Run to Win

“See Dane Run” is a book about Dane Rauschenberg’s quest to run a marathon every weekend for an entire year as he raised money for L’Arche USA, a charitable organization that enables people with and without disabilities to share their lives in communities of faith and friendship.

Dane started right out, running the first weekend of the year, and managed to find a marathon every single weekend through December save one. That weekend he decided that he should put on his own marathon, The Drakes Well Marathon, in his home town.

Amongst all of that traveling and running, he also had to balance his fund raising efforts, as well as his time with his friends and family and working full time in DC, with everything on his own budget.
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Over the last few months I’ve been making my way through the Pure Fit Radio archives, and on one of the episodes they did an interview with Bryan Boyle.

It sounded like an interesting story that he had, so I picked up his book, Iron Heart: The True Story of How I Came Back From the Dead.

I just tore through it. He has a great story and you can’t help but be inspired when you listen to it or read about.

Bryan was a weight lifter and a competitive swimmer when he graduated from high school. He was driving home from swim practice, and his Camaro just got completely smashed by a dump truck.
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Last week, I reviewed The Barefoot Running Book, and found that it was short, to the point, and was a great primer for somebody that is venturing out into barefoot running for the first time.

Many of the lessons could easily be learned on your own, but knowing what to expect and following a plan from somebody that has helped others learn to run barefoot is certainly easier than muddling through yourself and hoping you don’t get injured.

I also held a contest to give a copy of the book away, where the only criteria to enter was to share your own experience or lack thereof in the comments. If you were one of the people who entered, then you had a 1 in 22 chance of winning.

After a quick visit to Random.org, the winner has been chosen!

Here is the winning comment:
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Jason Robillard was kind enough to send me a copy of his new book, The Barefoot Running Book, which is intended for new barefoot or minimalist shoe runner’s to help them find the proper form and learn how to run without getting injured.

Overview

Jason splits the book into 4 main sections for the different levels of experience you will find yourself as you become a barefoot runner.

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I am giving away a free copy of The Barefoot Running Book to one lucky reader!

All you need to do is leave a comment below sharing your experience (or lack thereof) with barefoot running.

You have until Tuesday evening (July 13, 2010) at 8:00 pm EDT to leave your comment, after which I will choose somebody at random. Only 1 comment is allowed per person and is subject to any applicable laws where you live.

You can purchase the book for yourself at Amazon, or read my review about what the book contains and what I think of it.

If your comment doesn’t appear right away, then it is probably because this is the first contest you’ve participated in here.

First time commenters are moderated to help keep spam from overtaking the site. So…welcome to Run to Win, and thanks for your patience, I’ll approve it ASAP!

Update: Contest Winner Announced

In early/mid 2008, my friend Steve Speirs started a website to help people do 100 consecutive pushups. If you ever visited a fitness blog around that time then you undoubtedly saw people making the attempt using Steve’s training schedules (many of whom succeeded, I might add.)

Fast forward a year, and in June of 2009 Steve published his first book, 7 Weeks to 100 Pushups.

It’s a very quick read, and the programs offered in it seem even more accessible than the ones on the website. You should be able to read it in one or two sittings without any trouble.

The first thing that you’ll notice about the book is that it is 7″x9″, which was not what I was expecting when I ordered the book. It has more of the feel of a training log than a book that you would sit down and read.

The advantage, of course, comes from the book staying open on the floor in front of you on the page with that day’s workout, so that you can easily see how many pushups you should be doing for each set. (Unless your cat is wanting to play and keeps closing it on you, anyway.)

7 Weeks to 100 Pushups is divided into 4 parts:
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A popular book that came out recently is Born To Run by Christopher McDougall. (I’ll have a review up on the book one of these days – it was a good read.)

If you’re familiar with the book, then you’ll get a kick out of Chris’s appearance on the Daily Show last night (click through for video): (Click here to continue reading…)

Last night I had the pleasure of running with Bart Yasso as he accompanied us to Baxter Woods, where the group I coach did some hill repeats. Temperatures were up in the mid-90s so getting into the shade was a welcome change from the warmup to get there.

Upon returning to Maine Running Company, Bart signed copies of his book, My Life on the Run and gave away training logs, Runner’s World magazines, Powerade, and pizza. One lucky runner even got a free pair of Saucony running shoes. (They had their tour bus there and were performing gait analysis and shoe fittings.)

Bart told a few jokes and described some of his varied experiences in different races and cultures before settling down to chat with folks individually (video after the jump): (Click here to continue reading…)