Weekend Reading - Born to Run

One book I rather enjoyed recently was Christopher McDougall's "Born to Run." "Born to Run" follows the Tarahumara, a tribe in Mexico that besides being shy and wearing sandals made out of tire rubber, also happen to be accomplished ultrarunners.

"Born to Run" also chronicles the author's struggle with running injuries and his quest to run injury-free. McDougall gets into some interesting information about running shoes, minimalist and barefoot running, and an evolutionary discussion contemplating whether or not running made humans human. In other words, are humans "born to run?"

The book features an interesting cast of characters including Caballo Blanco, a former boxer turned ultrarunner turned running hermit. Caballo Blanco is putting on an ultramarathon of 47 miles, which for some reason McDougall decides is 50 miles. Poetic license I guess. The author brings some American ultrarunners to run in Caballo Blanco's utramarathon, the most memorable of which I believe is Barefoot Ted.

This book is pretty readable and McDougall does a pretty nice job of moving between narratives of running the ultramarathon, the Tarahumara, and the American ultrarunners, along with the various sections on minimalist running and the shoe industry. Most of those sections were pretty interesting though it seems like some of McDougall's "facts" were a little suspect. I definitely recommend it though as a good, light read.