Maybe from about the age of about 14-21 a fit guy with a shirt off might be considered attractive to a female. But if you don't fall into that category put your damn shirt on when you run. Nobody wants to see your gut hanging out, man boobs and hair like you are chewbacca. It is a freeking eyesore and you look like a goof. Think about other people that have to look at you instead of your own selfishness.
signed,
Humanity
This such utter BS. I grew up (and ran) in the 70s and 80s. Men going shirtless, in pretty much any warm weather situation, was a COMPLETE non-issue. This probably extended until at least the 90s. Somehow, in the last few decades younger people (apparently, mostly?) have decided that there is something wrong with it.
And the lack of consistency is ridiculous, too. Somehow, no one dies when they see lots of men at a beach (or pool) without their shirts on. But leave those environments, and suddenly it's so troubling/annoying.
Just STFU.
I'm confused as well. My running prime was in the 2000s in the south, and it was considered normal -- a lot of the year, it's all but necessary. I spent the later part of the decade in a northern state where I only tended to go shirtless in the summer months, but no one seemed to mind either and no one said anything. All ages would run shirtless in races if it was hot enough. I was more of an off-and-on runner in the 2010s but took it up more seriously again in 2019. That year I ran a 4th of July race shirtless and noticed afterward that I was the only one doing so, and that "the kids" were giving me weird looks. I'm not overweight, just a normal looking distance runner. I'm also in a running club now and there are definitely some younger guys that never go out in less than a singlet. I don't know for sure, but I'm kind of gleaning that the young generation has a weird relationship to bodies, sexualization, etc. etc. etc. Like, yay be yourself fat girl OnlyFans creator, but boys should keep it to themselves in the name of "being respectful." I can personally say IDGAF about what anyone thinks of me being shirtless. I haven't had a comment in a long time, so if passersby are merely thinking rude thoughts, that's not a problem for me. I'm certainly not going to stop. Like another poster, I definitely overheat easily, and I also unfortunately lost a friend back in the day to heat-stroke while running, so I'm very careful about anything involving the heat.
I do have kind of a funny story about shirtless running though. One summer some of us met up on our college campus for a run, all shirtless, etc. and at one point we ran past a bunch of elementary school kids who were in this summer program my school put on. We overhead this one girl turn to her fellow 8-10 year olds and say in a kind of know-it-all voice, "That's called streaking, college boys do it all the time and it's great!" We definitely had our shorts on before anyone gets the wrong idea.