The Book Of Secrets

Considering the three running books I have on my bedside table at the moment, What I talk about when I talk about running from Haruki Murakami was the one I started to read posteriorly but finished first. Not just because it was shorter and easier to read, but more important, it talks about how running can change your entire life’s dynamic. If you are looking for training sheets and diet schedules, this book is not for you. However, you will actually enjoy this quick read if your interests lies in understanding deeper the feelings and issues of a successful professional (in this case a worldwide best-selling writer) trying to balance his routine around working, ageing, traveling and running (and triathloning and ultra-maratoning and etc, etc, etc – this guy can do anything, it is incredible).

Personally speaking, when Murakami talked about his writing activities I found a little bit monotonous because I was more interested in the running parts. Nonetheless, after a while you start to understand how his job as a writer was intrinsically connected to his athlete aspect. You cannot talk about one and leave the other aside. The necessity to overcome barriers, walls and targets were equally important in both sides.

Anyway, it’s not because it is a book focused more on life than running that you will not be able to get some very good tips on the way. For example, I am extremely conscious of how sluggish I am - ‘runningly’ speaking. There are some days the fact that I am slower than others (honestly, I occasionally feel that I am slower than EVERYONE else) really annoys me. Seeing all these older and heavier people passing me like they are not even making an effort drives me insane sometimes. But Murakami talks about how he dealt with the same preconception. It is reassuring and empowering to have a guy who once finished the course Athens-Marathon under excruciating conditions accepting and talking openly about feeling the same embarrassment.

Summarising this topic, he said that some people are slower just because that’s how we are. Different human beings with different body structures. That's all. Getting annoyed and upset it is not going to help – or change – anything. Denial just makes things worse. Besides, it is not that some people are 'slow', most of the time it is just because some bodies take longer to warm-up. That’s how he figured it out that he was doing right running long-distances. If your muscles take 5km to heat up, running short distances will be always frustrating because your body will not even have time to reach its full potency before the race is over.

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In my opinion, the chapter he talked about his experience running a 62-mile ultra-marathon was the best one. I was so curious about the end I couldn’t stop even when my train got to the final destination. I wish I could stay longer sitting there just to be able to finish. You can feel in your bones the pain he felt during the course, the anguish. “Even though my legs were working now, the thirteen miles from the thirty-four-mile rest stop to the forty-seventh mile were excruciating.” OMG. 100km. I will not say anything else about this chapter (and the book) because I don’t want to spoil anyone’s curiosity any longer, but it is a book definitely worth reading.