North Star Run Club is a new and growing community for active people in Madison.
The club’s kickstart began this spring when Daniel Araya, a recent graduate of UW-Madison, approached his friends, Josiah Preston and Isaac Fuentes, with an idea.
The three of them decided to create North Star Run Club to foster a sense of community among experienced and beginner runners alike.
“Us three together would sometimes just catch each other on runs or around campus and whatnot,” Araya said. “So I think it kind of shifted to how can we try and bring more people into doing what we were doing.”
The trio began to advertise North Star on social media and organize two runs per week. The club has quickly become an outlet for people of color and active individuals in Madison.
“We’ve seen run clubs in Milwaukee or like run clubs just in different states and they didn’t really have a POC one in Madison, and you know that wasn’t necessarily at first the intention,” Araya said. “The intention was really just to open it to everybody, but just naturally, us being people of color and how we advertised it, it became that safe space.”
North Star Run Club is also a safe space for runners of all experience levels. Preston explains how the club is committed to supporting runners of all different paces.
“We have people that have been running previously, and we also have people that haven’t ran a mile in their life before,” Preston said. “But they’re seeing that difference and change through our run club. It’s amazing to see.”
The club is still in its early stages, but the trio has been hard at work coordinating collaborations with small businesses and creating merchandise.
The cofounders believe the next step for their club is to give members of North Star structured time to socialize after runs.
“The plan is to kind of expand it to more of a social aspect so having different places in the city or hosting the runs in ways where you’re not just running but you’re also having a set time to socialize with new people in a third space,” Araya said.
They hope North Star’s popularity will continue to grow as students return to campus and Fuentes and Preston go into their senior years at UW-Madison.
“I definitely think a part that I’m really looking forward to is the word of mouth, ” Fuentes said. “People showing up, people coming to have fun and honestly just spreading the word.”
North Star Run Club meets twice a week at Essen Haus Restaurant on Wednesdays at 7 p.m. and Saturdays at 9 a.m.
They can be found at their instagram @northstarrc for updates and events.
