Born to Run

I heard a lot about this book. Whoever read the book said that it was about a tribe. For long, I was putting off reading this brilliant book. I finally read it and came off having my mind blown.

There is not a passage which is literally brilliant, but there are a lot of passages where the research of the author shines through. He builds the book systematically. Nowhere does there appear to be a discord in the narrative. It flows smoothly. No wonder that it’s being made into a movie now. If it stays loyal to the book, there is no need of a separate screenplay.

The book starts off in the quest of Caballo Blanco and sets off on an interesting journey culminating with Caballo’s fulfilled state of mind. In this journey we are introduced to a lot of characters as well as their own back stories.

We live in a blessed world. So, the information that McDougall provides in the book can be easily searched and you can know more about the person. Each and every person mentioned in the book is interesting and warrants that you know more about them.

Grandstanding isn’t something that McDougall does well. So we are provided with facts rather. The writing is simple and the research is monumental. Every person who gets introduced in the book also has a primer on him that follows. Of course, Tarahumara are given the pride of the place in the book, but there are others who earn the respect of the author – none more so than Scott Jurek 

The book promotes barefoot running. It’s not at the cost of putting the running shoes down. Yes, he does present us with facts that might make us want to throw the running shoes into the bin, but never does he advocate barefoot running in the book.

One of the best parts, and because it is also explanatory, and the lengthiest parts of the book is the portion where he writes about how human beings evolved to run. Though it seems very lengthier than what it actually is, it gives us information on why we run the way we do.

Before I started out to read this book, one of the people who already read it said, ‘You will want to run once you finished reading the book’. I can’t say the same because I am a lazy bum but what I can vouch for the fact that you will want to know more about the people that McDougall writes so brilliantly about.

I will let you rest with one of the facts that I found out – Luna Sandals were named in honour of Manuel Luna, one of the Tarahumara runners.

Image Courtesy – amazon.co.uk