Book Review: Lisa Jackson’s ‘Your Pace or Mine?’

[ktsok]

At the time this was published in 2016, Lisa Jackson had run over 90 marathons - and come last in 20 of them! She usually runs in a flamingo hat, or dressed as a fairy, complete with wings. She likes to chat and laugh with people as she runs and her best marathons are those where she made friends along the road. As the blurb says: ‘Your Pace or Mine? is proof that running isn’t about the time you do, but the time you have’ and is ‘an account of the triumph of tenacity over a lack of talent’.

The book is broken down into chapters entitled ‘What running taught me about... fear/failure and success/nudity’. If you are wondering, that last refers to the BH5K Naked Run at The Naturist Foundation in Orpington, Kent. Lisa tells (invariably funny) stories in each chapter and then there are a few pages of other people’s running stories relevant to the chapter heading and photos. Those stories might be from ordinary (marathon-running) people, or they might be Olympian athletes.

This book is about marathon running, even ultra-marathon running, but it doesn’t feel at all inaccessible. In several marathons she spends time dodging the mop-up vehicle that tries to collect up people going too slowly (some marathons have a 6-hour/6.5-hour cut off, after which the finishing line closes. London Marathon is 8 hours).

It is a light-hearted, funny book for the most part, but moving too. People run marathons for all sorts of reasons, and it seems there is a lot of catharsis - the outpouring of emotion - in long-distance running.

The way it is laid out makes it very easy to pick up and put down, read a snippet here and there. Chapter 11 is entitled ‘Your running record’ and is set out like a diary, starting with: name; date when I started running; age when I started running; reasons why I run. It has a page for times, but also spaces for ‘most beautiful places run in’ and ‘races with the best snacks/entertainment/crowd support’. I’m not sure I would use this as a journal, but it got me thinking about running in the longer-term...

[ktsok Graduate]

Next review: ‘Born to run: the hidden tribe, the ultra-runners and the greatest race the world has never seen’ by Christopher McDougall.

[deadandalive Graduate in reply to ktsok]

Thanks and keep these coming! I am still thinking about getting the Murakami one (it grabbed me more of the two when I looked them up in Amazon), although the focus on distance running makes me wonder if it’s really what I’m wanting. Still, good writing is a delight anytime, and good writing about running sounds like fun.

I did pick up another book though: Running Free, by Richard Askwith. I’ve never heard of the author but the focus of the book appealed to the kind of runner I think I’m becoming: one interested in running because it’s pleasurable, not in order to achieve arbitrary goals. (I don’t know if that’s what I am naturally or what I’m running is changing me into — maybe a combo of both?)

The book is part ranting about the commercialisation of running (Big Running, he calls it) and part reflections on the joy of running for pleasure. I’m only a couple chapters in and loving it. And you’re inspiring me to share my thoughts on it here as well when I’m done!

[ktsok Graduate in reply to deadandalive]

Yes, write a review! It’s interesting to hear the opinion of a newly hatched runner. The fact is, nobody is going to be interested in publishing a book about someone sitting on a couch who manages to run 30 minutes in 9 weeks. I imagine it would have a rather limited readership, too! Books about running are going to be written by people who run a lot, a long way. But this book was friendly - and so too was the Murakami - no matter how far or how fast you run, we are all just putting one foot in front of the other, moving through life.

[deadandalive Graduate in reply to ktsok]

Oh he’s certainly not newly hatched, haha! He runs distances too, but I was drawn by the focus on not getting caught up in the marketing of running. Lemme share some bits I loved so far…

[deadandalive Graduate in reply to deadandalive]

From Chapter 2: “Big Running”

Running is now a market, not a recreation: buying products is what ordinary runners are supposed to do.

Advertisers target us virtually every minute of our waking lives, online and off, and sometimes it seems as though just being a person is no longer enough. Instead, for your life to be worth anything, you have to be a consumer, defined by the objects you covet or spend your money on. It is, similarly, no longer enough simply to do something. For an activity to count, money and products must change hands; ideally, the transaction must be ‘shared’ online.

Runners are born free, and everywhere they run in chains. Or, if you prefer, in chain stores.

‘Gosh, you must have a lot of willpower,’ people often say when they hear that I still go running every day at the age of fifty-three. To which I reply: bollocks. I exercise no more willpower in going running than I would in eating a bar of chocolate. I don’t do it for self-improvement, or to keep me slim or healthy. I do it for pleasure. It’s my little treat. Or, rather, my big treat: a seemingly inexhaustible stream of free, life-affirming brightness from which I constantly refresh myself, spiritually and physically.

If I sometimes get carried away with enthusiasm as I try to share an aspect of my life that has brought me huge amounts of joy, please don’t mistake my enthusiasm for self-congratulation. In many cases, I’m only just discovering those joys myself.

From Chapter 3: “Clock-watching”

Where once I had fantasised about being a better person, I was now concerned mainly with being a better athlete.

From Chapter 4: “Running wild”

[After he got lost on his first rural, totally unplanned run, after years of regularly running up to 10 miles] When you’ve no idea where or how you went wrong, you can never be sure that your attempted corrections won’t make things worse. And with each extra fruitless mile, your legs grow heavier and the night grows darker …

[ktsok Graduate in reply to deadandalive]

Argh! You stopped with a cliff-hanger!

[deadandalive Graduate in reply to ktsok]

Haha I’m sorry but that’s actually the end of a paragraph! 😂 I’ve got the Murakami too by the way and diving into it after this one!

[ktsok Graduate in reply to deadandalive]

Cool. Let us know what you think 🙂

[Granspeed Graduate in reply to ktsok]

Keep ‘em coming. Can’t have too many book recommendations.

[deadandalive Graduate]

(I find myself starting to think I’ll get this too! Why am I wanting to buy running books like they’re shoes!)