Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen

“The Tarahumara like to be visible only if they decide to be; laying eyes on them without invitation was like barging in on someone naked in the bathroom.”

In Chapter 4, McDougall describes getting to the bottom of the canyon with his guide after two days of hiking. Upon meeting the legendary Tarahumara runner Arnulfo Quimare, the pair made a cultural mistake by approaching his hut rather than waiting from a distance and allowing him to come out to greet them. McDougall explains the cultural misunderstanding by pointing out that the Tarahumara prefer to live in isolation, even from each other (26).

“In the Tarahumara tongue, humans come in only two forms: there are Rarámuri, who run from trouble, and chabochis, who cause it. It’s a harsh view of the world, but with six bodies a week tumbling into their canyons, it’s hard to say they’re wrong.”

Whereas Rarámuri is the technical name of the Tarahumara, chabochi is the name they use to describe white people. Later in Chapter 4, the author describes some of the horrors the Tarahumara have suffered at the hands of Spanish silver hunters, who used them as slave labor; Wild West bounty hunters, who passed their scalps off as those of Apache; and Jesuit missionaries, who brought unknown diseases. More recently, Mexican drug cartels have used the canyons as a base and a place to dispose of dead bodies.

“Only drug lords and illegal loggers benefit from Copper Canyon roads, which makes the Mexican government’s obsession with backcountry road-building rather bewildering—or, considering how many soldiers and politicians are linked to the drug trade, rather not.”

In Chapter 5, when McDougall speaks with the schoolteacher who told him about Caballo Blanco, he is also told an anecdote concerning the village of Mesa de la Yerbabuena. Many of the best Tarahumara runners lived there and they had one of the region’s best travel trails, but the government decided to pave the trail and build a road. With that road came access to new foods for the Tarahumara and many took jobs in nearby towns to have money to purchase the foods. Soon, there were no more runners in Yerbabuena.

“To Caballo, running has become as much of a first option in transportation as driving is to suburbanites; everywhere he goes, he goes at a lope, setting off as lightly equipped as a Neolithic hunter and with just as little concern about where—or how far away—he’ll end up.”

In Chapter 7, McDougall finally tracks down Caballo Blanco in the lobby of an old hotel in the small mining town of Creel. At first, Caballo seemed to be apprehensive about talking, but it turned out it was largely because he was nearly delirious from hunger after running all day. McDougall explains that earlier that day he had set out for a short hike but discovered a new trail and his hike turned into a grueling trail marathon.

“Ten straight hours of mountain running will either knock you on your ass or plant its flag on your face, no exceptions. Even the best ultrarunners by this point are heads down and digging deep, focusing hard on the near-impossible task of getting each foot to follow the other.”

In Chapter 10, McDougall relays the story of the Tarahumara runners’ second visit to race in the Leadville 100. This quote is in reference to Ken Chlouber’s, the race director, reaction to seeing the Tarahumara runners at the halfway point. According to McDougall, Chlouber had seen every Leadville runner for the last decade “and not one of them had looked so freakishly…normal” (64).

“Fisher promised that Team Tarahumara would be back next year, and that was the magic wand that transformed Leadville from a little-known gruelathon into a major media event. ESPN grabbed broadcast rights; Wide World of Sports aired a Who-Are-These-Super-Jocks special; Molson beer signed on as a Leadville sponsor. Rockport Shoes even became official backers of the only running team in the world that hated running shoes.”

Beginning Chapter 11, McDougall describes how the Leadville race was transformed because of the Tarahumara runners’ amazing performance in the 1993 race. The following year brought an incredible amount of media attention not only because of curiosity about the Tarahumara but also because Ann Trason was racing as well.

“At its essence, an ultra is a binary equation made up of hundreds of yes/no questions: Eat now or wait? Bomb down this hill, or throttle back and save the quads for the flats? Find out what is itching in your sock, or push on? Extreme distance magnifies every problem (a blister become a blood-soaked sock, a declined PowerBar becomes a woozy inability to follow trail markers), so all it takes is one wrong answer to ruin a race.”

Chapter 12 discusses the 1994 Leadville, which had drawn massive media attention because of a perceived battle of the sexes between the Tarahumara and female champion Ann Trason. With this quote, McDougall is highlighting the advantage Trason had because of her experience and the inexperience of the Tarahumara.

“As a sport, most track coaches ranked ultras somewhere between competitive eating and recreational S&M.”

McDougall is alluding to the fact that the sport of ultrarunning has largely not been taken seriously in the track and field community and among its coaches. One legendary coach who did take it seriously was Joe Vigil, who came to the 1994 Leadville race because he knew that something was unique about these events, in which older runners can compete with younger ones and women can compete with men.

“Ultrarunning seemed to be an alternate universe where none of planet Earth’s rules applied: women were stronger than men; old men were stronger than youngsters; ‘Stone Age’ guys in sandals were stronger than everybody.”

In Chapter 13, McDougall discusses Dr. Joe Vigil, the legendary track coach who traveled to Leadville to watch the race between the Tarahumara and Ann Trason. Vigil was there because he needed to understand the contradictory nature of ultrarunning and why women could compete with men in longer distances but not shorter ones.

“Ultrarunners had no reason to cheat, because they had nothing to gain: no fame, no wealth, no medals. No one knew who they were, or cared who won their strange rambles through woods. They didn’t even get prize money; all you get for winning an ultra is the same belt buckle as the guy who comes in last.”

In Chapter 14, McDougall discusses how legendary trach coach Joe Vigil traveled to watch the Leadville 100 because he viewed ultrarunners as “pure lab specimens,” meaning he knew their performance would not be tainted by phoniness (85). McDougall is alluding to recent sports scandals in which Major League Baseball players used steroids to improve their power and professional cyclists used blood transfusions to improve their endurance.

“That was the real secret of the Tarahumara: they’d never forgotten what it felt like to love running. They remembered that running was mankind’s first fine art, our original act of inspired creation. Way before we were scratching pictures on caves or beating rhythms on hollow trees, we were perfecting the art of combining our breath and mind and muscles into fluid self-propulsion over wild terrain.”

What Vigil discovered while watching Trason and the Tarahumara at the 1994 Leadville race was that they enjoyed doing it. Running brought them joy the same way that it has always brought children joy. While modern running has gotten wrapped up in material gain or to alter the way one looks, the Tarahumara ran only for the love of running.

“We wouldn’t be alive without love; we wouldn’t have survived without running; maybe we shouldn’t be surprised that getting better at one could make you better at the other.”

In Chapter 15, McDougall discusses Emil Zapotek, the legendary Czech Olympic champion, as the prototype of the runner Vigil was looking for. Zatopek was notorious for his rigorous training methods but also regarded as a great humanitarian. Vigil wondered if Zatopek was a great man who happened to run or if he a great man because he ran. McDougall’s assessment is that it would seem natural to become a better person because of running.

“Faced with anger and hostility, the world’s greatest underground athletes reacted as they always had; they headed back home to their canyons, fading like a dream and taking their secrets with them. After their triumph in 1994, the Tarahumara would never return to Leadville.”

McDougall is referring to the fallout that came after the 1994 Leadville race, when Rick Fisher accused the race directors of attempting to cheat the Tarahumara runners, among a number of other wild accusations. Fisher’s antics brought a tense situation with Leadville officials to a head. The Tarahumara were not really sure what was being said, but they easily recognized the anger and hostility they thought was directed at them.

“After a few years in the canyons, Caballo was stronger, healthier, and faster than he’d ever been in his life.”

McDougall explains that when Caballo first came to live in the Copper Canyons among the Tarahumara, he was suffering from the same sort of foot and knee problems other runners were, but he decided to “chuck logic and trust that the Tarahumara knew what they were doing” (109). He soon began wearing only sandals when he ran and eating only pinole and the pain from running went away.

“Running seemed to be the only sensual pleasure in his life, and as such, he savored it less like a workout and more like a gourmet meal. Even when his hut was nearly demolished by a landslide, Caballo snuck in a run before getting the roof back over his head.”

In Chapter 18, McDougall discusses the fact that Caballo led a very dangerous life. Not only did he live among cartel-backed drug traffickers, but he also had been known to suffer from fainting spells. McDougall knew if he happened to have a spell out on the trail there was a good chance he would never be found. Regardless, Caballo wanted to live that way because running the trails of the canyons was the only thing that brought him pleasure.

“The heroes of the past are untouchable, protected forever by the fortress door of time—unless some mysterious stranger turns up with a key.”

McDougall is alluding to Jurek’s ultimate decision to commit to competing in Caballo’s race. He had ignored most of Caballo’s emails, but knowing he would always wonder if he could have beaten the best runners in the world, the Tarahumara, would haunt him caused him to reconsider. Caballo was the mysterious stranger showing up with a key, he was offering Jurek the opportunity to compete against heroes of the past.

“Whenever an art form loses its fire, when it gets weakened by intellectual inbreeding and first principles fade into stale tradition, a radical fringe eventually appears to blow it up and rebuild from the rubble.”

In Chapter 22, McDougall discusses Shelton and Barret’s addition to the group of runners who will be going with him to compete in Caballo’s race. He describes them, along with other very young ultrarunners, as “young guns” because they are almost always much younger than other competitors. The quote alludes to the fact that these young gun runners brought new attitudes, personalities, and styles into ultrarunning.

“Running shoes have only been around about as long as the space shuttle; before that, your dad wore flat rubber gym shoes and your granddad was in leather ballet slippers. For millions of years, humans ran without arch support arch support, pronation control, or gel-filled pods under their heels.”

In Chapter 23, McDougal introduces Barefoot Ted as he joins the group of Americans who will be going to compete in Caballo’s race. Ted had discovered his back pain went away when he began running barefoot and thus became completely devoted to running barefoot. Roughly around the same time, a “barefoot uprising” was starting to form in which other runners were catching on to the fact that modern running shoes did more harm than good as it relates to foot injuries.

“The deconditioned musculature of the foot is the greatest issue leading to injury, and we’ve allowed our feet to become badly deconditioned over the past twenty-five years.”“The deconditioned musculature of the foot is the greatest issue leading to injury, and we’ve allowed our feet to become badly deconditioned over the past twenty-five years.”

McDougall argues that one of the painful truths concerning running shoes is that humans are designed to run without shoes. Those in the running and medical communities who support this notion point out that our feet get stronger when they are used bare and they get weaker when we surround them in padding. Foot injuries, particularly plantar fasciitis, have increased exponentially since the invention of the modern running shoe.

“As a corporate-sponsored elite athlete, Scott had the worldwide buffet of nutrition at his fingertips, but after experimenting with the entire spectrum—everything from deer meat to Happy Meals to organic raw-food bars—he’d ended up with a diet a lot like the Tarahumara.”

When Caballo took the Americans out for a run in the canyons to get them used to the terrain, Shelton asked Jurek if he used goos, the concentrated energy gels used by runners, but he replied that he likes real food (191). What he meant was that he typically carried a bag of pinole just like the Tarahumara eat while running. He tells her “it’s just as portable and you get real calories, not just a fast burn” (191).

“Runners are assembly-line workers; they become good at one thing—moving straight ahead at a steady speed—and repeat that motion until overuse fritzes out the machinery. Athletes are Tarzans. Tarzan swims and wrestles and jumps and swings on vines. He’s strong and explosive. You never know what Tarzan will do next, which is why he never gets hurt.”

To train for Caballo’s race, McDougall contacted Eric Orton, an adventure sports coach, to help. Orton explained to him that the Tarahumara are not great runners, they are great athletes, like Tarzan. Their daily lives involve physical activities that most people, even great runners, never experience.

“All the pelt-covered creatures in the world cool off primarily by breathing, which locks their entire heat-regulating system to their lungs. But humans, with our millions of sweat glands, are the best air-cooled engine that evolution has ever put on the market.”

McDougall is alluding to the science behind what anthropologists call persistence hunting, which means literally running an animal to death. Because humans can breathe while running and sweat efficiently, we can run continuously, albeit much slower, but animals can only run so long, albeit much faster, before they must stop to pant to cool off. Therefore, if enough people take chase after an animal and chase it long enough, it will go into hypothermia and collapse.

“It was eerie watching Scott run side by side with Arnulfo; even though Scott had never seen the Tarahumara before and Arnulfo had never seen the outside world, somehow these two men separated by two thousand years of culture had developed the same running style. They’d approached their art from opposite ends of history, and met precisely in the middle.”

McDougall is referring to a picture Luis Escobar snapped as he saw Jurek and Arnulfo running together in the days before Caballo’s race. The respective strides and gaits of the two men were identical despite the fact that their running traditions and background could not have been more different.