Book Review - Hal Koerner's Field Guide to Ultrarunning

OneBiteAtATime

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Aug 18, 2013
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OneBiteAtATime's review of Hal Koerner's Field Guide to Ultranunning. Training for an ultramarathon from 50K to 100 miles and beyond. Hal Koerner with Adam W. Chase. Foreword by Scott Jurek. Velopress, 2014.

Note, through thebarefootrunners.org the publisher has provided a complimentary copy of this book in return for the following review.

Hal Koerner’s Field Guide to Ultrarunning is the perfect title for this book. It is extremely useful as a field guide. It’s well organized and easy to follow. If you are looking for advice on particular subjects, i.e. night running, fueling, hydration, etc., there is an index for you to find information on the specific subject. This book is organized in such a way that it doesn’t necessarily beg to be read from cover to cover, but more from subject to subject as you need guidance.

There are 8 well organized, logically laid out chapters:
Getting Started; Training; Nutrition and Hydration; Gear; Maintenance, Self-Care and First Aid; Dealing with Your Environment; Race Day; and Training Plans

I really like some of the personal stories:
“Now desperate, we began to forage around the parked cars and a couple of unlocked truck toppers for water… I share this rather embarrassing impropriety purely for educational purposes.”
“I’ve seen Scott Jurek down a burrito literally while running downhill during a race. My horror was exceeded only by my envy and respect.”
I would have really enjoyed some more stories, especially some racing yarns, but that isn’t really the point of this book. It truly is a field guide.

I believe this would be an excellent training guide for someone looking to make the leap into ultramarathon. I’m actually incorporating some of the training plan into my personal training. There is a lot here that could be learned from hours of combing through ultra forums, but it is compacted and well organized here. A new ultrarunner can absorb years of experience quickly in this format.

All in all, I would say this is a great guide for a budding ultrarunner. I’m thinking of a few friends for whom I can buy a copy.