UKH

Just pondering about nothing much, if a gallon of petrol/diesel costs £6.00 and your car does 60mpg then you should get 1000 miles from £100 worth of fuel.

Do you get 1000 miles from a pair of trainers that cost £100.00?

You are not factoring in the cost of the 10-20 grand car/breaks/gears/tires.. yet you are the trainers..

And I get 400 out of a pair of running shoes, 500 max, 200-300 out of a lightweight pair which is 3-4 weeks.

After 1000 miles the trainers are going to be pretty knackered structurally if nothing else.

I reckon running might be a bit cheaper than driving but there are so many variables huh. What food are you fuelling yourself with and at what cost? How much was the car and how much to service / repair over time.

I've been fell running off and on for about 15 years now. Thought it was getting a bit pricey (still do actually). More recently started cycling, by comparison, running is peanuts. Driving is quite possibly cheaper than cycling, for some

The Inland Revenues allows you to claim 45 pence per mile for car ownership tax insurance tyres servicing and fuel etc. 

So do you get 222 miles from a £100 pair of trainers? Of course you should really factor in cost of extra nutrition, Strava subscription etc

Strava is free..

We pay in $ what the UK pays in GBP for trainers, if not less. I'm amazed how much shoes are in the UK now. But then again running races are far cheaper in the UK.

It's the OCR and Tri's where the stupid money is. 

I can understand paying 1000 or so on a bike but not 3-4k. 

Saying that I've still not got Nike Next %'s. Just seem so much.

For cheapskates maybe, surely you’re a subscriber for the additional training data and analysis??

On most cars the depreciation is about the same as the petrol.  If you pay £20,000 for a new car which is basically worthless after 200,000 miles the depreciation is 10p per mile, same as the petrol.  Try throwing that into the mix next time you are asking your mates for petrol money.

If it's a posh car then the depreciation can be n times that estimate.

Calorifically and in terms of CO2 emissions, a fully loaded modern vehicle is less intensive than the same number of people running, whilst travelling 5x as fast and keeping the weather out.

As we decarbonise the supply chain and energy, it becomes less polluting to travel by EV - especially when you factor in the carbon cost of food.

Its surprising just how energy efficient a modern combustion vehicle is.  

Also not factoring in the money spent at the physio!

A runner working at an FTP of 200W doing 6 minute miles will expend 0.02 kWh to run a mile. The human body's combustion system is around 25% efficient so will need 0.08 kWh of biomass fuel

a diesel car at 10 miles per litre (45.546 mpg) will use 0.1 litres of diesel at 10kWh per litre = 1 kWh to do a mile

So the runner is 12.5 times more efficient than the car

Bored engineer working away from home

Ballpark same mass of mine, but I was going with 90 mpg for a very efficient combustion car doing 50 mph.  Carrying 6 people that car is using the same energy per person per mile as those 6 people running.

When you think about it, it’s amazing that a machine weighing 1500 kg can move itself and 350 kg of runnings at five time’s the speed for the same energy as just the runners.  

Level the humans up by giving them wheels and their per mile energy need drops and the car would have to have something like 15 people in it to win on energy...  In terms of energy per kg being moved it’s still ahead but not per kg of cargo.

But that ignores energy used to accelerate car from rest which is lost  when braking (ok I’m ignoring EV with regenerative braking) 

On the other hand but the runner on a nice bike and his 200W FTP would equate to around 25mph or more 

You can always recover that by coasting down to your final stop.  I can do the last 3 miles to my house coasting down from 60 mph and an average shallow descent.  (For safety sakes I did this test with the glut down and shifting the gears to always be appropriate if I had to come off the clutch.  Top tip from someone I know who coasted down a very tall mountain road for fun once - don’t turn the engine off as that engages the steering lock...)

Though that isn't taking into account the cost of shoes.  The cost of biomass is likely to be less relevant as most people overeat.

That’s taking the piss.  Do you want me to re do my calcs with the runner running down hill, or the cyclist free wheeling?

We’ve moved on from cost to energy and carbon balances 

Even without the gradient you can always coast a car down.  If you’re lucky the impatient person behind you might lend a nudge or two...

Fair enough.  Even so, most people eat too much and therefore no additional food need be consumed, more likely it'll just get burnt instead of going on as fat.

Wait till you factor in the cost of 5 years in a nursing home from the exercise extended lifespan... 

Let's just gloss over that - I was only sitting here having a beer in front of the woodburner thinking bollocks . Like, a car is actually a heap of worthless metal that can't go anywhere without fuel and we can't run anywhere without shoes (let's not go down barefoot running argument). And we seem to have bikes in the equation as well now......

But true to UKH we are in deep discussion and why not for a bit of fun on a dismal night.

Wish I never mentioned it.

Bored Mole sitting at home with beer .

I'm an Ambassador, well was, so I get free premium.. I was one of the original runners they used to grow Strava in Germany.

And Race fees.. 

The running is a simple cheap sport argument soon falls flat on its face..

if I've enough expendable income maybe, at the moment I get by on a $500 gravel bike. Not great and noticeably inferior to my more expensive bikes in the UK but with 2 more kids due soon I'm in no position to justify much on a bike. I also just don't ride enough. At most it was a once a week/fortnight activity. It's never been much more than that.

Sure I’ve seen a graphic somewhere that shows cycling to be the most energy efficient form of transport by some considerable margin. 

Cycling at 200w gets you about 19mph on average I reckon. My last 100 miler I averaged 19.05mph and 200w for a circular course returning to where I started. 

A good cyclist requires no computer programme to make maximum use of gearing, striking the balance of energy efficiency and still making uphill progress. The natural compromise between seating position, aerodynamics and getting power through, or bike fit for similar. Then of course making maximum use of gravity on downhill sections. 

No chance, the amount of work and commuting I do to fund my cycling habit makes it about as friendly as an old Boeing 747 I reckon

Ha! Same here to be honest

No, but how many miles do you run / drive each year?

If you're keen enough you could do 2352 miles without inflicting any wear & tear on your expensive trainers at all.
https://www.annamcnuff.com/BarefootBritain

You dont have to enter races to run & you def dont need strava!

Fuel and trainers aren’t measuring the same thing. 
 

I get 60mpg from my car, that’s about £6.50 per 60miles for fuel or 11p per mile. 
A banana costs 12p and has about 100 calories.

Fuelwise that’s about 2p a mile more expense to run somewhere. If you only eat bananas. Chocolate might be cheaper. Do the sums. 

Trainers are pretty much your tyres. 
£100 for 600 miles for trainers. 
£400 for 30,000 miles for tyres, assuming no punctures. Running works out a lot more expensive there  £5,000 for 30,000. But that would be about 15 years of running and tyres would have perished by then and you’d have got through 3 sets maybe over that time?  

Servicing would be physio and massage.

Lets say £350 a year for servicing. I’ve never had a physio or massage. Driving is more expensive there for me. Maybe not for others. 

How much is your time worth? 10 miles in a car would take about 20 minutes. Running, an hour an a half.

Whats your health worth?

I’m sure there’s other factors. 

Time for a spreadsheet? 

20 years of poor health due to couch potato lifestyle?

Is mileage the correct way to judge this? Would 'time spent on the activity' be a better measure since people rarely run for commuting purposes.