, we are talking about sports, then the author "switches" to the classification of urban runners, then recalls the "potential of the urban environment", even touches upon human virtue awakening while running and etc. But the question remains: what problem is the author considering and what goal does he set for this? I do not see answers to these reasonable and generally self-evident questions in the lengthy text. The strange design of the links in parentheses violates the "rhythm" of the perception of the material – the author needs to strive for uniformity. The lack of logic in the presentation of the material is discouraging: at first the author focused on urbanization, then moves on to the topic of sports, then to the metaphysics of the city, again to cultural and recreational activities, and so on until the end of the text. Unfortunately, such a text is perceived with difficulty, the scientific potential decreases sharply, the number of claims on the style, research culture of the author increases, etc. It is not yet possible to evaluate the material positively, however, there is a certain perspective in it.

Second Peer Review

Peer reviewers' evaluations remain confidential and are not disclosed to the public. Only external reviews, authorized for publication by the article's author(s), are made public. Typically, these final reviews are conducted after the manuscript's revision. Adhering to our double-blind review policy, the reviewer's identity is kept confidential.
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Review of the article Urban running practices, their determinants, transformations and influences The article "Urban running practices, their determinants, transformations and influences", submitted to the journal Sociodynamics, is relevant and original, since the topic is not often sanctified in scientific circles. It should be noted that the article does not clearly state the relevance of the topic, but at the same time, when reading the article, there is undoubtedly a special significance of this topic for modern residents of large cities. Running as a practice, collective or individual, is quite universal, since it suits the most diverse segments of the population and satisfies various human needs, for example, such as: the need to follow the ubiquitous fashion for healthy lifestyle; the need to feel competitive and feel part of something more (just the tradition of marathon races allows you to satisfy these needs). It is noteworthy that people who chose this type of leisure for themselves could initially come to this because of the needs mentioned above. However, after some time, practitioners began to focus on other axiological values in this activity, such as self-knowledge through meditativeness and contemplation of the process, the opportunity to gain creative insight, ecological processing of negative emotions, unity with one's own body, urban and natural environment. The question posed by the author in the article is especially interesting: How does urban running transform the city? The paper notes that running forms a special symbolic space of the city, its own semantic field, which leads the author to certain conclusions. At the beginning of the article, the author describes the degree of development of the topic, quotes various researchers on this topic, makes a broad review of research on this topic, then sets a number of tasks and describes the results of the research that were stated in these tasks. The article presents detailed conclusions. The title of the article, in my opinion, corresponds to the content of the work, since it provides a detailed analysis of the process of the origin of running as a special type of activity, and shows the transformation of this phenomenon in historical retrospect. The subject of the article is not specifically indicated by the author. I believe the subject is the historicity of the phenomenon under consideration, the axiological foundations of this phenomenon and the natural and urban influences on humans through running practices. The author draws attention to the specifics of this practice, emphasizing the moment of merging in this process of natural, social and cultural self-expression and self-presentation of the human Self. In my opinion, the article touches on important socio-philosophical issues, as the author writes about urban street running as a means of socialization, which forms "the experience of both freedom (choice of trajectories of runs) and subordination (running competitions according to the rules)." The author argues that; "the city generates running etiquette, which sets patterns of behavior, compliance with which allows runners to carry out their activities in ways acceptable to citizens." The necessary links have been made in the text. The bibliography reflects the research material and is designed in accordance with the requirements, has relevant modern sources. The author relies on both domestic and foreign research. The nature and style of presentation of the material meet the basic requirements for scientific publications of this kind. The article is structured logically and written in scientific language. This topic, in my opinion, has a certain novelty and relevance, the problems are presented by the author using a variety of methods, and may be of interest to researchers of a wide interdisciplinary profile. Thus, the article "Urban running practices, their determinants, transformations and influences" can be recommended for publication.
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