Born to Run “How do you flip the internal switch that changes us all back into the Natural Born Runners we once were? Not just in history, but in our own lifetimes. Remember. Back when you were a kid and you had to be yelled at to slow down?...Half the fun of doing anything was doing it at record pace, making it probably the last time in your life you’d ever be hassled for going too fast” (92). This is one of the many questions Christopher McDougall explores in his book, Born to Run. Throughout this book, McDougall explains that the human species has evolved to run; we are structured in such a way that enables us to go great distances. He believes that our society is suffering many of our problems because we are denying our evolutionary need to run. But I’m getting ahead of myself; to provide some context, this book is about
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Another large theme throughout the book is how good running is for people, especially if they become vegetarian. Scott Jurek, one of the best ultra distance runners of all time, said that after becoming vegetarian “Everyone told me I’d get weaker, I wouldn’t recover between workouts, I’d get stress fractures and anemia. But I found that I actually feel better, because I’m eating foods with more high-quality nutrients” (192). But putting diet aside, running makes a significant difference in your body and mind on its own. McDougall personally experienced this change; he wrote, “...because I was running more, I was sleeping great, feeling relaxed, and watching my resting heart rate drop. My personality had even changed: The grouchiness and temper I’d considered part of my Irish-Italian DNA had ebbed so much.” (213). He also came to understand how powerful an antidepressant could
Another large theme throughout the book is how good running is for people, especially if they become vegetarian. Scott Jurek, one of the best ultra distance runners of all time, said that after becoming vegetarian “Everyone told me I’d get weaker, I wouldn’t recover between workouts, I’d get stress fractures and anemia. But I found that I actually feel better, because I’m eating foods with more high-quality nutrients” (192). But putting diet aside, running makes a significant difference in your body and mind on its own. McDougall personally experienced this change; he wrote, “...because I was running more, I was sleeping great, feeling relaxed, and watching my resting heart rate drop. My personality had even changed: The grouchiness and temper I’d considered part of my Irish-Italian DNA had ebbed so much.” (213). He also came to understand how powerful an antidepressant could