VICKY: PRE: The Story of America’s Greatest Running Legend by Tom Jordan. I like Prefontaine because he brought attention to the sport of running and contributed largely to making running “sexy”. He once famously said about running:
“Some people create with words or with music or with a brush and paints. I like to make something beautiful when I run. I like to make people stop and say, `I`ve never seen anyone run like that before.` It`s more than just a race, it`s style. It`s doing something better than anyone else. It`s being creative.”
GRANT: He also brought a lot of attention to amateur athletes, who always seem to struggle opposite professional athletes. This is one subject that I want us to explore as we read through this book.
VICKY: According to the the publisher:
“For five years, no American runner could beat him at any distance over a mile.”
GRANT: I don’t care whether you think he was arrogant or not, that’s a pretty impressive record.
VICKY: What I can gather from watching the movies and doing a bit of Googling, is that he really approached running as a battle.
GRANT: Absolutely. He once said:
“I run to see who has the most guts.”
VICKY: I can’t wait to read this book and discover whether he was really the gladiator everyone has portrayed him to be. I wonder whether this fierce competitiveness is a required trait for track athletes. They always seem more intense than road and trail runners.
GRANT: I don’t know but I get a feeling we’re about to find out!
VICKY: Hey what do you all think? Are track athletes more competitive/fierce/intense than other types of runners?
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I just had a thought about this. It relates to the fact I’m having a slack training week (which I decided to blame on bad coaching (I am my own coach)). I was wishing I had a coach to kick my butt this week – track athletes have coaches which may help them become more intense/competitive/fierce. I don’t have any experience with track – so it’s just speculation!