If you’ve been to a national meet, you’ve probably seen them hanging around. However, if you missed them, there’s no need to fret, as you’ll more than likely see them online, either in a video or in the occasional race day selfie with runners on Instagram.

Matt Barnhart and Ian Terpin, otherwise known as the “RunnerSpace guys” are responsible for the Internet sensation, RunnerSpace Live, in which the two bring fans the latest happenings in the running world, ranging from the high school level to professional and international competitions. Over the course of their time being online, the guys have become quite familiar to those in the running community.

It all started just before the 2008 Olympic Trials when RunnerSpace.com, officially launched by Ross Krempley, came into the picture. Coming out as a coverage site, the Trials were the perfect way to get views to and have a fresh start. Wanting to get some good coverage, RunnerSpace sent out a team, and that’s where RunnerSpace Live was born.

With Ian doing the technical work, and Matt working the camera, the goal was to do a live daily recap of each day of the Trials. However, that proved to be a failed experiment, and the guys pondered what to do. After some thinking, and trying to find people to speak, they ended up jumping in front of the camera themselves and thought of another idea called the “RunnerSpace Rundown.”  They continued this throughout the week, and once the Trials were over, they decided to change it up, and have their videos be weekly, uploading each Wednesday. Another valuable change they added was to have something funny to start off with to keep viewers tuned in. This has now become to be known as the “Awkward Video of the Week” segment, in which they show a video of something usually funny at a meet somewhere in the country before going through the weekly recap.

However, before RunnerSpace Live, Matt and Ian were two people who relatively knew each other, though oddly enough, had been around each other longer than they thought. Both Oregon natives, Ian from Salem and Matt from Eugene, the two had crossed paths a few times before the 2008 Olympic Trials.

Being in Oregon and having Tracktown USA in your backyard, it’s hard not to become part of the running community. Ian was bitten by the running bug, and took up running throughout high school. He would go on to run as a walk-on at the University of Oregon during the same time as future Olympian, Galen Rupp.

With Matt’s father being a coach, it wasn’t long until he had a pair of spikes of his own. He would go on to dual-enroll at the University of Oregon, and run at Lane Community College on a scholarship where he’d meet his coach, coincidentally, Ross Krempley. With Ross being his coach, Matt would be part of Team XO, which was the precursor to RunnerSpace.

Ian got into RunnerSpace after Ross had seen a highlight video that he’d produced for a team banquet. Ian had a friend who knew Ross, and promptly introduced the two. After some conversating, Ian agreed to join the team, and was sent to the Arcadia Invitational, where he filmed the races, as well as met Matt for the first time, as he was part of the coverage team sent by Ross.

Aside from working on their show, Ian and Matt have a collective group of jobs, ranging from any type of work that deals with motion graphics, promotional videos, trail running documentaries, as well as interviews and live broadcasts, working the cameras as well. Despite the amount of work, they wouldn’t have it any other way.

“The job has taken me places where otherwise, I wouldn’t have gone,” says Ian. “Just traveling and getting to see all of these different parts of the country, and all of the different meets we get to go to and people we get to meet.”

Matt agrees, stating that the artistic freedom that RunnerSpace allows is truly wonderful. The guys have been able to expand their ideas and turn them into productions like RUNAHOLICS, Running Bad, and The Race Walking Dead. In addition, it’s a great joy to work with the same people that have been there since the start of RunnerSpace, and that it’s been really fun working with friends, and people that he genuinely likes spending time with.

“Ian and I have gotten to become really good friends over the years, and RunnerSpace helps keep that friendship,” he says.

Due to their duties to the show, the two either frequently see each other, or talk to each other over the phone to plan future segments and skits. However, when they’re not doing RunnerSpace Live or covering a meet, the two get to take a breather.

In Ian’s case, he stays in shape and runs often, usually running trails a few times a week. Since he lives nearby, he’ll go run the Wildwood trail of Forest Park in Portland, which is about 30 miles long.

“I really enjoy running the trails,” he says.

When Matt has some time off, he enjoys simple things as well, like playing music, meeting with friends at coffee shops, and even cleaning out his attic.

“When you travel so much,” he says. “Being home is almost like a vacation,”

Matt and Ian seem to be two of the luckiest guys in the world. They travel, meet famous athletes, they have fun, and it’s all in their job description. It’s now nearly eight years later, and the guys and the show are still going strong, though they admit that it’s becoming a bit more difficult to keep up with the show, as they’re constantly traveling. With this in mind and hopes of a brighter future for RunnerSpace, the guys along with RunnerSpace look to improve it even further by revamping it.

“I think we’re trying to make it more collaborative across the site, including more high school stuff with DyeStat,” says Ian.

DyeStat, which now has regional sites in Florida, Illinois, and California, is partners with RunnerSpace and is on the same page in terms of where they want to go in the future with their coverage.

It’s the start of a new year; a new year full of new challenges and experiences. Whatever the future holds, it can be assured that the RunnerSpace guys are going to be a part of it, and will be around for more RunnerSpace Rundowns. Until next week, they’re signing off.

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