The Brief

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

On a weeknight in April 2016, about 20 people gathered in Koreatown for a run organized by two friends who weren’t sure what they were doing or if anyone would even show up.

Ten years later, that group has become Koreatown Run Club, a weekly fixture that now draws hundreds at a time and roughly 800 to a thousand runners across a typical week, according to co-founder Duy Nguyen. The club has expanded well beyond the neighborhood through partnerships with major brands, including sneaker collaborations with Nike and a banner encouraging the group for this year’s L.A. Marathon.

Neither Nguyen nor co-founder Michael Pak expected it to last this long, or to take on the kind of role it has in people’s lives. The pair, Nguyen said, were “just looking for stuff to do together.”

“I don’t think we thought that far ahead. The idea itself was kind of spur of the moment and then when we had the first run, we were like, ‘oh, what are we doing next?’ And then you blink and it’s 10 years later,” he said.

The first run was loosely organized. Nguyen, an avid soccer guy, had originally planned to start a soccer club, but field access and liability concerns made that difficult. Running was simpler to coordinate and required little beyond a meeting point and a time.

“You could run for free and people could come out at their own will and join,” Pak said.

Even then, they were unsure how it would work in practice.

“None of us are runners,” Nguyen said. “So we were worried like, what route do we run?”

Koreatown Run Club founders Mike Pak and Duy Nguyen at Love Hour in Koreatown.

(

Brian Feinzimer

/

The LA Local

)

About 20 people showed up that first night, many of them friends who came to support the pair. Pak said much of the attendance over time happened through word of mouth rather than any formal outreach.

As the runs became more organized and more people came out to run, the nature of the group began to change. Pak said he started to notice it in conversations with runners who were willing to share more about their lives outside of running. He recalled one woman telling him about her struggle with alcohol addiction and how the club had helped her through it.

“That’s when a light bulb went off,” he said. “They have their own personal life, they’re going through their demons in life, and for them to express those feelings at a run club where they don’t know anyone, I realized, well, if it’s just that story, I’m sure there are thousands of other stories that maybe we have an opportunity to learn from.”

For many members, the club functions as a place to build relationships that extend beyond the runs themselves.

Julie Lee, co-captain of the crew on Thursdays, joined in 2023 after seeing its runners hype each other up in the Rose Bowl Half Marathon. She already knew who they were from Instagram, but said experiencing their energy in person made her want to join.

Originally from Maryland, Lee said finding a community she can trust in a new place has been life-changing.

“These are the friends that I call when I’m having hard times in life, when I’m going through my breakups, when I need a ride to the airport. This has become my family outside of my actual home,” she said.

Charles Austin, another co-captain, said the club filled a similar role for him after returning to the city after college. He’s invited people he met through the club, including Lee, to his wedding last year.

“That’s the sort of bonds that you end up building. And that’s something that kind of fulfills me day in and day out,” he said. “I probably couldn’t make it through some of the harder things I’ve been through in the last couple of years if not for KRC.”

Runners pose for a group photo before running with Koreatown Run Club at Love Hour in Koreatown.

(

Brian Feinzimer

/

The LA Local

)

The club has also influenced how participants interact with the neighborhood itself. Pak said that before joining, he felt some people were hesitant to spend time in the neighborhood or felt unsure navigating it.

“When you have friends in the neighborhood and you live in the neighborhood, you get a little curious and have curiosity to explore more of the neighborhood that you live in. And I think we just opened a little door,” he said.

Nguyen agrees.

“I think maybe the run club opened it up more to being like, ‘Oh, I’m just gonna walk to get coffee after a run and stumble upon all these places and meet all these people,’” he said.

Running through the neighborhood also shapes how people experience it. While the streets of Koreatown are “unpredictable,” Pak said, moving through the area on foot allows runners to notice details they might otherwise miss.

“I think in the beginning, I didn’t expect to see some really undiscovered restaurants and businesses,” Pak said.

Over time, Koreatown Run Club has expanded well beyond the city. Lee said that while traveling in South Korea for a marathon, she was welcomed by a local run club simply because she was associated with KRC.

Nguyen described a similar experience while traveling in Taiwan, where someone recognized the club’s name on his shirt and came up to talk to him.

Similarly, Pak said while traveling Japan, he ran into someone wearing a KRC shirt and ended up going to dinner together.

But Pak felt one of the clearest indicators of the club’s reach was when runners began sending him photos of unofficial club merchandise being sold overseas.

“That’s when I thought we really made it,” he said, laughing. “We didn’t know we could be bootlegged.”

The club has also taken on a larger role during moments of crisis. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Pak and Nguyen said runners used group chats to coordinate grocery deliveries and other forms of mutual aid.

More recently, after the L.A. fires, the club converted one of its spaces into a relief center, collecting and distributing donations to affected families. Pak said volunteers from the community showed up consistently to help run the effort.

“There were just so many volunteers that came through every single day,” he said. “It’s the community that we built. They all come together in a time of need.”

To Austin, the run club has become something he could rely on.

Runners along their route with Koreatown Run Club at Love Hour in Koreatown.

(

Brian Feinzimer

/

The LA Local

)

“It’s a spot where I can come to and I can build on friendships and family,” he said. “It all starts here and it just kind of branches out from here.”

On a recent weeknight at Love Hour — a burger joint co-owned by Pak and Nguyen — Lynn Nguyen, who joined the club in 2017, was in the middle of an interview after a run when she turned to Pak.

“I’m getting married, Mike! You’re invited to my wedding!” she said, before returning to her answer.

A few moments later, another runner walked by and stopped to greet her. Nguyen mentioned she had officiated their wedding three years earlier, then laughed and gestured toward the exchange.

“See? That’s how it is.”

Both founders said their lives have changed dramatically. Neither expected to run full marathons — Pak has done 10, Nguyen 31 — or to meet people from around the world and see strangers become friends who go on to get married and have kids.

“It’s really inspiring to see how many people look at us outside of just Los Angeles. And at this point, it’s way bigger than us and it’s really cool to see new people coming in who I have no idea who they are, but they are part of this long-term journey,” Pak said.

Ten years after the first run, they say they still approach running the club without a long-term roadmap and take things day by day.

“We’ve been doing that from the start and it’s gotten us here, so I think we’ll just keep going at it,” Nguyen said. “We never think too far ahead.”

Southern California was built on radio.

"I can still hear the jingle KFWB News 98,” wrote  Taline in Los Feliz, during a recent conversation on LAist's daily news show, AirTalk, which airs on 89.3 FM. “I grew up hearing that in my dad's minivan on the way to and from school. It has a special place in my heart.”

Back in April, broadcast company Audacy announced KNX News — one of the last-remaining all-news FM stations — was leaving the FM dial where it had simulcast on 97.1 FM since 2021. The station, which is also one of the oldest in L.A., is not budging from 1070 AM where it has been on the air for more than 100 years. The move away from FM officially happened in May to make way for a new sports talk station, which Audacy officials called an area of growth for advertisers in today’s media landscape.

The move is one in a long line of changes for radio and a reminder that before podcasts, playlists and algorithms, many Southern Californians built their days around radio broadcasts.

Radio, a daily ritual

The construction of KNX

(

Herman J. Schultheis

/

Los Angeles Public Library

)

Michael Jackson, a well-known KNX, personality

(

Los Angeles Public Library

)

Larry Mantle, now in his 41st year hosting AirTalk, remembers being a kid and dreaming of what it might be like to be behind the mic at one of these radio stations.

“ I grew up with KNX," he said. “My dream job as a kid was to be an anchor on KNX or KFWB, the two local all-news radio stations, 'cause there was nothing like hosting AirTalk that even existed at that point.”

Mantle opened up the phone lines on a recent show to hear from his fellow SoCal radio lovers about the shows they miss and the memories they have. Here's what they had to say:

A love for radio, then and now  

A pilot of KMPC's traffic alert helicopter pictured with his daughter and grandson.

(

Los Angeles Public Library

)

A 1963 picture of Valley State College (now Los Angeles Valley College) preparing to launch KVCM

(

Larry Leach

/

Los Angeles Public Library

)

“When you'd walk down Hollywood Boulevard where the station was, you could hear it playing as you went down the street,” said  Olivia in Glendale about KLAC 570 with Al Jarvis.

 Larry in Yorba Linda shouted out KBCA Jazz for its 24-hour jazz, saying “When I first moved out here in '68 from Phoenix, which had like an hour a week, it was a real wonder.”

 Mark in Glassell Park emailed that he loves KCRW’s Henry Rollins, writing, “I used to bristle at his unique DJ persona, but over time, I came to love him and his crazy eclectic playlists. I find his knowledge in history and punk rock fascinating. He's a gem and a legend."

"I'd like to give a shout-out to all the DJs working at KXLU, the college station at Loyola Marymount University, said  Jeremy in Culver City in an email. “That station's been on the air for nearly 60 years. I believe it's one of the best examples of what's possible with radio."

"KFWB and KRLA back in the day when they were rock music stations —  Dr. Demento, one of my favorite on-air personalities, also had eclectic music taste," said  Carrie in Desert Edge.

“ Dr. Demento was must listening when I was a kid in junior high school at Le Conte Junior High in Hollywood,” Mantle added. “Every Sunday night on KMET, we would make sure we were listening to Dr. Demento and his funny records.”

The question remains…

An 11-year-old winning a car in a KMPC contest in 1963.

(

Los Angeles Public Library

)

Listener support is vital to any radio station, and it’s clear KNX has many lifelong fans. AirTalk listeners highlighted their support for household KNX names over the decades like Bill Keene, Melinda Lee, Mike Roy and Jackie Olden.

As KNX makes changes, many are watching closely and thinking about the future of radio.

Listeners like Tommy in La Quinta are left wondering if the radio dial will be the same…

“I’m a hardcore listener, but I don't know about casual listeners [and] if they'll tune to AM,” he said.

After months of hand-wringing, Los Angeles and LA28 have come to a tentative agreement on how Olympics organizers will reimburse the city for its expenses for the 2028 Summer Games.

According to the deal, the private Olympic organizing committee will pay upfront for the estimated cost of services that are not eligible for federal reimbursement, like trash pick-up and traffic control. Under another proposal, the city would also be able to tap an LA28 contingency fund if it isn't fully repaid by the federal government for policing costs at Olympic venues.

The agreement is nearly nine months overdue and still needs approval by Mayor Karen Bass and the City Council.

The 2028 Olympics are intended to be privately financed, and an existing city agreement with LA28 states that the Olympics organizers, not L.A., will pay for extra costs for public services in support of the Games. But L.A. is the financial back-stop for the Olympics, meaning if LA28 goes in the red, taxpayers will pick up the bill.

Beyond that, the city services agreement presents another area where L.A. could incur additional unexpected expenses for hosting the Games. L.A. City Councilmember Monica Rodriguez warned LA28 CEO Reynold Hoover earlier this year that a bad deal could "bankrupt" the city.

Jacie Prieto Lopez, an LA28 spokesperson, and Paul Krekorian, who leads the city's office of major events, said in statements that the freshly inked agreement would help deliver a fiscally responsible Games.

"Mayor Bass’ priority is that the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games be fiscally responsible, protect taxpayers, and benefit Angelenos for decades to come. This agreement helps deliver that commitment," Krekorian said.

But the contract between the two parties doesn't fully resolve one of the biggest areas of financial risk for the city: the enormous cost of security for an event as extensive and high-profile as the summer Olympics and Paralympics.

Organizers are counting on the federal government to pay for public safety at Olympic venues that are considered part of a "national special security event." That includes costs for LAPD staffing. LA28 has not included security costs in its $7.1 billion budget — a fact that City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto criticized earlier this year.

The federal government has so far allocated $1 billion for security costs for the Olympics. Exactly where those federal funds will go has not yet been determined, and there's no guarantee they will cover all of L.A.'s policing costs.

To address this, city officials have also proposed an amendment to a 2021 agreement between the city and LA28. That amendment would establish that if L.A. is not reimbursed by the federal government for all its eligible expenses, it could dip into LA28's contingency fund of $270 million before the private organizing committee could use those funds for any legacy projects.

But that bucket of money will first be used for any costs that Olympics organizers still owe if they run out of revenue — meaning if the Olympics don't turn a profit, the city's access to that money will depend on how much is left for the taking.

Civil rights attorney Connie Rice, who has been tracking the city's negotiations with LA28, told LAist the agreement was a "PR document" not a deal. She pointed out that if the federal government does not pay up for security spending as expected, L.A. could be in trouble.

" It leaves the taxpayers with a GoFundMe strategy," she said.

The city services agreement lays the groundwork for more negotiations between LA28 and the city. Each venue will require its own agreement, to be negotiated by July 1, 2027. Venues in the city of L.A. include Dodger Stadium, the L.A. Convention Center, L.A. Memorial Coliseum and the Venice Beach Boardwalk.

The City Council's ad-hoc committee on the 2028 Games will meet Tuesday afternoon to vote on the agreement.