 My Unlikely Journey to Ultramarathon Greatness
By Scott Jurek with Steve Friedman | Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 236 pages
“To run 100 miles and more is to bring the body to the point of breaking, to bring the mind to the point of destruction, to arrive at that place where you can alter your consciousness.”
Meet Scott Jurek, one of the world’s great ultramarathoners. In Eat & Run, My Unlikely Journey to Ultramarathon Greatness, you get to  know Jurek like a friend, as if you are his badass soulmate, Dusty. The reader commiserates through tales of his sour father and sympathizes with efforts to care for his beautiful mother, crippled by multiple sclerosis.
Eat & Run is Jurek’s memoir, but also his discovery and testament. An avowed vegan, Jurek preaches his evolution and conversion from carnivorous hunting days in the Minnesota backwoods to abandoning meat for the fruits, vegetables, grains, seeds and nuts that fuelled his superhuman feats.
The result created an endurance athlete like no other, one who ran through the breaking point, the destruction and altered consciousness to win seven consecutive titles at the Western States 100-Miler. Jurek also won twice at the Badwater 135 and twice at Greece’s classic 245.3K Spartathlon. Many of his victories were in record time.
To broaden the book’s appeal, each chapter includes a vegan recipe and a coaching tip. These tidbits, while tasty, are sidebars to the compelling human story of a great athlete who discovers new things about himself with each stride.
— Chris Welner |
