I started reading Death by Food Pyramid : How Shoddy Science, Sketchy Politics and Shady Special Interests Have Ruined Our Health by Denise Minger several months ago (Minger writes the Raw Food SOS blog). I was cruising along, really enjoying the book, when I made the mistake of watching the first season of Game of Thrones on Amazon Instant Video. That led me to reading the 5 books currently included in George R. R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire series, and Death By Food Pyramid was put to the side for a few months.

I finished my journey through Westeros a few days ago (must have been well over 5000 pages!), and immediately picked Minger’s book back up. Finished it in two days. Song of Ice and Fire has apparently made me a very fast reader.

Anyway, to the point, Death By Food Pyramid is an excellent book. I rarely write book reviews here on Runblogger because books take a long time to read, and book reviews are hard to write. But I feel compelled to write about DBFP because I like to think that if I were to write a book about nutrition this is what it would look like. (There’s no way that will happen since although I generally try to eat well, I have far too “healthy” an appetite for IPA, pizza, and coffee to give anyone nutritional advice.) One of my goals when I wrote Tread Lightly was to objectively look at the science underpinning potential links between running shoes, running form, and running injuries. In her book, Minger takes a similar approach to investigate the links between nutrition and health. This is a much bigger topic, and the consequences of getting nutrition wrong are far more dire than the consequences of running poorly in a bad pair of shoes. Minger tackles the topic masterfully.

In about 250 pages Minger goes through such topics as how science works (great explanation!), why most nutritional advice coming from the US government is suspect and often tainted by special interests and lobbying groups, and (my favorite) why no single diet is going to necessarily be best for promoting good health for all human beings (which is basically what I concluded about running shoes and form – due to human variation, no single best answer for all people). She covers all of this ground in a lighthearted yet rigorous way, and cites tons of scientific and historical documents to support her position.

To give you a few examples of her approach, I’ve pulled a few quotes that I highlighted from the book:

On Nutrition Advice in General

“No matter how far science advances, nutrition is still a field booby-trapped with hucksters, charlatans, and diet gurus hoping you’ll blow half your paycheck on their life-extending line of goji berries and deer antler velvet.”

On Nutrition “Experts”

“Folks with low genuine skill in their field suffer from double trouble: not only do they grossly overestimate their own abilities, but they also don’t even have the knowledge necessary to realize what they’re saying is inaccurate.”

“Anyone who’s certain they’re right about everything in nutrition is almost definitely wrong.”

“Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge.”

“Currently, no nutrition-oriented classes are required to get a Harvard medical degree—and ditto for 70 percent of the other medical schools in the nation.”

On Peer-Reviewed Journal Publications

“Science-ese ultimately prevents most of us from venturing beyond the reader-friendly blurbs we see in newspapers and popular diet books. It holds us hostage to ignorance, ensuring any health news we receive must first pass through layers of middlemen.”

“…peer-reviewed studies can seem infallible to the media and general public alike, and often dodge the scrutiny and skepticism other publications receive. Unfortunately, the reality is hardly rosy.”

“We know that the system of peer review is biased, unjust, unaccountable, incomplete, easily fixed, often insulting, usually ignorant, occasionally foolish, and frequently wrong.”

“We shouldn’t assume that just because a study endured peer review, all the thinking has been done for us.”

Minger wades through a lot of the science on topics like whether or not saturated fat to heart disease, whether red meat is bad for you, the pros and cons of a plant-based diet, and much more. She hammers home repeatedly that correlation does not equal causation, and I particularly like this quote on that topic:

“Sleeping with shoes on might be correlated with waking up with a hangover, but pulling off your sneakers before bed won’t stop that headache if the real culprit is tequila.”

She finishes the book by analyzing three diets that seem to perform well for some people – Paleolithic, Mediterranean, and Plant-Based. She then looks at the diets of indigenous groups that are (or were) known for their good health. Among these she tries to identify commonalities in what they do and don’t eat. Some of this won’t be surprising (e.g., sugar and processed foods are minimized), but some of the commonalities are interesting (e.g., lots of shellfish, eating animals head-to-tail rather than just choosing muscle meat).

I’ll finish by saying again that one of my favorite parts of the book is Minger’s emphasis on human variation when it comes to diet. She points out several examples of how humans can differ when it comes to the ability of the body to process food. For one:

“It turns out the number of AMY1 copies contained in our genes is not the same for everyone. And the amount of salivary amylase we produce is tightly correlated to the number of AMY1 copies we inherited. In humans, AMY1 copy number can range from one to fifteen, and amylase levels in saliva can range from barely detectable to 50 percent of the saliva’s total protein.⁴⁴ That’s a lot of variation!”

Minger then goes on to describe how people with varying amounts of amylase respond to starch intake in very different ways (e.g., those with low amylase tend to see a larger insulin spike after eating starches), and how these differences could predispose some individuals on a high starch diet to increased risk of things like Type 2 diabetes. The point here being that, as Minger writes:

“…chasing a single ideal diet is the wrong way to approach health…It’s simply a genetic reality. And it goes a long way to help reconcile how one of your friends could shed eighty pounds following Atkins while another claims they’ve never been slimmer or more energetic since going lowfat vegan.”

This human variation makes me think that maybe I should think more about eating like my nordic ancestors than hunter-gatherers on the African savannah. Sure we all share a single human lineage, but some things have changed since humans move out of Africa. My ancestry prior to 1900 was almost entirely in Scandinavia (Sweden to be exact), and I wonder if a diet similar to what was commonly eaten there would be more optimal for my health. Tough to know, but interesting to think about. And I’m not sure I’ll be adopting my great grandfather’s taste for pig’s feet any time soon (though he did live well into his 90’s).

I don’t want to give too much away, I’ll simply recommend that if you are interested in science and nutrition, read Death By Food Pyramid.  It’s a great book.

Running With the Kenyans is a book that I had been looking forward to reading for quite some time. I was familiar with Finn’s work through a series of articles he wrote for The Guardian on running in Kenya, some of which I excerpted in my own book. His description of kid’s racing barefoot in Kenya was of particular personal interest.

The book is essentially the story of how Finn, a guy about my own age, decides to move with his family to the town of Iten, Kenya for six months to train and live among the best distance runners in the world. His motivations are many: to experience an adventure with his family, to take another crack at improving his running performance by training with the best, and to see if he could uncover some of the “secrets” that make the Kenyan runners so darned good at what they do.

There’s a lot to like about this book. Being a fairly self-competitive runner and a father of young kids, I could identify with Finn on an individual level, and the personal story struck a chord with me. Part travelogue, part running book, Running with the Kenyans is well written and a fast read – it’s a book that I had a hard time putting down. One of the things I enjoyed most about the book is that it gives a glimpse into the lives and personalities of the athletes that win most of the major distance races around the world. Included among the cast of characters are several runners who will be competing in the London Olympics in just over a month – it’s hard to read this book and not want to take a trip to Kenya to see these amazing individuals run the Thursday fartlek in Iten!

What will make this book of particular interest to many runners is Finn’s dissection of the factors that make Kenyans such phenomenal runners. What you come away with after reading Running With the Kenyans is that there are a lot of things that contribute to Kenyan running prowess, and that it’s the mix of factors coming together in a single location that is more important than any individual factor on it’s own.

Among the factors that Finn thinks are critical are an active, physical upbringing (involving a lot of running to and from school), a drive and motivation to succeed because running is a way out of poverty and a life of farming, immersion in a culture where elite runners are worshipped and are figures of immense respect in communities, and many others which I won’t give away here.

I did want to share a brief excerpt that will be of interest to readers of this blog. At one point Finn asks Brother Colm, who coaches many of the young elites, including Olympian David Rudisha, about barefoot running and form – here’s is part of Colm’s response:

“In the West we put children in shoes before they can walk. What are we teaching them? We’re teaching them the ground is dangerous, that they need to be protected from it. But Kenyan children can feel the ground, so they have a better relationship with it. They learn to place their foot carefully when they run, so they don’t hurt themselves. They learn to land gently, lightly, gliding over the earth rather than pounding it.”

Colm goes on to describe how he works with the Kenyans on form, but I don’t want to give away all of the good stuff here, you’ll have to read the book. I will note, though, that Finn observed that all adult Kenyan runners wear shoes, it’s just the kids who tend to go barefoot.

One other excerpt that I found interesting is the following:

“It’s interesting to note that the runners here still get injured despite their barefoot upbringing, but the types of injuries they get are different. ‘I don’t see many impact injuries,’ the physiotherapist at Lornah’s camp tells me one day. These are common injuries in the West and are usually the most serious and debilitating; things like runner’s knee, shin splints, plantar fasciitis, and stress fractures. In my time in Kenya I haven’t met a single athlete suffering from any of these problems. If someone is injured, it is always something less serious, such as a tight hamstring or a pulled calf. Or a cut leg.”

Running With the Kenyan’s is full of interesting passages like this one, and if you find these topics interesting you will really enjoy this book. It’s near the top among running books that I have read, and I highly recommend that you pick up a copy.

Running With the Kenyans is available for sale at Amazon.com.

Bill’s initial idea was for me to write the book and he would serve as editor and agent (which he has done for several books by Phil Maffetone), but in our conversations we came up with a concept that was going to be more than I could handle on my own given time constraints associated with my day job and being a father of three little kids. So, we agreed to co-author a book and divided up the topics that we wanted to hit upon. After a sometimes grueling process (as I hear any book-writing experience can be), Bill and I finally finished our book last month (which involved a marathon editing session while I was on vacation with my family in Disney World!).

The end product of our labors is a book titled Tread Lightly: Form, Footwear and the Quest for Injury-Free Running. The content will not come as a surprise to readers of this blog (or Bill’s Zero Drop blog). We basically address the question of why modern runners so often get hurt. We don’t pretend to provide an answer that will “cure” running injuries, but we do take what we feel is a fairly balanced look at topic as it relates to form, footwear, and food (and much more). This is by no means a barefoot running book (far from it!), or even necessarily a minimalist running book. Rather, it is a book that attempts to look at how modern humans differ from our running ancestors, what both history and modern science tell us about form, footwear, and injuries, and how this knowledge might be applied to reduce your chances of getting hurt. A lot of the questions we address still have incomplete answers, but our hope is that our writing will stimulate continued thought, research, experimentation and discussion.

Over the coming weeks you will hear more about this book, and I’ll likely post a few excerpts leading up to the official release date (June 1 according to Amazon, but could be a few weeks earlier if the current schedule holds. For now, I’ll provide the chapter titles to give you a feel for the breadth of topics that we cover:

Introduction – Pete’s Story and Bill’s Story

Chapter 1 – The Evolution of Running in Humans

Chapter 2 – Running Injuries: Why They Happen

Chapter 3 – Barefoot and Running

Chapter 4 – The Running Shoe

Chapter 5 – The Recreational Runner

Chapter 6 – Pronate Nation

Chapter 7 – Foot Strike

Chapter 8 – The Running Stride

Chapter 9 – Turning the Clock Back on Nutrition

If you are interested in pre-ordering a copy of Tread Lightly, you can do so on Amazon.com. I don’t have official confirmation that a Kindle version will be released, but I assume that this will happen (I read most books on the Kindle app on the Iphone these days, so I plan to push for it). If you’d like to help this process along, you can go to the Amazon page for Tread Lightly and click on the “Tell the Publisher: I’d like to read this book on Kindle” link just below the cover photo.

Thanks to all of you who read this blog and have offered your support over the past few years – I owe much of the thought process that led to the book’s evolution to discussions that I have had here!

Below are the front and back covers of Tread Lightly:

“I’m more interested in the future of running form. I couldn’t care less what people wear; I’m more concerned about what they do. For too long, all we’ve heard about is what to buy; what’s been missing from the conversation has been how to run properly. I’m convinced that the next big wave in running won’t be footwear, but a surge in running coaches who teach proper, gentle, barefoot-style form.”

Update 12/13/10: Christopher McDougall emailed me and wanted to emphasize that he has been pushing “form-first” since day one. Here’s a quote from a post on the barefoot running debate from his blog:

“…the secret to injury-free running isn’t the proper shoe. It isn’t stretching. It isn’t even training mileage. It’s skill. Like every other sport, healthy running is all about technique. But why hadn’t I ever heard that before? All I ever heard, over and over, was about shoes. Every podiatrist, sports physician, and running magazine preached endlessly about the absolute necessity of corrective footwear. I was never told what to do; I was only told what to buy.”

The thinking is that barefoot-style running form will allow you to run more efficiently and with less likelihood of sustaining a dreaded overuse injury. If there’s one thing that runners fear above all else, it’s an injury that prevents them from logging miles out on the road and trail. While the verdict is still out on whether all runners might benefit from changing form, my anecdotal experience in the form of receiving emails from readers is that changing running form has the power to allow at least some subset of formerly hobbled runners to run injury free – of this I am now 100% convinced. My own form change experiment has been both fun and fascinating, and is still a work in progress (probably always will be), so I was excited and curious when I was contacted by Backbone Media and Velo Press about reviewing Danny Abshire’s new book called Natural Running (written with Brian Metzler of Running Times Magazine).

If you don’t know Danny Abshire, he’s one of the cofounders of Newton Running, makers of the popular and pricey Newton brand of running shoes. Newton is unique in that their mission from the start (they were founded in 2007) was to produce shoes that fostered a natural running style. Abshire also has long history as a maker of custom orthotics, and he tells this story in the book – he’s a big proponent of proper forefoot balance and believes that orthotic intervention is warranted in some cases to achieve this balance. I personally don’t have much problem with this in some cases, but the question remains whether some types of forefoot imbalances are a product of our shoe-wearing history and whether wearing more minimal shoes can help correct imbalances by allowing the foot to strengthen and work more naturally – the verdict is still out. Hardcore minimalists and many barefoot runners might argue that orthotic intervention is anything but “natural,” though I prefer to not be dogmatic on issues like this where solid evidence is still lacking. This, however, is a discussion for another day.

In a nutshell, Natural Running is described by Abshire as a style that mimics what we do when barefoot: light landing on the midfoot/forefoot, slight forward lean of the torso, and a landing underneath the center of gravity (the hips). In his book, Abshire discusses the problems with modern shoes, the basic biomechanics of the running gait, and provides helpful tips on how to assess your own form and pick out any potential problem spots with your feet. The recurring phrase that he use repeatedly throughout the book is that a runner needs to “stay in balance with gravity.” He views proper balance as being of utmost importance, and deviations from proper balance can set up a chain reaction of negative events through our joints, particularly if we pound the pavement with our heels as we run. I found this discussion interesting and informative, and Abshire’s writing style is one of the patient and fatherly coach who simply wants you to be able to run better.

The last several chapters of Natural Running lay out a series of strengthening exercises and form drills designed to help you make a smooth transition to natural running. These are detailed, but like so many of the workout guides found in popular magazines like Runner’s World, I wonder how many people will take the time to follow them. I’m more of a jump in and (carefully) try it kind of guy, and this technique seems to have worked well for me. That being said, if you are looking for detailed information, this book is an excellent choice in most respects.

I only had a few points of disagreement with what Abshire has to say in Natural Running. First, he repeats the oft used mantra to “land directly under your center of gravity (hips).” For example, here’s a direct quote:

“Put simply, have your feet contact the ground beneath your center of mass. From there, you’ll be set up for efficient whole body kinematics. If your foot strikes are slightly in front of your body mass, you’re braking and will need to add power to keep moving forward.”

As I outlined in a long and detailed post on where footstrike should occur, I don’t believe that it is physically possible to land directly under your center of mass. Steve Magness of the Science of Running blog agrees, and wrote a long post himself explaining why. It may be a minor point, but it’s repeated numerous times in the book, and I have yet to see anybody actually doing it. A more accurate way to phrase things would be to land slightly in front of the hips, and allow maximum loading to occur when the foot is under the center of mass. Alternatively, it can be effective to suggest landing under the center of mass as a cue, with the understanding that it doesn’t really happen in practice.

Another point of question is when Abshire states the following:

“The process of sensory communication from your feet is at its best when you are barefoot. That sensory interaction still happens if you’re wearing shoes, but it works a heck of a lot better if you can feel the ground through your shoes. If your foot is raised high off the ground, as is the case with many traditional running shoes with foamy midsoles, the sensory input is dampened considerably.”

I agree with the above statement, but it’s a bit odd considering that Newton shoes generally have a very thick midsole that sits the foot high above the ground (see photo below). Granted, the midsole is firm and provides better sensory input than a soft slab of EVA, but combined with the odd sensation of the forefoot lugs, it’s still far from being barefoot-like. Don’t get me wrong, I’m enjoying running in a nearly zero-drop pair of Newton Distance Racers right now, and they do allow easily for a midfoot stride (see video below), I just don’t think they provide the ground feel suggested by the above quote (certainly nowhere close to a shoe like the Vibrams, or even a low-profile road flat). Again, a small point, but one that needed to be mentioned.

Newton Distance Racer – note the thick midsole

On the plus side, my friend Brandon of the Brandon’s Marathon Podcast recently posted a photo of a lower profile and apparently zero-drop racing flat that Newton has in development (see photo below) – the zero drop march continues to move forward!

Newton Zero Drop Racing Flat???

Conclusion

All-in-all, Abshire’s Natural Running was a great read (I read it in 3 days!) and I would highly recommend it as a guide if you are looking to transition to barefoot-style running form and want to keep your shoes. Abshire is very scientific and sensible in his approach, and despite my few small points of disagreement, I found most of the information to be high quality and very useful. He clearly know his way around the human foot, and I anticipate that this book will find it’s place alongside others which are attempting to change the way we run. I don’t believe that there is such a thing as a perfect form that equally applies to every person, so it’s up to the reader to try out Abshire’s approach to see if it works for them. As Abshire states, we are in the midst of a running re-evolution, and if you desire to get off your heels, Natural Running is a resource that will help you get back to running naturally like you did when you were a kid.

There’s a lot to like in this book – although I’m not a full-time barefoot kind of guy myself, I respect Howell for his devotion to the cause. Though it at times borders on idealistic, his discussion of the anatomical problems that shoes can cause are well done, his descriptions of the proper form and function of the foot are very readable and non lecture-like (he’s an anatomy professor like myself), and I agree with a lot of what is written in the book. Though I don’t go barefoot full-time, I do spend as much time as possible barefoot when at home, and generally prefer my shoes to be zero drop or nearly so when I run or go out and about, so we share common beliefs on those fronts. I also appreciate his discussion of the dangers of children’s shoes – as a father of three young children I encourage and allow them to be barefoot as much as possible, and am continually frustrated by the lack of anatomically shaped and non-heel-lifted children’s shoes. This is a problem in dire need of attention by shoe manufacturers – we need shoes that aren’t going to ruin our kids feet!

Howell does have a chapter in the book in which he discusses footwear for those occasions when shoes are an absolute necessity (he covers things like huaraches, moccasins, Vibram Fivefingers, Vivo Barefoot, etc.), but it’s clear that he views even these as necessary evils. As a result, I would not recommend this book for someone who is interested in minimalist running and has no interest in being barefoot. However, if you’re open-minded and have an interest in barefooting, or even if you just want to learn a bit more about problems with the design of modern shoes, then Howell’s book is well worth a read.

I was at the library the other day with my daughter (a frequent activity in this family!), and came across the book “The Naked Olympics” by Tony Perrottet. The cover (see picture to the left) featured what looked like an ancient painting of a group of naked Greek runners (more on this below) in seemingly modern running shoes (still not sure what’s up with that), but I was intrigued and decided to take the book home with me. I wound up reading it in about a week, and it was quite enjoyable.

The Naked Olympics is basically a very readable historical account of what it was like to actually attend the Olympic festival in ancient Greece. It describes what it was like to be both a spectator and athlete, and goes through in detail the various events that comprised the Ancient Olympic Games. While my initial interest in this book was to see what the author had to say about the running events, I found the entire book to be very enjoyable, and full of interesting tidbits about the Games. Among other things, I learned:

1. The Ancient Greeks were wild about athletics, perhaps uniquely so in the ancient world.

2. Like the star athletes of modern times, Olympic champions were held in very high esteem, and were well taken care of financially.

3.The Ancient Greeks really liked to be naked, particularly when competing in athletic events. I have a hard time imagining how this could be comfortable while running, and although I’ve experimented a bit with running barefoot, I don’t suspect that I’ll be running a 5K in the buff anytime soon (though I really do want a new PR!).

4. The Ancient Greeks really loved their olive oil, and used it for purposes that went well beyond cooking (in particular, they liked to combine their use of olive oil with their penchant for being naked). I think I’ll pass on this as well.

5. Despite the picture on the cover of the book, the Ancient Greeks raced barefoot, and appeared to utilize a forefoot strike. I’m still puzzled by the painting on the cover depicting the runners in lace-up running shoes, though I did learn that Nike is the Greek Goddess of victory. I suspect Vibram was the Greek God of foot odor.

6. Death was not an uncommon occurrence for a competitor in the Ancient Olympics. This was apparently common in the chariot race, and also not uncommon among boxers and competitors in the pankration (a pretty much no-holds-barred brawl that I suppose is a predecessor of modern events like the UFC). Today’s Olympics are quite tame by comparison, though it might be an interesting twist if flogging were re-introduced as punishment for a false start in track races.

There’s a lot more of interest to be found in this book, and for anyone with an interest in the history of athletics, I highly recommend it. It’s a short, easy read, and well worth a trip to the library, Amazon, or you nearest locally owned book store.

The 100 Pushups Program was developed by Steve Speirs (also known as @britishbulldog), a great (and ridiculously fast) guy that I interact with frequently on sites like Twitter and Dailymile.  With 100 Pushups, Steve has created a detailed 6-week program to get you to the point where you can do 100 consecutive pushups without stopping. You start by doing an initial pushup test, and based on the results you choose one of three program levels that is most appropriate for your ability. You then progress through the six weeks by performing three push-up workouts per week, each of which consists of 5 sets of push-ups with a specified period of rest between sets that decreases with each workout, each week.  The number of push-ups per set varies within a workout, but increases steadily with each workout, thus building strength over the duration of the program.  It’s really quite simple to follow, and I’ve found it to be very effective.  You can print out a copy of the program from the hundredpushups.com site here.

I’m now making a second attempt at completing the 100 Pushups challenge, and it’s going well so far (my first attempt was sunk by a summer vacation and the resulting lack of motivation – my fault entirely).  My initial test placed me in level 3, and unlike the first time around, I decided to start the program at week 1 to ease myself in more slowly (if your initial test result exceeds 20, you can opt to skip weeks 1 ad 2).  So far, my pushup total in a single workout has increased by about 50 in 2.5 weeks (69 on week 1, day 1 to 121 on week 3, day 2)!  I’m doing the program via the Hundred Pushups Iphone App this time around, which is a handy way to keep track of your progress (it can also send your results to Twitter/Facebook). I also like how the Iphone app tells you exactly how many push-ups to do for each set, and it times the rest period between sets for you.

Finally, Steve has now written a companion book to go along with the program outlined on the hundredpushups.com website.  I’m ashamed to admit that I haven’t bought it yet (sorry Steve!), but it’s on my Christmas list for this year.  For more information on the book, check out the 7 Weeks to 100 Push-Ups book page on the hundredpushups.com website or view the book page on Amazon.com.

So, if you’re looking for a bit of motivation to get in some upper body work, I highly recommend the 100 pushups program.  It’s easy to follow, and so far seems to be very effective at improving upper-body strength.  What’s more, Steve is an incredibly supportive guy in many ways, and he’s very open to giving advice and cheering you on as you move through the weeks.  If you’re on Twitter, you can follow him as @britishbulldog or follow the @100pushups account.  Give him your support by trying out his program, and I’m sure he’ll be there to help you through.

Download the 100 Pushups app for $1.99 on

The One Hundred Pushups book can be purchased from Amazon.com by clicking on the box to the left.

Image via Wikipedia

Perhaps what I found most appealing about this book was the author’s sincerity and honesty. Like many of us who log miles with no hope of ever winning a race, running for Murakami is a labor of love, and it plays a central role in his life. He runs so that he can stay healthy and continue to write novels, and he runs because he simply loves to run. Murakami is also very comfortable with his shortcomings, and he openly admits that he is not a perfect person. His description of overcoming his fear of the swim leg of triathlons is both humorous and heartfelt – you really feel for him (and laugh at his fear of jellyfish and vicious bears). Murakami’s open admission that his best marathoning days are long passed is impressively honest, but it doesn’t dampen his love of the sport. Reading this book is like reading a book written by you favorite running partner, which is a nice change from some of the other running-related books I have read. In its totality, it’s truly a wonderful book.

I’ll finish this review with a few quotes from the book (it’s filled with many great ones), and the recommendation that this is a book that simply deserves to be read.

And now, in Haruki Murakami’s own words:

“…a person doesn’t become a runner because someone recommends it. People basically become runners because they’re meant to.”

“When you see runners in town it’s easy to distinguish beginners from veterans…the ones with quiet, measured breathing are the veterans. Their hearts, lost in thought, slowly tick away time. When we pass each other on the road, we listen to the rhythm of each other’s breathing, and sense the way the other person is ticking away the moments.”

“I’m me, and at the same time not me. That’s what it felt like. A very still, quiet feeling. The mind wasn’t so important.” – Murakami describing how he felt in the late stages of an Ultramarathon

“Even when I grow old and feeble, when people warn me it’s about time to throw in the towel, I won’t care. As long as my body allows, I’ll keep on running.”

“…I didn’t start running because somebody asked me to become a runner…one day, out of the blue, I started to run-simply because I wanted to.”

“Those of us who participate in triathlons are unusual people…Most all the participants have jobs and families, and on top of taking care of these, they swim and bike and run, training very hard, as part of their ordinary routine…The world, with its commonsensical viewpoint, thinks their lifestyle is peculiar. And it would be hard to argue with anyone who labeled them eccentrics and oddballs. But there’s something we share, not something as exaggerated as solidarity, perhaps, but at least a warm emotion, like a vague, faintly colored mist over a late-spring peak.”

“…for most of the people participating in a triathlon the competitive aspect is less important than the sense of a triathlon as a sort of ceremony by which we can affirm this shared bond.”

“Long distance running (more or less, for better or worse) has molded me into the person I am today, and I’m hoping it will remain a part of my life for as long as possible. I’ll be happy if running and I can grow old together. There may not seem to be much logic to it, but it’s the life I’ve chosen for myself.”

“For a runner like me, what’s really important is reaching the goal I set myself, under my own power. I give it everything I have, endure what needs enduring, and am able, in my own way, to be satisfied.”

Buy this book, read it, and enjoy it.

Happy Running!

Image by I am I.A.M. via Flickr

The final of the one-mile race at the Empire Games in Vancouver, Canada on Aug. 7, 1954 might just be the greatest running race of all time. The race featured two of the titans of middle-distance running, Roger Bannister of England, and John Landy of Australia. Both of these men were world famous runners, both were at the peak of their respective careers, and both had, within the previous six months, broken the 4-minute mile time barrier that many at that time thought was impenetrable (they were the first two runners in history to do it). This latter fact is in part what made this race so compelling.

Without a doubt, Roger Bannister is best known for running the first sub 4-minute mile (he did so on May 6, 1954 in Oxford, England). Few people realize, however, that Bannister’s record stood for less than 2 months – it was broken (by over a full second) by John Landy in June of that same year. Some said Landy’s feat was all the the more impressive since he accomplished the time in a genuine race (in Finland) without the aid of dedicated pacers. Imagine, then, a situation where the two most famous runners of their day, and the first two men to run a sub 4-minute mile, were able to face each other down on the track. This is exactly what happened in August of that same year at the Empire Games in Vancouver.

One of my main reasons for writing this post is that on my run this afternoon, I finished listening to the audiobook version of “The Perfect Mile: Three Athletes, One Goal, and Less Than Four Minutes to Achieve It” by Neal Bascomb. If you’re not familiar with “The Perfect Mile,” it recounts the story of Bannister, Landy, and American Wes Santee as they competed to become the first to break the 4-minute mile barrier. Naturally, I assumed that the “Perfect Mile” in the title referred to Bannister’s record breaking race – I was wrong. It turns out that the Empire Games race, now commonly referred to as “The Miracle Mile,” was far more compelling, and I literally got goosebumps as the reader recounted the details of the finish. I highly recommend this book, and the audiobook reader is phenomenal. I listened to a good chunk of the 14 hours of audio while running myself, and enjoyed it thoroughly. Now back to the race.

More than anything else, the one-mile final of the 1954 Empire Games was a race about strategy. Roger Bannister and John Landy were both fast, of that there is no doubt, but they both approached races with different styles. Landy was a front-runner – he blazed through the initial miles with the hope of blowing away his opponents before they knew what hit them. Bannister, on the other hand, was a kicker. He preferred to hold tight to the leader, and then blast past them in the final leg with his deadly-fast kick. Both men knew their opponent’s style, and Neal Bascomb does a great job in “The Perfect Mile” describing the agonizing days leading up to the race as the two runner’s tried to figure out the appropriate strategy to use to beat their opponent. The race itself lived up to the hype (and then some), and both men decided to stick to their favored strategy and hope for the best. So who won??? I’m not going to tell you here in this post for fear of spoiling the climatic race for anyone planning to read “The Perfect Mile.” Sorry!

However, if you just can’t wait, I’ve made use of the miracle of modern technology known as YouTube to provide video footage of the race in its entirety. For your viewing pleasure, here is the race that has come to be known as “The Miracle Mile:”

A few weeks ago, I published a post on this blog about the evolution of running in humans. In this post, I summarized some recent research papers put forth by several scientists (notably Daniel Lieberman of Harvard and Dennis Bramble of the University of Utah) regarding the hypothesis that human beings evolved to become excellent distance runners. Shortly after publishing the post, a tweet came through on my Twitter wire (the web and social networking are amazing, aren’t they) regarding an article that writer and runner Christopher McDougall had written for the Daily Mail on the questionable value of modern running shoes. That article, titled “The painful truth about trainers: Are running shoes a waste of money?” piqued my interest, and I began to look into the literature on barefoot and minimalist running. As it turned out, McDougall had just written a new book, Born to Run, that discusses both running shoes and the evolution of running in humans, and that book is the one I’ll be discussing in the remainder of this post.

At it’s heart, Born to Run is much more than a book about running shoes. In fact, the bulk of McDougall’s treatise against the shoe industry occurs in just one chapter (Chapter 25 to be exact). Born to Run is more a book about the love of running – it is a book about regaining the joy that running can bring to your life, and about why running is more than just a way to keep your weight down and your muscles toned. It is a book about why we all should run, and why those of us who enjoy running what many consider to be insane distances love doing so. It is a book about why running is a part of our history as a species, and why running is truly a gift that was bestowed upon us as human beings.

Image by NileGuide.com via Flickr

The book begins with the author’s quest to find a shadowy tribe of Mexican Indians known as the Raramuri (translated as “The Running People,” the Raramuri are more commonly known to outsiders as the Tarahumara). The Tarahumara inhabit a remote region of the Chihuahuan Desert known as the Copper Canyons (see picture at right), and they tend to be very shy around outsiders. What is special about the Tarahumara from the standpoint of this book is that they are renowned as a culture that revolves around distance running, and among their numbers are some of the greatest distance runners on this planet (check out this video produced by Will Harlan or this article by McDougall for more on the Tarahumara). While on this journey, McDougall meets up with a mysterious American who lives in the canyons among the Tarahumara and goes by the name of Caballo Blanco – the “white horse” (check out Caballo Blanco’s website here). Caballo lets McDougall in on an audacious plan that he’s concocting – he’s organizing a race whereby he hopes to bring some of the top ultrarunners on the planet down to the Copper Canyons to face off with the best the Tarahumara have to offer on a grueling 50-mile ultra marathon course.

The Copper Canyon Ultra Marathon forms the backdrop for most of the remainder of the book, and in addition to Caballo Blanco, McDougall introduces a number of other colorful characters along the way. There’s Barefoot Ted, a guy who lives his name by running without shoes. There’s Jenn Shelton and Billy Barnett, two hard-partying young ultrarunners who like to live life on the edge. There’s Scott Jurek, arguably the best ultrarunner on the planet and the top non-Tarahumara challenger for the Copper Canyon race title. There’s Luis Escobar, who is another accomplished ultrarunner and the main race photographer (see some of his photos from the race here). There are the Tarahumara, the quiet, peaceful people for whom running is part of the daily fabric of life. Finally there’s Christopher McDougall himself and his trainer Eric Orton, and a good chunk of the book details how McDougall transforms himself in 9 months from an oft injured runner into someone who manages to make it to the starting line of a 50-mile race with full expectations of finishing (I won’t give away if he does).

What makes this book such a thoroughly enjoyable read is that McDougall is a fantastic storyteller and a great researcher. He shifts with ease from recounting his harrowing adventures in the Copper Canyons, to the antics and life stories of his running companions, to discussing the perils of running shoes and the evolution of running in humans (which, as an evolutionary morphologist, is one of my favorite parts of the book). He also throws in some interesting stories about some of the more well known ultra-races (e.g., Leadville, Western States, Badwater), as well as some no-holds-barred descriptions of some of the higher profile ultra-runners (e.g., Ann Trason, Dean Karnazes).

Ultimately, where McDougall succeeded most in this book for me as a runner was in his ability to really make me think about the joy of running. I listened to the last bit of the book yesterday while on my final 20-mile training run for the Vermont City Marathon (downloaded from Audible.com – the reader/narrator is excellent), and it helped me through what turned out to be a really tough run. He makes you realize that getting caught up in pace, distance, etc. can sidetrack you from the real joy of running, and he reinforced my belief that when we run, we are really running for ourselves – we run because we’re supposed to. McDougall’s comment about the Copper Canyon race that he was “running against the course” really rang true for me. I know that I have no chance at winning a marathon, so why do I compete? I do so because I can challenge myself against the course, and I do so because I love running. This book also made me think about my running shoes, and I’ve already purchased a pair of Nike Free 3.0’s in the hopes of transitioning into a more minimalist style of running, and I may give the Vibram Fivefingers a try at some point down the road. Finally, I liked this book because it makes me want to run a 50-mile ultramarathon, and if a book can accomplish that feat, you know that it has to be good.

So if you’re a runner now or hope to become one, this book is absolutely a must read. I would rank it as the most enjoyable running book that I have read, and probably one of the best books of any kind that I’ve read in a long time. I urge you to check it out – you won’t be disappointed.

Below are samples of the book that you can read (left) or listen to (right) for yourself (you can click on the image on the left to make it larger and readable):

Here’s a YouTube video of Christopher McDougall demonstrating and discussing the Tarahumara style of running:

You can also watch John Stewart’s interview with Christopher McDougall here: https://runblogger.com/2009/08/chirstopher-mcdougall-on-daily-show.html

See below for some additional reviews of Born to Run by fellow runners:

Review: ‘Born To Run’ a spellbinding look at running.
by Doug Binder, The Oregonian

Barefoot Ted’s Adventures: Born to Run by Christopher McDougall

“Born to Run” is a Must Read Book for Runners
Recover Your Stride Blog

Book Review: Born to Run—5-12-2009
Koach Karl, Endurance Planet

Born To Run Book Review
Portland Trail Runner

Review – Born to Run by Christopher McDougall
Tina’s Barefoot Adventures Blog

In reading this chapter, I couldn’t help but feel that something was not quite right. I employ statstics regularly in my own work, and I understand that they are simply analyzing available data from one large study and reporting the results. However, what kept popping into my mind is that applying statistical methods to a dataset will always give you some kind of answer, and sometimes that answer will be unexpected. The problem is that the results of a given analysis are only as good as the data that were analyzed. Now at the outset I will say that I have not gone into the details of how the ECLS study they discuss was conducted, but they report in the book that the data consist of measurements of academic performance, survey information provided by parents, and answers to questions posed to parents during interviews. Whereas test scores are concrete measurements, the latter two sources of information seem highly susceptible to error. Bear with me and I’ll try to explain.

Lets assume that the parents of the vast majority of the 20,000 or so children in this study love their kids and are trying to be the best parents that they can be. Conventional wisdom would have you believe that reading to your kids is good, and that letting them watch lots of TV is bad. If you were surveyed in this study either on paper, or even worse in an interview, my suspicion is that most parents would tend to exaggerate parenting qualities that are thought to be good (i.e., reading), while downplaying qualities that are though to be bad (i.e., letting kids watch TV). My guess is that this effect is more extreme in parents who are doing less of a supposedly good thing (reading), and more of a supposedly bad thing (TV watching). It is human nature for a parent to do this – we want our kids to succeed and we may even trick ourselves into believing we spend more time on positive parenting behaviors than we really do. So what does this mean for the conclusions in Freakonomics?

If parents overestimate how much they read to their kids, and parents who read less bump their estimate up even more than those who read alot (perhaps due to a sense of guilt or fear of judgment), then a correlation between reading and academic performance may not be all that accurate. I don’t know if the ECLS study had controls for this potential source of error, but I would be interested to find out. At the very least, this possibility was not addressed in Freakonomics, which is the source from which the vast majority of people will read about this supposed lack of a relationship. In a similar manner, if parents tend to downplay how much they let their kids watch TV, a similar problem would arise. The validity of these supposed correlations seems to be almost entirely dependent on how honest these parents are about their behavior. Now think about what you would do if you were sitting across from some interviewer and asked how much you read to your child. Would you be more likely to overestimate how many books you have in your house, or how often you actually read them together? Which carries less likelihood of judgment by the interviewer or someone reading your survey responses? Which is more likely to be subject to error? You can apply this same logic to questions regarding how much TV you let your kids watch. If you’re like me, the tendency to enhance the good and downplay the bad is hard to avoid when you’re simply trying to be the best parent you can be for your kids.

I personally have mixed feelings about the supposed detrimental effects of TV. When my 5-year-old son tells me out of the blue that the melting of ice into water is an example of reversible change (which he learned from Sid the Science Kid), it is clear that he has absorbed a lot from some of the TV shows he watches. However, I’m not buying the data showing that reading to your kids provides no future academic benefit. Maybe I’m just a sucker for the conventional wisdom, but my five years of hands-on experience as a parent leads me to believe otherwise. Ill be needing proof that the data analyzed in Freakonomics are good and valid before I put Dr. Seuss back on the shelf.

Posts on running related books that I’ve read or plan to read: