ChiRunning - A Revolutionary Approach to Effortless, Injury-Free Running

In Chi Marathon, Danny Dreyer, creator of the revolutionary ChiRunning program, highly respected running coach, and accomplished distance runner, takes a whole-body approach to long-distance running—much like T’ai Chi—making ease and efficiency of movement the prime goal of one’s training. Chi Marathon is the first book to focus not on building stamina first (though that is covered here) but on how to run all those miles without harming your body. A staggering 80 to 90 percent of marathoners face injuries during their training. This book debunks the myth that marathoners need to push through and beyond pain, and presents a technique-based plan for pain- and injury-free, high-performance half and full marathons. Chi Marathon also shows how to improve your performance by developing your own race-specific training plan tailored to your event, and will help you cross the finish line feeling strong no matter your age, body type, or running ability.

• Run a marathon or half marathon free of pain and injury

• Transform your racing with the training triad: form, conditioning, and mastery

• Tap into your chi, an energy source more powerful and enduring than muscles

• Teach your mind and body to work together as a team and master your event

Originally self-published in 1978 and sold at road races out of the trunk of the author's car, the book eventually found its way into the hands of high school, college, and postgraduate athletes all over the country. Reading it became a rite of passage on many teams, and tattered copies were handed down like sacred texts from generation to generation. It ranked as the number one most sought-after out-of-print book in the United States in 2007.

Once a Runner is the story of Quenton Cassidy, a collegiate runner at fictional Southeastern University whose lifelong dream is to run a four-minute mile. He is less than a second away when the political and cultural turmoil of the Vietnam War era intrudes into the staid recesses of his school's athletic department. After he becomes involved in an athletes' protest, Cassidy is suspended from his track team.

Under the tutelage of his friend and mentor, Bruce Denton, a graduate student and former Olympic gold medalist, Cassidy gives up his scholarship, his girlfriend, and possibly his future to withdraw to a monastic retreat in the countryside and begin training for the race of his life: a head-to-head match with the greatest miler in history. This book is a rare insider's account of the incredibly intense lives of elite distance runners; an inspiring, funny, and spot-on tale of one man's quest to become a champion.