Born To Run & Run For Your Life

Please forgive me. I don’t really know how to do a book review or a movie review for that matter. What I can tell you though, is that I have been reading and watching some running related material in the past week. Not intentionally, but only because the opportunity presented itself. The book is called “Born To Run” by Men’s Health magazine contributing editor Christopher McDougall, and the movie is “Run For Your Life”, a story about the life of Fred Lebow (now deceased), the founder and former race director of the New York City marathon.

The book was lent to me by one of my running friends, Rick G., who had been telling me about it in the past couple of months because the author was also suffering from ankle injuries before he set out to find out what was causing it. Thank you very much Rick, I really enjoyed reading it. It took me only about three sittings to finish it and it is the first book I have read in so many years.

I can compare the way the book is written to my rudimentary knowledge of the old BASIC computer programming where a flowchart is created from top to bottom with subroutines (gosub command) going off in different directions depending on what you want the program to do, then when you finish the subroutine, the program goes back to the center of the flowchart (return command). I say that because McDougall starts with the main topic about his injuries, then branches off like a subroutine to tell stories about other characters, then returns to the main topic before branching out to describe another character. This goes on several times and somehow he manages to put all those characters together at the end where they engage in a 50 mile race in the Copper Canyon of Mexico.

Like I said, I don’t do book reviews but here are a couple of articles which I think describes the book very well: http://www.kansascity.com/entertainment/story/1439309.html and http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/19/AR2009061901078.html

The movie “Run For Your Life” is basically the Fred Lebow story and how the New York City Marathon came to be. It is a good documentary that runners would enjoy, especially those who have run the New York City Marathon and would like to know more about how the five boroughs race started. I don’t know if the DVD is available at your neighborhood video store, but it’s available through Netflix. This is the IMDB plot summary: Without one eccentric first-generation Jewish immigrant from Transylvania, the New York City Marathon simply wouldn't exist. Ehrlich's fun, loving, and inspirational tribute to the late Fred Lebow shows how one man's imagination, determination, and love for running created one of the world's most popular sporting events. Written by Tribeca Film Festival

I think that runners would enjoy reading the book and watching the movie as well as I did, so if you get the chance to buy, borrow, or rent one or both then it would be worth your while.