Eat and Run

While many of us sit behind a desk for eight or nine hours a day, Scott Jurek is running. A legend among hard-core runners, Jurek has fashioned a lucrative career as an ultramarathoner. He runs--and wins--grueling races in excess of 100 miles in a wide array of usually inhospitable environments: Death Valley, the Sierra Nevada mountains, Mexico's Copper Canyon. And he does it on a completely plant-based diet. In Eat and Run, Jurek tells the story of how an average Midwestern kid growing up on meat he caught or killed himself became a vegan elite athlete. The most inspiring proposal in this book--part memoir, part training guide, part vegan manifesto--is that running, like so many things in life, depends less on physical skill than on willpower. Runners of all levels, meat eaters, and vegans alike will be inspired to lace up their sneaks and hit the trails. --Juliet Disparte