Once upon a time, running kit was black. It was a sensible choice, it didn’t show the dirt and sweat patches and, helpfully, everything matched. You wore it until it fell apart, the mud stains would no longer wash out of it or it stank so bad that it crawled it’s way to the bin and threw itself out.

Then running got a bit more popular and people started asking previously unheard of questions in running shops like ‘does this come in any other colours?’ Women were offered pink running tops and a few brave souls put up their hands and said “Um, actually, I know I’ve got ovaries and all that but I don’t actually like pink. Have you anything else for us?”

Kit makers scratched their heads, consulted their colour swatches and thought. Doubtless, some clever soul in a boardroom somewhere piped up with “what if we made running clothes like regular clothes that you run in. We could have them in all different colours so that people could wear ones that reflected their own individual tastes and style? And best of all, we could bring new ones out every few months so that people didn’t wait until their clothes fell apart before they bought new ones.”

It was a cunning plan. One that suited the manufacturer wanting to sell more stuff and the consumer wanting to look less like an extra from the Death Star.

Before long one colour wasn’t enough and so more colours were added. Consumers gobbled up purple and green and orange and blue and yellow and started wearing them together. “Give us all the colours and we shall wear them all at once!” they cried as they brazenly ran through the streets unashamed by how many different shades of neon they were adorned in.

“Patterns! Lets make kit in patterns!” piped up one wise visionary. And so it was that you can now adorn your legs with all sorts of psychedelic and colourful fabrics. Ladies and gentlemen we are living in a kaleidoscopic utopia of colourful kit because of the vision of our inspired forefathers.

Not all patterned or bright kit is created equally and the savvy consumer should be wise to this. The very kind and very colourful folks at Onzie sent me the kit pictured right and the leggings above. They’re made for sweating in, bending over in, running in and cycling in. They have been put through their paces by my and haven’t let me down.