Learn Hardcore Russian: Я бегаю утром чуть быстрее, чем вечером. - I run in the morning a bit faster than in the evening.

бегать (imperfective, multidirectional, habitual)
бежать (imperfective, unidirectional, usually about one specific running action in one direction)

Я бегаю means “I (regularly / habitually) run” or “I run around (in general)”.
Я бегу means “I am running (right now) / I am running (to some place)”.

In the sentence Я бегаю утром чуть быстрее, чем вечером, we’re talking about a regular, repeated situation: how the person usually runs in the morning vs in the evening. That’s why Russian uses бегаю (from бегать), not бегу (from бежать).

What exactly does бегаю express here? Is it present continuous (“I am running”) or simple present (“I run”)?

Russian doesn’t have a separate present continuous form like English “I am running”. The same present tense form covers both “I run” (habit) and “I am running” (right now).

However, context and verb choice matter:

With бегаю (from бегать), the default meaning is habitual/repeated action: я бегаю утром ≈ “I (usually) run in the morning”.
If you wanted to say “I am running (right now)”, you’d usually pick я бегу instead.

So here я бегаю clearly means “I usually run (in general)” rather than “I am running right now”.

Why are утром and вечером used without any preposition like “в” or “по”? What form are they in?

Утром and вечером are adverbial forms that come from nouns утро (“morning”) and вечер (“evening”).

утром ≈ “in the morning / in the mornings”
вечером ≈ “in the evening / in the evenings”

They are very common, fixed adverbial forms, so you don’t add a preposition:

Я работаю утром. – I work in the morning.
Мы гуляем вечером. – We walk in the evening.

Grammatically, they’re historically instrumental forms used adverbially, but as a learner you can just remember them as set adverbs meaning “in the morning / in the evening” with a habitual flavor.

You can use prepositional phrases like по утрам (“in the mornings”) or по вечерам, but утром / вечером by themselves are completely natural and common.

What is the nuance of чуть in чуть быстрее? Is it the same as немного or чуть-чуть?

Чуть is a short, informal way to say “a bit / slightly / a little”. In comparatives like чуть быстрее, it means “slightly faster / just a bit faster”.

Rough comparison:

чуть быстрее – slightly faster, a bit faster
немного быстрее – a little faster, somewhat faster (neutral)
чуть-чуть быстрее – a tiny bit faster (emphasizes small degree, a bit more emotional)

In this sentence:

Я бегаю утром чуть быстрее, чем вечером.
→ “I run in the morning a little bit faster than in the evening.”

All three (чуть, немного, чуть-чуть) would be grammatically fine here; чуть just sounds concise and natural.

What is быстрее exactly? Is it an adjective or an adverb? From which word is it formed?

Быстрее is the comparative form of быстрый (“fast, quick”). It can function as:

comparative adjective: “faster” (describing a noun)
comparative adverb: “faster / more quickly” (describing an action)

Russian uses the same form быстрее for both, so context decides.

In я бегаю утром чуть быстрее, it describes how the person runs (the action of running), so it functions as an adverb: “I run a bit faster in the morning…”.

You could paraphrase:

Я бегаю утром чуть быстрее.
≈ Я бегаю утром чуть более быстро. (“more quickly”)

But быстрее is the natural way to say it.

Why is there a comma before чем in чуть быстрее, чем вечером?

In Russian, comparisons with чем (“than”) often use a comma, especially when the comparison part is more like a separate phrase:

Он выше, чем я. – He is taller than I am.
Я уверен, что это сложнее, чем кажется. – I’m sure it’s harder than it seems.

Your sentence:

Я бегаю утром чуть быстрее, чем вечером.

The comma separates the main statement (я бегаю утром чуть быстрее) from the comparison clause (чем вечером – “than in the evening”). In many cases this comma is considered standard and is the safer choice in writing.

Could I say Я утром бегаю чуть быстрее, чем вечером? Is that still correct, and does it change the meaning?

Yes, Я утром бегаю чуть быстрее, чем вечером is grammatically correct and natural.

Differences:

Я бегаю утром чуть быстрее, чем вечером.
Neutral word order; main focus tends to be on “I run in the morning a bit faster than in the evening.”
Я утром бегаю чуть быстрее, чем вечером.
Begins with утром, so it slightly emphasizes the time frame “in the morning” first. It can sound a bit more contrastive: “As for mornings, I run a bit faster than in the evenings.”

In everyday speech, both versions are fine and the meaning is basically the same. Word order in Russian is flexible and often used to shift emphasis rather than to change basic meaning.

Why is it чем вечером and not something like чем вечером я бегаю?

Russian often shortens the second part of a comparison if it’s clear from context. The full, very explicit version would be:

Я бегаю утром чуть быстрее, чем я бегаю вечером.

But since я бегаю is already mentioned, you usually drop what can be understood:

Я бегаю утром чуть быстрее, чем вечером.

So чем вечером here is shorthand for чем (я бегаю) вечером – “than (I run) in the evening.” The verb and subject are simply omitted because they would repeat the same information.

Could you say по утрам and по вечерам instead of утром and вечером? Would that change the meaning?

Yes, you can say:

Я по утрам бегаю чуть быстрее, чем по вечерам.

Nuance:

утром / вечером often means “in the morning / in the evening”, and in many contexts it already has a habitual sense.
по утрам / по вечерам explicitly emphasizes repeated occurrence: “on mornings / on evenings” → “in the mornings / in the evenings (regularly)”.

So по утрам … по вечерам sounds a bit more clearly “on mornings vs on evenings (as a general pattern)”. In your sentence, both versions are correct and natural; the difference is subtle.

How do you pronounce бегаю, утром, and быстрее? Where is the stress?

Stress marks:

бе́гаю – [BE-ga-yu], stress on the first syllable: бе́
у́тром – [OO-tram], stress on у́
быстре́е – [bɨ-stryé-ye], stress on -ре́-

So the whole sentence with stress:

Я бе́гаю у́тром чуть быстре́е, чем ве́чером.

(Stress in ве́чером is on ве́.)

Could the subject я be dropped here, like just Бегаю утром чуть быстрее, чем вечером?

Yes, in spoken and informal written Russian it’s perfectly acceptable to omit я when it’s clear from context:

Бегаю утром чуть быстрее, чем вечером.

This would still be understood as “I run in the morning a bit faster than in the evening.” Russian often omits subject pronouns when the verb form already shows the person (here, -ю in бегаю clearly indicates “I”).