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

by Christopher McDougall

  Or try this word problem: subtract the Tarahumara from last year’s race, and what do you get?

  Answer: a woman lunging for the tape.

  In all the hubbub over the Tarahumara, few besides Vigil paid much attention to the remarkable fact that Christine Gibbons was just nosed out for third place. If Rick Fisher’s van had blown a fan belt in Arizona, a woman would have been thirty-one seconds from winning the whole show.

  How was that possible? No woman ranked among the top fifty in the world in the mile (the female world record for the mile, 4:12, was achieved a century ago by men and rather routinely now by high school boys). A woman might sneak into the top twenty in a marathon (in 2003, Paula Radcliffe’s world-best 2:15:25 was just ten minutes off Paul Tergat’s 2:04:55 men’s record). But in ultras, women were taking home the hardware. Why, Vigil wondered, did the gap between male and female champions get smaller as the race got longer— shouldn’t it be the other way around?

  Ultrarunning seemed to be an alternative 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. And the mileage! The sheer stress on their legs was off the charts. Running one hundred miles a week was supposed to be a straight shot to a stress injury, yet the ultrafreaks were doing one hundred miles in a day. Some of them were doing double that every week in training and still not getting hurt. Was ultra-running self-selective, Vigil wondered—did it attract only runners with unbreakable bodies? Or had ultrarunners discovered the secret to megamileage?

  So Joe Vigil had hauled himself stiffly out of bed, tossed a thermos of coffee in his car, and driven through the night to watch the body geniuses do their thing. The best ultrarunners in the world, he suspected, were on the verge of rediscovering secrets that the Tarahumara had never forgotten. Vigil’s theory had brought him to the brink of a very important decision, one that would change his life and, he hoped, millions of others. He just needed to see the Tarahumara in person to verify one thing. It wasn’t their speed; he probably knew more about their legs than they did. What Vigil was dying for was a look inside their heads.

  Suddenly, he caught his breath. Something had just come floating out of the trees. Something that looked like ghosts … or magicians, appearing from a puff of smoke.

  Right from the gun, Team Tarahumara caught everyone by surprise. Instead of hanging back as they had the last two years, they surged in a pack, hopping up on the Sixth Street sidewalk to patter around the crowd and take command of the front-running positions.

  They were moving out fast—Much too fast, it seemed, thought Don Kardong, the 1976 Olympic marathoner and veteran Runner’s World writer watching from the sidelines. Last year, Victoriano had shown shrewd restraint by steadily climbing along from last to first, gradually getting faster as he got closer to the finish line. That’s how you run one hundred miles.

  But Manuel Luna had spent a year reflecting on gringo-style racing, and he’d done a nice job of briefing his new teammates. The course is wide open under the streetlights, he told them, then suddenly funnels onto a dark single-track trail as it enters the woods. If you’re not up front, you hit a solid wall of bodies as runners pause to fumble with flashlights and then caterpillar along in single file. Better to move out early and avoid the jam-up, Luna advised them, then ease back later.

  Despite the dangerous pace, Johnny Sandoval of nearby Gypsum, Colorado, stuck tight with Martimano Cervantes and Juan Herrera. Let everyone go nuts over Ann and the Tarahumara, he thought, while I stealth myself to a trophy. After finishing ninth the previous year in 21:45, Sandoval had the best training year of his life. Quietly, he’d been coming to Leadville throughout the summer, running each segment of the course over and over until he’d memorized every twist, quirk, and creek crossing. A nineteen-hour run should win it, Sandoval figured, and he was ready to run one.

  Ann Trason had expected to be in front, but an eight-minute mile right out of the box was just nuts. So she contented herself with staying within sight of Team Tarahumara’s bobbing flashlights as they entered the woods around Turquoise Lake, confident she’d reel them in soon enough. The trail ahead was dark and knotted with rocks and roots, and that played to one of Ann’s peculiar strengths: she absolutely loved night runs. Even back in college, midnight was her favorite time to grab a flashlight and a friend and trot through the silent campus, the world reduced to glitters and sparkles in a tiny orb of light. If anyone could make up time running blindly on a treacherous trail, it was Ann.

  But by the first aid station, Sandoval and the Tarahumara had opened a good half-mile lead. Sandoval checked in, got his split— about 1:55 for 13.5 miles—and shot right back on the trail. The Tarahumara, however, veered into the parking lot and ran over to Rick Fisher’s van. They began kicking off their yellow Rockports like they were crawling with fire ants. Rick and Kitty, as planned, were already standing by with their huaraches. So much for product endorsement.

  The Tarahumara knelt, looping the leather thong around and around their ankles and high up on their calves, adjusting the tautness as carefully as you’d tune a guitar string. It’s a fine art, custom-fitting a strip of rubber to the bottom of your foot with a single lash of leather so it doesn’t shift or flop for eighty-seven miles of gritty, rocky trail. Then they were up and gone, hard on Johnny Sandoval’s heels. By the time Ann Trason arrived at the aid station, Martimano Cervantes and Juan Herrera were out of sight.

  Sick pace, Sandoval thought, as he shot a glance over his shoulder. Anyone tell these guys it had been raining here for the past two weeks? Sandoval knew they were heading straight into a world of slop around the Twin Lakes marshes and down the muddy back end of Hope Pass. The Arkansas River would be a roaring mess; they’d have to haul themselves hand over hand along a safety rope to cross, and then claw their way two thousand feet to the top of Hope Pass. Then spin around and do the same again coming home.

  Okay, this is suicide, Sandoval decided after he came through mile 23.5 in three hours and twenty minutes. I’ll save my strength and cream those guys when their tires go flat. He let Martimano Cervantes and Juan Herrera go—and almost immediately, he was passed by Ann Trason. Where the hell did she come from? Ann should know better; this was crash-and-burn speed.

  At the thirty-mile mark in Half Moon campground, Martimano and Juan were ready for breakfast. Kitty Williams slapped thin bean burritos into their hands. They ran on, chomping contentedly, and were soon swallowed up by the thick woods around Mount Elbert.

  Ann raced in a few minutes later, pissed off and shouting. “Where’s Carl? Where the hell is he?” It was now 8:20 in the morning and she was ready to shuck weight by dumping her headlamp and jacket. But she was so far under record pace, her husband hadn’t yet made it to the aid station.

  To hell with him; Ann kept her night gear, and disappeared on the trail of the invisible Tarahumara.

  At mile 40, the crowd milled around the ancient wood firehouse in the tiny cabin village of Twin Lakes, checking their watches. The first runners probably wouldn’t show up for another, oh, about—

  “There she is!”

  Ann had just crested the hill. Last year, it took Victoriano seven hours and twelve minutes to get this far; Ann had done it in less than six. “No woman has ever led at this point in the race before,” said an incredulous Scott Tinley, the two-time world champion Ironman triathlete who was doing TV commentary for ABC’s Wide World of Sports. “We’re witnessing the most incredible demonstration of raw courage in sports today.”

  Less than a minute later, Martimano and Juan popped out of the woods and came scrambling down the hill behind her. Tony Post of Rockport was so swept up in the drama, he didn’t care for the moment that his boys were not only losing but had also shit-canned the shoes he was paying them to wear. “It was the most amazing thing,” said Post, once a nationally ranked marathoner himself, with times in the low 2:20s. “We were just flipping out, watching
this woman take control.”

  Luckily, Ann’s husband was in position this time. He got a banana into Ann’s hands, then ushered her into the little firehouse for her medical exam. All Leadville runners need to have their pulse and weight checked at the forty-mile mark, because shedding pounds too quickly is an early warning sign of dangerous dehydration. Only with Doc Perna’s okay are they cleared to plunge into the meat grinder ahead: there, looming across the marsh, was the twenty-six-hundred-foot climb to the top of Hope Pass.

  Ann munched the banana while a nurse named Cindy Corbin adjusted the scale. A moment later, Martimano stepped up on the scale beside Ann.

  “¿Cómo estás?” Kitty Williams asked Martimano, laying an encouraging hand on his back. How are you feeling after nearly six straight hours of high-altitude hill running at impossibly fast speed?

  “Ask him how it feels to get beat by a woman,” Ann called out. Nervous laughter rippled through the room, but Ann wasn’t smiling; she glared at Martimano as if she were a black belt and he was a stack of bricks. Kitty shot her an appalled look, but Ann ignored it and kept her eyes locked on Martimano. Martimano turned questioningly toward Kitty, but Kitty chose not to translate. In all her years of running ultras and pacing them for her dad, it was the first time Kitty had ever heard one runner taunt another.

  Despite what most people in the room heard, a video of the incident would later suggest that what Ann actually said was, “Ask him how it feels to compete with a woman.” But while her exact words were debatable, her attitude was unmistakable: Ann didn’t just win by running hard; she won by racing hard. This thing was going to be a death match.

  As Martimano got off the scale, Ann pushed past him and hurried out the door. She slung on her fanny pack—freshly loaded with carbohydrate gel, gloves, and a slicker in case she hit sleet or freezing winds above the timberline—and began trotting down the road toward the snow-capped mountain. She was outa there so fast, Martimano and Juan were still biting into slices of orange while Ann was heading around the corner and out of sight.

  What was wrong with her? The trash talk, the hasty exit—Ann didn’t even take time to slip on a dry shirt and socks, or get a few more calories down her neck. And why was she even in the lead at all? Mile 40 was only round one of a very long fight. Once you jump ahead, you’re vulnerable; you surrender all element of surprise, and become a prisoner of your own pace. Even middle-school milers know that the smart tactic is to sit on the leader’s shoulder, go only as fast as you have to, then jam ’er into gear and blow past on the bell lap.

  Classic example: Steve Prefontaine. Pre came out too quickly twice in the same race in the ’72 Olympics; both times, he was chased down. By the home stretch, Pre had nothing left and faded out of the medals to fourth. That historic defeat pounded home the lesson: nobody gives up the pursuit position if they don’t have to. Not unless you’re foolish, or reckless—or Garry Kasparov.

  In the 1990 World Chess Championship, Kasparov made a horrible mistake and lost his queen right at the start of a decisive game. Chess grand masters around the world let out a pained groan; the bad boy of the chessboard was now road kill (a less-gracious observer for The New York Times visibly sneered). Except it wasn’t a mistake; Kasparov had deliberately sacrificed his most powerful piece in exchange for an even more powerful psychological advantage. He was deadliest when swashbuckling, when he was chased into a corner and had to slash, scramble, and improvise his way out. Anatoly Karpov, his by-the-book opponent, was too conservative to pressure Kasparov early in the game, so Kasparov put the pressure on himself with a Queen’s Gambit—and won.

  That’s what Ann was doing. Instead of hunting the Tarahumara, she’d hit on the risky, inspired strategy of letting the Tarahumara hunt her. Who’s more committed to winning, after all: predator or prey? The lion can lose and come back to hunt another day, but the antelope gets only one mistake. To defeat the Tarahumara, Ann knew she needed more than willpower: she needed fear. Once she was out front, every cracking twig would spur her toward the finish.

  “To move into the lead means making an act requiring fierceness and confidence,” Roger Bannister once noted. “But fear must play some part… no relaxation is possible, and all discretion is thrown to the wind.”

  Ann had fierceness and confidence to burn. Now she was deep-sixing discretion and letting fear play its part. Ultrarunning was about to see its first Queen’s Gambit.

  CHAPTER 14

  SHE’S INSANE! She’s … awesome.

  Coach Vigil was a hard-data freak, but as he watched Ann plunge into the Rockies with her ballsy do-or-die game plan, he loved the fact that ultrarunning had no science, no playbook, no training manual, no conventional wisdom. That kind of freewheeling self-invention is where big breakthroughs come from, as Vigil knew (and Columbus, the Beatles, and Bill Gates would happily agree). Ann Trason and her compadres were like mad scientists messing with beakers in the basement lab, ignored by the rest of the sport and free to defy every known principle of footwear, food, biomechanics, training intensity … everything.

  And whatever breakthroughs they came up with, they’d be legit. With ultrarunners, Vigil had the refreshing peace of mind of dealing with pure lab specimens. He wasn’t being hoodwinked by a phony superperformance, like the “miraculous” endurance of Tour de France cyclists, or the gargantuan power of suddenly melon-headed home-run hitters, or the blazing speed of female sprinters who win five medals in one Olympics before going to jail for lying to the feds about steroids. “Even the brightest smile,” one observer would say of disgraced wondergirl Marion Jones, “can hide a lie.”

  So whose could you trust? Easy; the smiles on the oddballs in the woods.

  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 the 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. So, as a scientist, Vigil could rely on the data from an ultramarathon; as a fan, he could enjoy the show without scorn or skepticism. There’s no EPO in Ann Tra-son’s blood, no smuggled blood in her fridge, no ampules of Eastern European anabolics on her FedEx account.

  Vigil knew that if he could understand Ann Trason, he’d grasp what one amazing person could do. But if he could understand the Tarahumara, he’d know what everyone could do.

  Ann sucked air with deep, shuddering gasps. The final push up Hope Pass was agony, but she kept reminding herself that ever since the time Carl cursed her out, no one had beaten her on a big climb. About two years earlier, she and Carl were running on a rainy day when Ann began grousing about the endless, slippery hill ahead. Carl got tired of hearing her kvetch, so he blistered her with the most obscene name he could think of.

  “A wimp!” Ann would later say. “The big W! Right then, I decided I was going to work to be a better hill climber than he was.” Not only better than Carl, but better than everybody; Ann developed into such a relentless mountain goat that hills became her favorite place to drop the hammer and leave the competition behind.

  But now, as she approached the Hope Pass peak, she could glance back and see Martimano and Juan steadily closing the gap, looking as light and breezy as the capes that swirled around them.

  “God,” Ann panted. She was so hunched over, she could almost pull herself up the slope with her hands. “I don’t know how they do it.”

  A little farther down the mountain, Manuel Luna and the rest of Team Tarahumara were also catching up. They’d gotten scattered in the early miles by the startlingly fast pace, but now—like an alien protoplasm that re-forms and gets stronger every time you blast it to bits—they were tightening back into a pack behind Manuel Luna.

  “God!” Ann exclaimed again.

  She finally reached the peak. The view was spectacular; if Ann turned around, she could see all forty-five miles of tumbling green wilderness between her and Leadville. But she didn’t even
pause for a slurp of water. She had an ace in her hand, and she had to play it now. She was woozy from the thin air and her hamstrings were screaming, but Ann pushed straight over the top and started chop-stepping downhill.

  This was a Trason specialty: using terrain to recharge on the move. After a steep first drop, the backside descent quickly softens into long, gently sloped switchbacks, so Ann could lean back, make her legs go limp, and let gravity do the work. After a bit, she could feel the knots easing in her calves and the strength creeping back into her thighs. By the time she reached bottom, her head was up and the glint was back in her cougar eyes.

  Time to fire the jets. Ann veered off the muddy trail and onto hard-packed road, her legs spinning fast and loose from the hip as she accelerated into the last three miles to the turnaround.

  Juan and Martimano, meanwhile, had gotten a little sidetracked. As soon as they’d broken past the tree line above, they were startled to see a giant herd of strange, woolly beasts—and among them, some animals. “SOUP’S ON, FELLAS,” a hoarse voice bellowed to the uncomprehending Tarahumara from somewhere inside the herd. The Tarahumara had just made first contact with another wilderness tribe: the Hopeless Crew.

  Twelve years earlier, Ken Chlouber had mustered enough of his neighbors to staff a good half-dozen aid stations, but he refused to put anyone at the top of Hope Pass; even the tough-guy miner who delighted in his race’s high hospitalization rate considered that inhumane. A volunteer on Hope Pass would have to haul enough supplies up the mountain to feed, water, and bandage an endless parade of battered runners, and then camp out for two nights on a snowy peak with gale-force gusts. Nothin’ doin’; if Ken sent anyone up there, he’d have hell to pay when they didn’t come back down.