At 6:00 a.m., Seoul was still winding down from the night before. As I stepped onto the metro heading to Gwanghwamun for the Seoul Marathon, I found myself surrounded not by fellow runners, but by late night revelers heading home. It was a striking contrast. Two different rhythms of the same city intersecting in a single carriage. By the time I reached the start line, the streets had transformed. About 40,000 runners gathered beneath the early morning sky, representing a running culture in Korea that feels both fast growing and deeply embedded. What stood out was the diversity of run clubs, each group dressed in its own colors, almost like teams lining up for competition. It felt organized, communal and quietly competitive. Only later, scrolling through social media, did I realize I had been running alongside influencers and even celebrities. A reflection of how visible and mainstream running has become. The Seoul Marathon is not only one of the oldest in the world, but the oldest in Asia. There was something powerful about running in a race with such history, especially as the rest of
Sydney to Seoul: Finding a different rhythm of running
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