RAW Running

RAW #653.

livfenneken birthday was recently. Is it her birthday today? No.

Are we going to continue celebrating it anyway because we have a photo of her standing in Mean Eyed Cat next to an open flame? Obviously.

Olivia is a former D1 runner from Kent State who escaped Ohio, moved to Austin, found RAW and apparently decided that after years of collegiate running what she really needed in her life was to spend Tuesday nights doing 1Ks with people who drink beer afterward.

Great judgment.

Tonight: **WOODMONT RELAYS.**

This one is simple enough that even the people who completely ignore the announcements should be able to figure it out.

Find a partner.

You alternate ~1000m loops around Woodmont / Exposition.

A group: 5 loops each = 5K of hard running
B group: 4 loops each = 4K of hard running

While your partner runs, you recover.

Which means you get roughly four minutes to:

* breathe
* question your pacing
* tell everyone you “felt controlled”
* watch your partner come screaming around the corner
* realize you have to do it again

The goal is for everybody to finish around the same time. The actual outcome will depend largely on whether someone goes completely insane on rep one.

6.45p — Mean Eyed Cat
7.00p — announcements
7.05p — warmup leaves
7.20p — workout starts
8.20p-ish — beers and continued celebration of Olivia’s no-longer-current birthday

First timers: sign the waiver at [www.raw.run](http://www.raw.run).

It’s August. It’s Austin. Hydrate before you get there. Bring water if you signed up. Tip your bartenders. Don’t drink and drive.

And happy birthday again, Olivia.

We intend to keep saying that until at least September.

RAW #653. See ya tonight. Go .

RAW #652: **Rollingwood Hills**

Tonight’s workout is very simple:

**hills, hills, hills.**

We’re headed to Rollingwood for one of RAW’s classic lies:
“it’s just one hill.”

Yes, it is one hill.
No, that does not make it easy.
In fact, this hill is 540m of pure dishonesty.

We’ll hit it **4–6 times**, which is intentionally vague because RAW has always believed that numbers should feel more like suggestions than promises. There’s also a shorter option, so if you’re reading this and already trying to negotiate with yourself, relax. We have something for everyone.

Schedule:

6.45p — Meet in front of Mean Eyed Cat
7.00p — Announcements
7.05p — Warm up to the start
7.20p — Workout starts
8.20p-ish — Back to Mean Eyed Cat for beers, lies and selective memory loss

First timers: sign the waiver at www.raw.run
Everyone else: hydrate before you show up, bring water if you signed up, and prepare to learn that “deceptively tough” is just polite language for “this hill is .”

Also, let the attached photo serve as an important reminder:
**drinking out of your shoe is not required for tonight’s workout.**
It is, however, apparently part of RAW’s broader cultural heritage.

See ya tonight.
Go HAF.
Tip your bartenders.
Don’t drink and drive.

🚨 TONIGHT: Jose Castro AND Tara Schwehm ARE ABANDONING AUSTIN 🚨

After 10 f**k - ahhh - years, Jose and Tara have decided they’ve had enough of the heat, the traffic and all of us, so we’re giving them one final night at Mean Eyed Cat before they escape.

Jose is a RAW OG, which means he has spent years running stupid workouts, drinking responsibly adjacent amounts of beer and graciously allowing us to turn his house into the greatest Austin Marathon cheer station on Earth.

So while everyone else is sad about losing two wonderful friends, RAW leadership is currently dealing with a much more serious crisis:

Where the hell are we supposed to party during the Marathon | Half Marathon | 5K

We have contacted Zillow. We have contacted the City. We have contacted several people who live near the course and none of them have agreed to let 300 sweaty adults, a DJ and an irresponsible quantity of beverages take over their front yard.

Please come say goodbye tonight.

📍 Mean Eyed Cat
🕕 6.00p
📅 Tonight
📝 Tomorrow’s productivity is between you and your employer

Take PTO. Call in sick. Get fired. Claim you have an emergency involving a man in striped overalls and a cape. We do not care. Just be there.

Bring your favorite Jose and Tara stories, photos and evidence from the last decade. Be prepared to laugh, cry and ask them several times whether they’re absolutely sure they want to leave.

And per the official party instructions: if you’re single, introduce yourself to Ari. We don’t know why he has been placed in charge of this, but apparently his responsibilities now include romantic intake coordination.

We love you, Jose and Tara. Austin will miss you. RAW will miss you.

The marathon runners who counted on Jose’s house for motivation, noise and questionable hydration choices are completely screwed.

📸: Courtney Claire

Tonight we’re going back to Pease Park for Rainbow Bend Loops, which is a RAW OG workout and also a very efficient way to find out who has been lying about their fitness.

Here’s the deal:

Meet at Mean Eyed Cat at 7.00p
OR meet us at Pease Park Conservancy around 7.20p

If you’re going straight there, put this in your GPS:

1100 Kingsbury St
Austin, TX 78703

The workout is 4–5 loops of Rainbow Bend. Hard up the hill, jog easy, left on Rainbow Bend and go , right on Windsor, easy to Parkway, then go again until you’re back at the start. Repeat until morale improves or until Mitch 🅿️ or Daniel Duffy tells you you’re done.

This is one of the originals. Fast, scenic, rude in the exact right way, and on home turf. Pease Park has seen a concerning amount of RAW behavior over the years, including us somehow donating $10K to name the front garden after the crew, which still feels like something the city should have stopped us from doing.

First timers: sign the waiver at www.raw.run
Everyone else: hydrate before you show up. It’s hot. Bring water if you signed up. Don’t be weird. Actually, be a little weird, but not medically weird.

See ya tonight. Go HAF. Tip your bartenders. Don’t drink and drive.

📸 pictured: the exact face you make when you know the loop is about to hurt but you’re pretending this was your idea Johnny Pace 📸🎥🏃🏻

Tonight we are doing The Deibel, which is not technically named after the devil, but the distinction becomes less clear somewhere around loop 3.

Here’s the deal: we’re jogging from Mean Eyed Cat over to Pemberton Heights / Possum Trot for 5 x 1200m. You run a hard loop, everyone regroups, we recover together for 3–4 minutes, and then we do it again because apparently this is what we do for fun.

The loop is beautiful. The hills are rude. The shared recovery is the secret sauce. Nobody gets left behind, but everybody does get humbled.

Schedule:

6.45p — Meet in front of Mean Eyed Cat
7.00p — Announcements
7.05p — Warmup jog to the start
7.20p — Workout starts
8.20p-ish — Back to Mean Eyed for beers / emotional support

If you’re driving to the workout or bringing water, put this in your GPS:

2372 W 12th St
Austin, TX 78703

Please hydrate before you show up. Please sign the waiver at www.raw.run. Please bring water for the crew if you signed up. Please do not make us name another workout after you because you passed out on Possum Trot.

See ya tonight. Go HAF. Tip your bartenders. Don’t drink and drive.

Ryan Fenton has just been informed that tonight’s workout involves five hard 1K loops.

RAW OG. FloTrack legend. Man who appears to have several questions about how his evening reached this point.

Tonight we’re heading over to Woodmont Dr. and Exposition for the Woodmont Relays. You’ll be paired into teams of two and alternate 1,000m loops:

A group — 5 loops each
B group — 4 loops each

That means 5K or 4K of hard running, depending on your group, and enough standing around between reps to convince yourself the next one won’t hurt as badly. It will.

The groups are designed so everyone finishes around the same time. Unless your partner is Ryan, in which case you may finish earlier while he’s busy telling you a story about the 2012 NCAA West Regional.

Meet at 7.00p at Mean Eyed Cat
Warmup starts at 7.05p
Sign the waiver at www.raw.run

It’s hot. Hydrate before you arrive. Drink something afterward. Tip your bartenders. Don’t drink and drive.

📸: Johnny Pace 📸🎥🏃🏻

Tonight night we’re linking up with Fleet Feet Austin for the “Never Been Better” Summer Series Kickoff at Better Half. The event name is referring to the running community, not the beer. Hope that clears things up.

It’s going to be roughly 9,000 degrees, so naturally we’re running either 2.5 or 4 miles before drinking cold beverages and launching ourselves down a 22-foot slip & slide like responsible adults.

Here’s the agenda:

6.30p — Show up, bother the vendors, hydrate
7.00p — A heroic number of introductions
7.10p — Run starts
7.35p-ish — Return sweaty and dramatically overstate how hard the route was
7.35–8.15p — Happy hour, Cowboy Pools, slip & slide and general foolishness
8.15p — Raffles
8.30p — Go home

There will be water, electrolytes, food and drink specials, prizes and plenty of ways to cool off. Big thanks to Fleet Feet Austin and all the partners for putting this circus together.

Bring dry clothes. Tip your bartenders. Don’t drink and drive. Please do not make us explain why you got injured on the slip & slide.

See ya tonight if you want to swing by.