It took me decades to realize that running is as much about the mind as the body. We fatigue because of physical processes, but we also fatigue because our minds get scared. Our emotions regulate our speed as much as our muscles do. Alex Hutchinson's Endure explains this complicated process better than anything else I've ever read and, in so doing, offers insights into why running is about so much more than just how often, and how fast, our feet can touch the ground.

I have read a lot of books on running — histories, memoirs, books about how to run faster and how you should run slower, and so on. But [Let Your Mind Run] this is the one that I reliably think about every time something is hard. Specifically, I always come back to Deena's frame of gratitude. "I'm so lucky that my coach put this extra rep in, because that's how we get ready to race." Or "Isn't it great that my house is on top of a hill so I have to run it every day!" I think a mark of a good book is a take-away so clear that you do not forget it, even as the details fade, and this book delivered on that for me.

My favorite running book is Running with the Buffaloes by Chris Lear. After moving to Boulder, my coach and CU Buffs Alum, Joe Bosshard, gifted it to me for inspiration. I deepened my connection to the mileage on the Boulder farm roads and the infamous Magnolia Road—I got to be totally immersed in historical running lore and it made the grind feel heroic. I love how this book gave me context for who came before me in the town of Boulder and how special it is to belong to that running community.

Once a Runner by John L. Parker Jr. has always been my favorite running book. The book perfectly captures the camaraderie and fun of being on a running team along with the focus and dedication it takes to reach the highest levels in the sport. Quenton Cassidy’s mythical 60x400m workout glorified working hard in silence in pursuit of chasing excellence. Parker describes the mental and physical side of the unsexy training days unlike anyone else. After reading this book, I was motivated and inspired to put in the work to find out how good I could be in the sport.

Flanagan is a former elite marathoner and high school track coach who has come to the conclusion that there is something fundamentally wrong with youth sports in the United States--particularly girls sports. She argues [in Take Back the Game] that in the singleminded pursuit of excellence, we've removed the fun from kids sports. She thinks parents need to stop attending every game and meet, athletic scholarships should be banned, and athletes shouldn't specialize until they are well into their teens. It did not occur to me until I read Flanagan's brilliant book, how great a price we've paid for letting parents project their athletic ambitions onto their children’s lives. Take Back the Game should do for youth sports what Silent Spring did for the environmental movement half a century ago. 

Should sport and politics be kept separate? This is a question that has taxed the minds of athletes, administrators, politicians and fans for as long as humans have participated in organised games. The reality is that whenever attempts to keep the two apart have been made, they have mostly failed. Likely because sport is a microcosm of life and its popularity gives people involved who want to make a statement, an almost irresistible platform.

In some cases political messages are not intentional – they come as part of the achievements of athletes: for example in 1936 at the Olympics in Berlin, Black American Jesse Owens almost single-handedly dismantled the propaganda message the ruling Nazi party intended to make about the superiority of the Ayran race by winning four gold medals… In other cases, political protests are intentional. At 1968 Games in Mexico City, sprinters Tommy Smith and John Carlos each raised a clenched fist clad in a black glove whilst standing on the podium during the medal ceremony – just after they had been awarded the gold and bronze medals respectively – to raise awareness of the Black Freedom Movement in the United States.

But in many cases, athletes choose not to use their sporting abilities to make political points. Alain Mimoun was one such athlete, despite having ample reason to speak out. 

In his short and tightly crafted monograph, The Destiny of Alain Mimoun, writer Pat Butcher describes how Mimoun – an Algerian by birth whose name was originally Ali Mimoun Ould Kacha – became one of the most successful French athletes of all time and yet was never rewarded or recognised in line with the level of his achievements…

The reason I love this book so much is that Mimoun’s character as well as the events of his life and the political situation in France are so deftly captured by the author… Mimoun was a man who overcame so much in life – the extremely tough childhood he endured in Algeria in the 1920s; the privations of fighting for the country that had colonised his birthplace; and the injuries he suffered when he was hit by shrapnel which almost resulted in having his damaged leg amputated… And yet, Mimoun ran for the race…When he captured the marathon gold medal at the 1956 Olympics in Melbourne, Australia, the prize he craved more than anything was the acknowledgement of his victory by his closest rival (and great friend), the legendary Emil Zatopek, who – finishing sixth – hauled himself to his feet, saluted the winner and gave him a kiss on the cheek.

[Note: The Destiny of Alain Mimoun was published by Globe Runner in 2011. It is no longer in print.]

Running can be tribal. Trail runners, road runners and track athletes will regularly emphasise the differences between their preferred type of running. In some ways, that is a good thing. Meeting a fellow marathon devotee means connecting with someone who has similar experiences. Same goes for those for whom mountain trails or a 400m tartan oval is their happy place.

And the ‘road vs. trail vs. track’ distinction is just the start. There are trail runners and then there are ultra-trail runners. There are road-milers and then there are marathoners. And let’s not get started on the differences between 100m sprinters, 10,000m distance runners and the otherness of the steeple-chasers.

In his book, Feet in the Clouds, writer Richard Askwith describes his adventures “up north” into the United Kingdom’s fell running landscape and his attempt to complete the famous—or perhaps infamous—Bob Graham Round within the required cut-off.

For those unfamiliar with the Bob Graham Round, the challenge involves running and navigating between 42 fells – mountains and moor-covered hills in the Lake District – starting and finishing in the town of Keswick, within a 24 hour period. There is no prescribed route or even much in the way of paths between the summits. But typically the round is 66 miles (106 km) with 26,900 feet (8,200 m) of climbing.

What the reader discovers in Feet in the Clouds is that the Bob Graham Round is just a small part of the sport of fell running. A point that Askwith learns himself the hard way. Because Askwith is an outsider. He describes himself as “a 13-stone Southerner with weak ankles”. And by Southerner, he means from the south of England… Feet in the Clouds, then, is as much an exploration of society and culture as it is a story of one man’s obsession with an obscure running challenge or a guide to the niche-within-a-niche sport of fell running…

As for me, Feet in the Clouds did inspire me to sign up for some fell races and make the long trip up to the “Lakes”, as the Lake District is commonly known. The races I did were as low-key, quirky and competitive as Askwith wrote they would be. And I felt as welcome and out of place as he suggested I would (as a Southerner with weak ankles myself). I would argue that Askwith’s book not only introduced the world to fell running. It introduced a type of running book that weaves history, culture and geography into a tale that is essentially about something ubiquitous: running. Which makes sense, because of course we all know – running is nothing if not multi-dimensional. And that is part of the attraction.

LANDON, DIRECTOR OF BOOKSELLING

Monsters of Templeton by Lauren Groff

One of the narrators in this multivocal novel is a running group. Yes, the whole group, speaking from the first-personal plural. "We run; we like to run; we have run together for twenty-nine years now; we will run until we can run no more." They also voice the final lines of this generation-spanning novel. I won't spoil the last lines, but they're pretty special.

ABBY, BOOKSELLER

Running by Lindsey A. Freeman

I love books about running. Am I a runner? No. 
Are you a runner? You'll like this book. 
You're not a runner? You'll like this book.

GREG, BOOKSELLER

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami

You’ll feel extremely motivated by how he started writing and running relatively late in life. And, if you’re like me, you’ll feel totally insecure about what a schlub you are in your mid-twenties. Ultimately, I found the former outweighed the latter.

KATE, BOOKSELLER

Ghost by Jason Reynolds

Castle "Ghost" Cranshaw wants to be the greatest...something. Turns out he might be a great sprinter, if he doesn't sabotage his chances. I'm not generally a sports novel reader, but this — the first book in store favorite Jason Reynolds' track series — made me dig my running shoes out of the closet.