My Best Race

Book excerpt: Fifty runners—from the world’s elite to passionate amateurs—share the races they’ll never forget in this “fascinating and fresh look at competitive running” (Jon Sinclair, former USA cross country and 10K champion, RRCA Hall of Famer). Every runner that enters a race has a unique motivation behind competing: racing for the challenge, for the achievement, for the health benefits, or for more personal reasons. But whether they are twenty-mile-a-day elite marathoners or twenty-mile-a-week recreational runners, each of them can invariably point to a singular performance as “the best race I ever ran.” My Best Race is a collection of those singular performances. In this inspirational collection, fifty runners, from Olympians and world champions, to courageous disabled athletes and middle-of-the-packers, share their personal accounts of what they consider the best race they ever ran—and why. Contributors include a top marathoner who sacrifices his place on the Olympic team to pace his friend to the final qualifying spot at the Olympic Trials; “The Central Park Jogger” who finishes a race she founded to benefit disabled athletes, fourteen years after being left for dead from a brutal attack that gripped the nation; an unheralded high school runner who beats a previously undefeated state champion—and who goes on to become a two-time Olympian; the woman race organizers tried to physically remove from the male-only Boston Marathon in 1967; and forty-six other runners. “Such wonderful and inspiring stories by a diverse group of runners—bravo!” —Ryan Lamppa, media director of Running USA “What a fascinating concept! . . . A very unique and inspiring collection that gives great insight into the minds of runners.” —Keith Brantly, member of the 1996 US Olympic marathon team