Amanda Brooks - Run to the Finish: The Everyday Runners Guide to Avoiding Injury, Ignoring the Clock, and Loving the Run

This book is not for the elite runners. Its for me and for you and for the 98 percent of us in the middle of the pack to know that its just fine to be the best runner you can be while juggling work, family, friends, and still enjoying that delicious slice of pizza every Friday night.

This book is for the runners who often shy away from calling themselves a runner. This book is for the runners who love the sport, but who have more to learn. This book is for the runners who arent in it for the podium, but instead for the feeling of satisfaction from a mile well run.

Its not about dissuading you from dreaming big or setting goals for that sparkly new personal record feeling. Here, were learning that were more alike than we are different and why our very middle of the pack running makes us so spectacular and doesnt excuse us from learning how to train smarter.

Forward is a pace is the very simple motto that helped me push myself just a tad farther each day as I returned to running after an unexpected knee surgery in 2017. The previous seventeen years of building my identity as a runner needed to be reshaped, not for the first time and certainly not for the last, as I plan to continue this journey for many more decades.

Instead of lamenting where I wasnt, those four little words reminded me that every step was a success. It gave me the opportunity to embrace being a beginner once again, where my only real goal was finding a way forward each day and celebrating with fresh eyes those milestones Id forgotten over the years. A mile was still spectacular and the day I squeaked my way back to a sub-two-hour half marathon felt just as momentous as many faster races in the past.

Forward is a pace and with that mental shift we can encourage ourselves to run to the finish of every big hairy scary goal from a 5K to a marathon to life.

I feel that now is a good time to tell you a few important things about myself. In case we havent met yet or you havent stumbled across RunToTheFinish.com while Googling a running question, thats me, Amanda Brooks.

First and possibly most important, that knee surgery was the result of a very good afternoon spent at a trampoline park. It was not the result of being a runner. Whew, Im glad we cleared that up right now and Ill talk more about our knees later in the book so we can put that long-standing myth behind us for good.

People who meet me often assume Ive been a runner all my life and that, based on my ridiculous 33-inch inseam, these legs are fast. So, lets start there. Starting at age five, I played sports from softball to volleyball to swim team, but running was punishment. You know, the youre late to practice so go run laps kind of thing that made you dread every single step and swear youd never run again.

I vividly remember a few volleyball afternoons of grabbing my knee and dramatically limping to the sideline to get out of running. Thats embarrassing now, especially when I consider the months where I pretended not to have knee pain to keep running, but a teen I was just proud of my acting skills (being an actress was my fallback plan to being a writer).

Now, for the fast part. While fast is relative, generally my motto is, I run far, not fast. Although I have scrambled onto a few podiums, even after eight marathons and 21,000 miles running, Im not yet a Boston Qualifier, Im not an-easy-run-at-a-seven-minute-pace runner, and Im not a went-out-for-a-short-20-miler-over-lunch runner. Which is why I feel qualified to discuss life in the middle of the pack. I may have done thousands of hours of research and coaching, but my miles are largely spent in the company of most other runners who are also on the largest part of the bell curve.

Next up, there tends to be a common assumption that Im a perfectionist. I was, after all, a straight-A student and even graduated magna cum laude from the University of Missouri. Honestly, school was easy for me and I just did the required work. Which is to say that had it been hard, I would have tried and put forth effort, but Im not the person who would have belabored every detail to go from a B to an A (though I am the person who will always have a project done a week early).

In my world, perfect is a tremendous waste of mental energy because someone is always going to find ways you could have done it better. This isnt to say that I settle for less than my best or Im okay with mediocrity. But it is to say that I believe good solid hard work is enough to allow you to enjoy the ride with a whole lot less stress, and thats a lifestyle I can stand behind happily. Which means if you see a misplaced comma, I hope youll focus on the bigger message and not the error.

Finally, you need to know that Im a student of running. Ive written over two thousand highly researched articles on running; I devour every running book that comes out; I pick the brains of every coach, sports medicine doctor, or physical therapist that I come in contact with, to help ensure that Im always sharing the best information. I love this sport deep down to my core and my greatest wish is for us all to run healthy and happy for as many years as possible.

In other words, I hope we can run to the finish together.