M is for list MANIA!

Gotta love my friends on Daily Mile. I put out an innocent request… ‘Compiling a list of running books… any ideas?’ They gave me so many titles, I now need to write ANOTHER list! Hurrah!

Here goes…

More fantastic book recommendations from real life runners!

• What I talk about when I talk about running, Haruki Murakami
• Run your butt off , Sarah Lorge Butler (I like the sound of this one)
• Run like a mother, Dimity McDowell (also sounds funny, I hope it’s not actually about a mother though, that would be disappointing)
• To be a runner, Martin Duggard
• Ultra-marathon man, Dean Karnazes
• Run 26.2! Dean Karnazes (The picture on the front is pretty appealing too. Just saying ladies, worth a look on Amazon!)
• The courage to start, John Bingham
• My Life on the Run, Bart Yasso
• 50/50, Dean Karnazes. It says on the cover that this guy ran 50 marathons in 50 days? In real life?

The prize for the best recommendation goes to Ryan who wrote, ‘Yeah Born to run will make you think that you can toss your footwear out the window and go run a few marathons back to back. Then you get 1/4 mile down the road and realize that maybe some adjustment is necessary.’ I was drinking tea when I read this and nearly choked to death laughing.
According to my training schedule, I am tapering at the moment. I looked it up online and found roughly 8 million conversations and arguments about how best to taper so, in the interests of science (and because I was bored of reading) I picked the first sane sounding idea: run half of what you would usually run. Even I can manage this! So I ran 5 miles tonight and it took 55 minutes.
During that 55 minutes I made about 30 new lists and I ‘worked’ on my gym bunnies identification guide (think ‘birdwatchers guide to the wild’ and you’ve got the idea. Only it’s in a gym. And instead of birds, there are people. Sweating. On treadmills. Get it?) Any meditative ‘flow’ I achieved before (I think I achieved flow for about 10 seconds 11 miles into my last 13 mile run but it could have been exhaustion and/or the fact that I fell and banged my nose) has now disappeared. If I’m not actively ‘thinking’ about something, disturbing visions of me crossing the finishing line in an ambulance/ on a mobility scooter swim into my consciousness. Anyway, back to the lists… any more book ideas anyone? Please?
Happy times x