Born to Run

I've been reading a lot of cycling books recently - the Robert Millar story, the David Millar story, 'Blazing Saddles' about the Tour and so on - but there were some athletics books in there as well. Most recently it is 'Born to Run' by Christopher McDougall. He is billed as a runner whose feet hurt so he went to see how the Tarahumara Indians in Mexico could run for days at a time without injury. Well, aye that's the basic plot but it is also a quite savage indictment of the running shoe companies. For instance, go into your nearest book shop and find the book. Open it at chapter 25 (page 148) and start to read it. Bookshops even give you wee seats and sofas to sit on while you browse these days so you can do it easily. On page 149 he tells of two Nike reps going to a sponsored college team and seeing them running barefoot because it was faster and safer than wearing their shoes. He goes on to develop the arguments that more athletes are injured wearing top of the range shoes than are injured wearing cheap shoes; that the newer more modern shoes actually weaken the foot and that the foot naturally pronates and that anti-pronation shoes subvert the body's natural movements and so cause injury!
There is a lot more about shoes, racing, attitudes, etc in the book as well as stuff about the Tarahumara and the basic story. He also puts Dean Karnazes in his place! I would suggest that road and endurance runners generally have a wee look at the book - persuade the Library to buy it for you or even get your nearest and dearest to buy it as an extra birthday present!