My Book Report: 50/50 by Dean Karnazes

Believe it or not, you can learn something about building muscle by reading a book about an ultramarathon runner who's all of 160 pounds when he's got a full stomach and a five-pound dumbbell in his hand.

50/50 is a first-hand account written by Dean "Karno" Karnazes and it details his self-imposed challenge of running 50 full marathons (those are 26.2 miles each, in case you forgot), one in each of the 50 states for 50 consecutive days.

Karnazes, who's kind of a big deal in ultramarathon circles, ends up making the experience sound like some kind of a rock tour. His trip is complete with roadies (who created their own 50/50 challenge of getting 50 girls' phone numbers across all the states), a fully-stocked tour bus complete with surly British driver, and a "finish festival" after each race for press meet-and-greets and brief socializing with fellow runners.

There are definitely a few parts of the book that just didn't sit right with me, such as several "screenplay-perfect" moments of drama that included burst blisters on his feet, running with a gruesomely described snot-filled sinus infection, and a spontaneously disappearing tour manager. "Dave had mysteriously vanished while I was running the Montana Marathon, and now he wasn't on the bus." ::cut to Dramatic Chipmunk:: And that all happened before the end of the second week!

Another hard-to-believe "fact" is Karnazes' mention that his family, of Greek origin, is supposedly from the same small town that the Ancient Greek Pheidippides hailed from. Pheidippides, as we all know, is said to have completed the first "marathon" when he ran from Marathon to Athens after a key battle. Convenient, huh?

There's also the point when Karnazes insinuates that he's responsible for giving a shoe designer at Nike the idea to look into barefoot training, which lead to the development of the Nike Free. So you can (maybe) thank Karno next time you lace up your Frees before some heavy deadlifts.

So, with all that said, what can this distance runner possibly have to offer those who lift heavy things? Well, in one section, Karnazes describes his sport:

"Running is a participatory sport, not a fan sport. For this reason, typical runners have only limited interest in sitting back and admiring elite and other well-known runners. Rather, typical runners want to learn from these folks and apply the knowledge to their own performance." (p.63)

Now substitute "bodybuilding" for "running," and "lifters" for "runners," and...voila... we're two sides of the same coin, man. That's deep. Seriously though, for a second, forget that in marathon running there literally is such a thing as "too much muscle."

If somebody is pushing their body farther than it otherwise wants to go, and they're focusing more on willpower than lactic acid build-up, don't you think they deserve at least a nod of respect, even if their total bodyweight is roughly equivalent to your daily protein intake?

More importantly, there's the chance to look at the bigger picture of what Karnazes accomplished. The guy averaged a below-four-hour marathon time throughout his 50 races (which is a decent pace for an inexperienced runner and, while not Karno's best times, some of the 50 runs were closer to a quick-paced three hours) and that was all done on an average of four and a half hours sleep each night.

The 154-pound runner also managed to burn over 160,000 calories during the 50 marathons and lost a grand total of one pound of bodyweight. Granted, Karno is "that runner" you might've heard of who has pizzas delivered to street corners so he can eat a pie during his run. But (technically) it's workout nutrition, any way you cut it.

The big picture here is telling us that, contrary to common belief, it's damn hard to overtrain a well-conditioned Human body through excessive exercise. If you've been lifting for a while and you're the least bit hesitant about increasing your overall training frequency or using an entire training day to decimate one bodypart, just think back to what this little runner might be able to teach you.