One plus side to all this extra time at home is finally starting to get a little bit caught up on my reading. I’ve talked about Ryan Hall’s book Running With Joy: My Daily Journey to the Marathon a few times in vlogs ofter the past few months, but since I finally finished reading the whole thing, now’s the best time to do a proper review.
Part training diary, part spiritual journal/devotional, part autobiography, Running With Joy tells the story, in Ryan Hall’s own words, of his path to the 2010 Boston Marathon. A devout Christian, the intersection of his sport/career with his faith is an important element in the book. The other major element, obviously, is Ryan’s training regime. The book is broken up by training weeks, and each day has Ryan’s training log.
I haven’t been a runner for all that long, relatively speaking. Reading thoughts about running penned by a fellow Christian who’s been running for a couple of decades helped me articulate some of the ideas which have been (no pun intended) running through my head. There’s a part in the book where Ryan articulates his vision of running effortlessly and finishing a race with joy. That’s something I want to achieve someday.
Another quote that really stuck with me was the idea that “You run the first twenty miles with your head; you run the last 10km with your heart.” I’m definitely not there yet either, but I hope to be someday.
It’s also comforting, in a way, to read about Ryan’s struggles. I doubt I’ll ever run a six-minute mile, much less a sub-three hour marathon, but knowing that even the elites have bad training days is helpful when I’ve had a bad run. There’s something to the knowledge that I’m far from alone in that regard, and that distance running is as much about what’s going on inside your head as it is about your physical state.
This isn’t the book for someone looking for a hardcore workout guide to train for a marathon. There are already plenty of those out there. As an introduction to the thought process of a world-class distance runner, and also a glimpse into what that training regimen can look like, however, this book is absolutely invaluable. I’d definitely recommend it to anyone I know who’s digging into long distance running.
Disclosure: No compensation was received for this review. The book was borrowed from my local church’s library.