Born to Run
Full Title: Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen
Author: Christopher McDougall
Born to Run is a book on minimalist running that reintroduced and reignited interest in minimalist running.
- Born To Run Summary
- Born To Run Review
- About Christopher McDougall
Born to Run Summary
Here’s the Amazon Born to Run summary:
An epic adventure that began with one simple question: Why does my foot hurt?
Isolated by Mexico’s deadly Copper Canyons, the blissful Tarahumara Indians have honed the ability to run hundreds of miles without rest or injury. In a riveting narrative, award-winning journalist and often-injured runner Christopher McDougall sets out to discover their secrets. In the process, he takes his readers from science labs at Harvard to the sun-baked valleys and freezing peaks across North America, where ever-growing numbers of ultra-runners are pushing their bodies to the limit, and, finally, to a climactic race in the Copper Canyons that pits America’s best ultra-runners against the tribe. McDougall’s incredible story will not only engage your mind but inspire your body when you realize that you, indeed all of us, were born to run.
Born to Run Quotes
Below are some of the most notable quotes from Born to Run:
“Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up, it knows it must outrun the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning in Africa, a lion wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the slowest gazelle, or it will starve. It doesn’t matter whether you’re the lion or a gazelle-when the sun comes up, you’d better be running.”
“You don’t stop running because you get old, you get old because you stop running.”
“The reason we race isn’t so much to beat each other,… but to be with each other.”
“You don’t have to be fast. But you’d better be fearless.”
“We’ve got a motto here-you’re tougher than you think you are, and you can do more than you think you can.”
“Suffering is humbling. It pays to know how to get your butt kicked.”
“If you don’t have answers to your problems after a four-hour run, you ain’t getting them.”
“Make friends with pain, and you will never be alone.~Ken Chlouber, Colorado miner and creator of the Leadville Trail 100 mile race”
“If you don’t think you were born to run you’re not only denying history. You’re denying who you are.”
“We were born to run; we were born because we run.”
“Blaming the running injury epidemic on big, bad Nike seems too easy – but that’s okay, because it’s largely their fault.”
“We run when we’re scared, we run when we’re ecstatic, we run away from our problems and run around for a good time.”
“Running should be free, man.”
“Only recently have we come up with the technology to turn lazing around into a way of life. We’ve taken our sinewy, durable, hunter-gatherer bodies and plunked them into an artificial world of leisure.”
“We say the rarajipari is the game of life, ‘ Angel said. ‘You never know how hard it will be. You never know when it will end. You can’t control it. You can only adjust.”
“You ran to eat and to avoid being eaten; you ran to find a mate and impress her, and with her you ran off to start a new life together. You had to love running, or you wouldn’t live to love anything else…We were born to run; we were born because we run”
“Nearly all runners do their slow runs too fast, and their fast runs too slow.” Ken Mierke says. “So they’re just training their bodies to burn sugar, which is the last thing a distance runner wants. You’ve got enough fat stored to run to California, so the more you train your body to burn fat instead of sugar, the longer your limited sugar tank is going to last.”
-The way to activate your fat-burning furnace is by staying below your aerobic threshold–your hard-breathing point–during your endurance runs.”
“He was onto something. Something huge. It wasn’t just how to run; it was how to live, the essence of who we are as a species and what we’re meant to be.”
“The Tarahumara would party like this all night, then rouse themselves the next morning to face off in a running race that could last not two miles, not two hours, but two full days. According to the Mexican historian Francisco Almada, a Tarahumara champion once ran 435 miles, the equivalent of setting out for a jog in New York City and not stopping till you were closing in on Detroit.”
“Imagine your kid is running into the street and you have to sprint after her in bare feet,” Eric told me when I picked up my training with him after my time with Ken. “You’ll automatically lock into perfect form–you’ll be up on your forefeet, with your back erect, head steady, arms high, elbows driving, and feet touching down quickly on the forefoot and kicking back toward your butt.”
You can’t run uphill powerfully with poor biomechanics,” Eric explained.”
“Way before we were scratching pictures on caves or beating rhythms on hollow trees we were perfecting the art of combining our breath and mind and muscles into fluid self-propulsion over wild terrain.”
“Running is the heart of what it means to be human.”
“Ask nothing from running and you’ll get more than you ever imagined”
“If you can run six miles on a summer day, then you, my friend, are a lethal weapon in the animal kingdom.”
“human urine is both nutrient-rich and an effective tooth whitener”
Born to Run Review
We’ve compiled various reviews of Born to Run below. Check them out.
- http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/19/AR2009061901078.html
- http://www.amazon.com/Born-Run-Hidden-Superathletes-Greatest/dp/0307279189
- http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2012/05/the-running-life.html
- http://books.google.com/books/about/Born_to_Run.html?id=4gS_0UwVI34C
- http://lrobbins.hubpages.com/hub/Born-to-Run-Book-Review
- http://birthdayshoes.com/born-to-run-by-christopher-mcdougall-review
- http://www.atrailrunnersblog.com/2009/06/book-review-born-to-run-chris-mcdougall.html
- http://longevity.about.com/od/booksreviews/gr/born-to-run-review.htm
- http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1948120.Born_To_Run
- http://www.streetarticles.com/running/born-to-run-review
About Christopher McDougall
Christopher McDougall is the author of Born To Run. Born in 1962, he is an American author and journalist, who is best known for his 2009 best-selling book Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen. He has also written for Esquire, The New York Times Magazine, Outside, Men’s Journal, and New York, and was a contributing editor for Men’s Health.
Born to Run Videos
TedX: Christopher McDougall: Are we born to run?
Christopher McDougall at Google on Born To Run
TedX Phoenixville: Christopher McDougall: Born To Run
Author vs. Podiatrist
New York Times: Barefoot Running with Christopher McDougall
Christopher McDougall on why he was BORN TO RUN
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xv4Se5ka9Pk
Copper Canyon Ultra Marathon: Born To Run
Born to Run Links
A few links related to Born to Run and minimalist running:
- http://www.amazon.com/Born-Run-Hidden-Superathletes-Greatest/dp/0307279189
- http://www.chrismcdougall.com/
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Born_to_Run
- http://www.borntorun.com/
- http://borntorun.org/
- http://www.borntoruninc.com/
- http://discovermagazine.com/2006/may/tramps-like-us#.UMP61NPjnio
Born to Run Music
On a semi-related note, we think this Bruce Springsteen song is the perfect soundtrack to take on your next minimalist run. Enjoy :).
Born to Run, Bruce Springteen
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