Book Review: Ultra Marathon Man by Dean Karnazes

How do you do it?

Why do you do it?

What do you eat?

Are you insane?

These are the four questions that Dean Karnazes sets out to answer in his book “Ultra-Marathon Man: Confessions of an All Night Runner.” Apparently almost all of these questions can be answered by one word….pizza.  First, the story of how all of this started.

Apparently the way to get into great shape involves copious amounts of bad tequila and mid-life crisis. Dean, out for his thirtieth birthday, took off into the night in a drunken haze, running all through the night (in dress socks), and ending up 30 miles away, with convulsing muscles, swollen feet, and a restored pride. This was to be the beginning of one of the greatest careers in ultra running the world has known.

Back to the pizza. Whenever Dean runs, he needs fuel. You cannot physically run the distances he does without eating. He has found one of the best methods for fueling up is having a pizza delivered to a street corner and meeting the delivery driver. Apparently complex carbs and fat is no problem while running for 36 hours straight. His other favorites are Pedialyte and any of the nasty stuff on those roller grills at 7-11. With 5% body fat, I think he can afford the occasional greasy pizza.

Dean has run everything from the Western States 100 miler, to 50 marathons in 50 states in 50 days. He has also participated in the only marathon to ever be held in Antarctica, and raced acrossDeath Valley. The man epitomizes extreme running.Scientific analyses has confirmed that while his body produces lactic acid (the stufdf that makes your muscles become useless and start twitching) like the rest of us, he also has a mechanism to reduce that lactic acid WHILE running. This means the only limit on his running is fuel and sleep.

The book is a great recount of his journey from marginal HS cross country runner who stopped moving for 15 years to a world class athlete.  Dean has a great writing style, kind of along the lines of the style used by Andre Agassi in “Open.” You will often know what was going on in his head during one of these events. I highly encourage you to pick up borrow this book from your local library and give it a read. It is inspiring to read about what the human body is capable of. Dean is a firm believer that all of us have a runner inside, it may not be  a 100 mile runner, but nonetheless, we are all capable of running long distances. He at least has me thinking a marathon is not crazy at all. I mean he runs them to WARM UP!

Warm Weather and A Wife on the Run

Date: 01/08/2012
Route:  8 Miles through Hines Park
Distance: 8 Miles
Pace: 10:28/mile
Total Time: 1:23:45
Temp: 35, Sunny

It has been a pretty great week for physical activity around the JD household. The amazingly warm weather around  Detroit continued throughout last week, with Jan 6th coming in at 55! degrees, and highs in the 40's for most of the week. I have taken advantage of this by having a great running week. I ran 4 miles on Wednesday, 3.1 on Friday and 8 today. I figure I better take advantage of this weather while it lasts. While it has been warm, I am counting on a harsh late winter and and spring.

Something else strange happened on Saturday afternoon. The Wife occasionally goes out for a short jog, just to get some physical exercise in. She has NEVER been serious about running or even worrying about how fast she goes. So off she goes on one of these short runs, but in this case we strapped the Garmin 405 to her wrist. I was taking care of CE and starting to get a little bit concerned, as The Wife had been gone over 30 minutes. We are watching out the window, and all of the sudden she appears running down the street, and then she runs right by the house. Now this does not make any sense to me, but she does a lap around the block and comes into the house with a huge grin on her face.

It turns out she ran a 5K. She did not set out to do that, but as she hit milestones, she just kept thinking, "I can do a bit more." I always knew she could run that kind of distance if she wanted to, in fact I am sure she could be faster then me if she wanted to. Trust me, she is built much more like the prototypical runner then myself. If she keeps this up, we can be one of those annoying couples running together with CE in the stroller:

Our Future...HA!

I am hoping to get her into a 5K race this summer, as we all know, once you are in a race, there is no turning back. I was just glad to see how excited she was, running is a passion of mine, and I would love ot be able to share it with her.

Coming later this week, I am going to review a book I recently read, "Ultra Marathon Man" by Dean Karnazes. My preview is simply one word...Wow.