Born To Run - Christopher McDougall | Summarized Books

Born To Run - A Hidden Tribe Superathletes And The Greatest Race The World Has Never Seen

The human body, by the injury the feet suffer, seemed not to be designed to run

8 out of every 10 runners are hurt every year. Hurt here means ripped hamstrings, strained Achilles tendons, sprained ankles, aching arches, ​and the likes. No human invention has been good enough to stem the tide, not even sophisticated spring-embedded, microchip-cushioned running shoes.

Running is the fitness version of drunk driving — you might get away with it for a while and even have fun in the process, but catastrophe is always around the corner.

Quoting “Sports Injury Bulletin,” every footfall of the typical runner puts enormous strain on his or her legs — a force equal to more than twice the runner’s bodyweight. That impact load will ultimately break down anyone’s bones, cartilage, muscles, tendons, and ligaments; in the same way,​ hammering away at an apparently impenetrable rock would eventually reduce it to dust.

We have a primal attachment to running. We run when we are scared, and also when we are ecstatic. We run away from our problems and run to feel good about ourselves. And when things take a nosedive around us, we run. For example, distance running in the US skyrocketed during periods of national crisis — the Great Depression, the resistance to the Vietnam War, the Cold War, the Race Riots of the 1960s, 911.

That our feet hurt because we run doesn’t make sense. Antelopes or wild mustangs don’t get disabled by impact injuries. What are we missing here?

Christopher McDougall, the author of “Born to Run” went in search of answers amongst the Tarahumarans — a tribe reputed for their ability to run ultra distances​ without rest, and without hurt.

“Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up. It knows it must outrun the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning in Africa, a lion wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the slowest gazelle, or it will starve. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a lion or a gazelle — when the sun comes up, you’d better be running.” ~ Roger Bannister, the first man to break the four-minute mile.

The journey into Tarahumara land is filled with natural and man-made danger

The author, accompanied by Salvador, a 33-year-old​ local who acted as a guide, embarked on a danger-filled trek into Tarahumara land; commissioned by “The Runner’s World” magazine. The quest was to reach Arnulfo Quimar, reputed to be the greatest living Tarahumaran runner ever, to pay homage and ask of him the secrets of his tribe’s ability.

The Tarahumara lived inside the cliffs of the caves that make up the Barrancas del Cobre — the Copper Canyon, a group of remote mountains in the wilderness. These cliffs are reachable only by long climbing poles which they pull up once inside. The trails that run through their villages are hidden — most disappear into the ground if one follows them. The few that remain visible track over suicidally steep terrain. One misstep would send a climber plunging 200 to 300 feet to the bottom of the Canyon.

Because the Barrancas are impossible to police, ruthless drug cartels — the Los Zetas and the New Bloods — operate from the extensive marijuana plantations they own in the forests at the edge of Tarahumara​ land. According to statistics, six murders are committed in the Barrancas every week.

Tarahumaran land itself lies in the wilderness; a full two-day trek beyond the lush green forests that make up part of the Barrancas. In between both is a deep gorge — wider than the Grand Canyon — in the earth. To get to Tarahumaran land on the other side of this gorge, one had to clamber down its steep face on one side; ford the river, at chest level, at its bottom; and then climb up the steep face of the gorge on the other side. Then the full two-day trek in the wilderness follows.

The Tarahumarans are a reserved and secretive people

The Tarahumara are a small tribe of recluses who have almost solved all problems known to man. In Tarahumara land, there is no crime, war or theft. There is no corruption, obesity, drug addiction, greed, heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, depression or carbon emissions. There is no old age too — 80 year-olds regularly hike marathon distances up the mountains. The Tarahumarans are easily the kindest and the happiest people on Earth.

In ultra distances, no human or animal outruns the Tarahumarans, not even the famed Cheetah or the Olympic marathoner. They are known to chase deer to exhaustion and catch them with their bare hands. They are strong beyond human understanding too, able to climb over a Copper Canyon mountain in minutes. Tarahumaras have a special brew — the Iskiate —which made them trim, powerful and unstoppable. A few gulps, and they are good to run all day without rest.

The Tarahumarans run 300 miles — 12 full marathons back-to-back. The best amongst them would run 435 miles at a stretch — that’s 17 full marathons.

For all their strength, the Tarahumarans don’t kick ass. Rather, they use their strength to live in peace. They would rather run away than stay and argue a point. They answer aggression with their heels. When Corte’s armored invaders, Pancho Villa’s rough riders and Mexican drug barons came calling, they ran faster than anyone could follow and deeper into the Barrancas del Cobre.

The sportsman was the ​unwelcome guest to Anulfo Quimar’s residence up in the mountains of the Copper Canyons

The entrance to Anulfo Quimar and his family’s lodgings was another indistinguishable crack in the cliff of the Copper Canyon. Emerging through the crack, one would find oneself in a small hut made from mud bricks and contained in the hillside. There are no similarly-camouflaged homes around — the Tarahumarans prefer to live in isolation even from themselves.

Tarahumaran etiquette demands no one directly approaches the cave that is their home. Instead, one sat on the ground a few dozen yards away and wait, looking off in directions opposite to its entrance; as if one was just resting from the rigors of one’s wanderings. If someone appears and invites one to the cave, great. If not, one had to stand up and leave. {16}

Even though Christopher McDougall and his guide, Salvador, got to Anulfo Quimar’s lodgings without invitation, he still treated them to the traditional basketful of sweet limes which all three ate as they sat in the shade. While eating, Anulfo Quimar cast appraising glances at the author, whom he didn’t know at all; and refused to answer any of his questions.

The Tarahumarans don’t answer anyone’s direct questions, unless the one questioning was well-known to them. To them, asking questions was a direct show of force, a demand to possess a part of their heads.

In Tarahumaran tongue, humans come in two forms — the Rarámuri, which is the real name by which the tribe is known and depicts those who run from trouble; and the Chabochis, who cause trouble.​

Since Anulfo Quimar did not answer to Christopher​ and his guide’s enquiries, both had to leave.

Caballo Blanco, also known as The White Horse, is a native American of Colorado who endeared himself to the Tarahumarans by adopting their way of life

“You would have to be amongst them for years and years for them to trust and be comfortable with you,” says Ángel Nava López, who ran the Tarahumaran school house in Muñerachi, a few miles downriver from where Anulfo Quimar lived, to the author and his guide.

“Like Caballo Blanco.”

Caballo Blanco — The White Horse, was so-named by the locals for his long blond hair and plain skin. He was a tall, thin, chalky white man who spoke a strange language and would emerge from the hills without warning. He always had on some dirt-colored Chabochi shorts, a pair of sandals, and an old baseball cap. He communicated with the locals in awkward Spanish, often asking for pinole, the Tarahumaran corn gruel and water; which he gulped down before heading back up the trail and into the wild.

Generally known as a good guy, Caballo lived in a hut he had built for himself somewhere across the Batopilas Mountain. He lived off the land when he ran, depending on korima — similar to karma — to survive. Korima is the Tarahumaran culture that mandates one to share whatever one had, instantly and with no expectations. Korima is how the Tarahumarans trade, exchanging favors and the occasional cauldron of corn beer.

The White Horse had warmed his way into the hearts of the locals who used his hut as a way station during their long journeys across the canyons. In return, the locals always welcomed him to a meal and a place to rest when he roamed their villages. He looked and dressed and sounded nothing like the Tarahumarans, but in a deeper way, he was one of them.

Ángel was positive the author and his guide would find Caballo in the old mining town of Creel, which was where he said he was headed when he passed through Muñerachi; but they had to hurry, the White Horse didn’t stay long in any place.

As the author and his guide raced through farms or villages on their way to Creel, the feedback they got was the same — the White Horse had just passed. Even in the old mining town of Creel, a woman in a taco stand affirmed she saw him that morning, walking along the train tracks towards the edge of town.

Both men raced along the tracks to the last building on its route — the Casa Pérez Hotel. And there, they found him.

Hopefully, he would share the secrets of the Tarahumara with them.

Caballo Blanco had a story to tell

His real name was Micah True, from Colorado, and he was on a personal quest to understand the Rarámuri.

In the 1990s, Rick Fisher came across the Tarahumarans during one of his several forays into the Copper Canyon. He had always wondered why the Tarahumarans were not winning the world’s toughest ultradistance races, considering that they were the world’s toughest runners.

Fisher had a Tarahumaran friend, Patrocinio López, and while watching a game of raráji-pari, the ancient Tarahumaran ball race with his fiancée in Patrocinio’s village, he hit upon the idea of facing off some of Tarahumara’s best runners against the modern world’s finest ultradistance runners in the Leadville Trail 100 — a 100-mile ultramarathon that held in Leadville, Colorado.

Leadville was 10,000 feet above sea level. The Leadville Trail 100 was nearly four full marathons, half of them in the dark, with twin 2,600-foot climbs in its middle. The race is brutal on its runners, who routinely fall off bluffs, break ankles, suffer from over-exposure and get weird heart arrhythmias. Most runners give up the race before they collapse from exhaustion.

Fisher pictured footage of good-looking guys in skirts smashing records and kicking ass showing on ESPN.

The first team of five Tarahumaran runners he fielded in the 1992 Leadville Race failed. All gave up midway into the race. Apparently, Patrocinio had gotten him average Tarahumara runners. He went for the elite runners of the tribe at his second go in the 1993 edition and his team; 55-year-old grandfather Victoriano Churro finished first, 41-year-old goat farmer Cerrildo Chacarito finished second, Manuel Luna finished fifth, and eighteen-year-old​ Felipe Torres finished sixth.

The first non-Tarahumara runner to finish the race was nearly a full hour behind the Tarahumaran winner.​

Because of the hype surrounding the Tarahumarans and their ability to do endurance running, little-known Leadville Trail 100 became a major media event.

Fisher featured another team of seven Tarahumarans in the 1994 Leadville Trail 100 race. The race’s star attraction was Ann Trason, a Community College science teacher and researcher who also ran ultradistances and was considered a formidable challenge to the Tarahumarans’ domination of the race. She was a 14-time winner of the Western States 100 over a span of three decades, world record holder at 50 miles, 100 kilometers, and 100 miles; and winner of the Leadville Trail 100 on at least two occasions.

It was a close race. For most part of the race, Ann Trason was ahead of the pack with the Tarahumarans following her closely. Then at one of the stopovers at a way station, Ann taunted the Tarahumarans, but they kept their cool.

Team Tarahumara finished well in the race with Juan Herrera, a 25 year old coming first, Ann Trason coming in second, injured Martimano Cervantes coming in third, Manuel Luna coming in fourth, and other Tarahumarans coming in fifth, seventh, tenth and eleventh.

Right after the race, Rick Fisher accused the Race Director of conspiring against Team Tarahumara. He accused the organizers of drugging some members of the team and as well as sexually molesting one of them. A riotous argument ensued, which the Tarahumarans witnessed. It didn’t make sense to them at all, they had done well, why were the Chabochis screaming at each other? Why was there a lot of anger and hostility all around them?

After the 1994 Leadville race, the Tarahumarans would never return to race in Leadville again. A native pacer, Shaggy, who had worked with them and also witnessed the humiliation they were put through, followed them into the canyons.

“Shaggy” was Micah True.

The secrets of the Tarahumarans are a collection of simple, commonsensical rules every human can live by​

Everyone thinks they know how to run, but there is an art to it that has to be learned; like any other sport. If the art is not learned, inefficiency is guaranteed and injury is inevitable. {25}

Ken Mierke, exercise physiologist and world-champion triathlete, says the best way to run, which the Tarahumarans do, is to run the way kids run — in short strides, allowing your feet to land under you and then pushing back on them immediately. Shorter strides are always better than longer ones.

Runners also get pacing wrong. They are clueless about speed, so they end up doing their slow runs fast and their fast runs slow; burning off their limited supply of sugar, instead of fat. A runner can activate his or her fat-burning furnace by staying below the aerobic threshold — the hard-breathing point — during endurance runs.

The Tarahumarans’ diet is made up of mainly of processed corn — pinole, pinto beans, squash, chili peppers, wild greens and lots of chias. They get bone-strengthening calcium from the limestone they use to soften the corn they eat. The rule here is to eat less and eat better by building a diet around plant carbohydrates, plant proteins, fruits and vegetables; instead of the common modern-day processed carbohydrates and animal protein staple. ​

Corn has a high level of phenols which boost the immune system and reduce the risk of diabetes and all cancers.

The tesgüino, the local beer the Tarahumarans drink excessively, is low in alcohol and high in nutrients. It is a whole-grain smoothie.

Lastly, the Tarahumarans get strong first, before they run long.

“Your body needs to be shocked to become resilient. Follow the same routine, and your musculoskeletal system quickly figures out how to adapt and goes on autopilot. But surprise it with new challenges — leap over a creek, commando-crawl under a log, sprint till your lungs are bursting — and scores of nerves and ancillary muscles are suddenly electrified into action.” ~ Eric Orton

Running shoes are the most destructive force ever to hit the human foot

Every year, between 65 – 80% of all runners suffer an injury.

Dr. Daniel Lieberman, professor of Biological Anthropology at Harvard University, thinks “a lot of foot and knee injuries that are currently plaguing us are actually caused by people running with shoes that actually make our feet weak, cause us to overpronate and give us knee problems. If running shoes never existed, more people would be running; if more people ran, fewer would be dying of degenerative heart disease, sudden cardiac arrest, hypertension, blocked arteries, diabetes and most other deadly ailments of the western world.”

Vin Lananna, who was Stanford University’s Track Team Head Coach once told representatives of Nike, “running shoes shield our feet from their natural positions by providing more and more support. Going barefoot strengthens them and reduces the risk of Achilles and knee and plantar fascia problems.”

Nike admitted as much when, in 2005, it launched its “Nike Free” footwear in its “Run Barefoot” ad campaign.

Conclusion

The Human Body is actually designed to run. Running is encoded in our DNA, and we are not supposed to hurt while we run. We hurt because we do it wrong, or we do it not at all.

We are all “Running Man.”

Try this:
• The Tarahumaran diet is essentially a vegetarian diet. Does this fact, in any way, surprise you?
• Would you love to challenge yourself to live the “Tarahumaran” lifestyle for a bit, say, for one, three or six months? Whip out your journal and draw up a plan covering:
a) What your lifestyle of endurance running would be;
b) Your pacing during your endurance runs;
c) Your vegetarian diet;
d) Your whole-grain smoothie
e) Spontaneity in your lifestyle.