Chris LearCritiques

Brought back so many fond memories of running and what it provided for me. Loved the structure of the book and the humor.

Excellent real life look into collegiate cross country and the Colorado system.

I like this kind of reporting. It reminds me of "A Season Inside" John Feinstein's inside account of a college basketball season from inside the perspective of a number of teams and coaches. Of course, it isn't nearly as good as Feinstein's work, but there really is only one John Feinstein. The technique of 'embedding' a journalist (please forgive the term) with a team for a season works and I really like the personal perspective that we get on Colorado's 1998 Cross Country season.

I'm a running geek (but I like to read about it more than I like to do it) so I really liked some of the insight into Coach Mark Wetmore's approach to training his athletes. I like that they explain the influence of Lydiard on his training philosophy and especially the question of talent versus preparation in achieving the highest levels of success. These are really the strength of the book.

Where it starts to break down is in how the author presents the runners' personal thoughts and statements. For whatever reason, these come across as flat and boring, its as if the journalist paid too much attention to reporting their words and not enough to communicating the experience of being on an elite team of runners. On the other hand, I don't know how to really convey what it means to run multiple 100+ mile weeks in singles other than to do it, and that will never happen. Still, that is what I expect from a journalist or a running writer and this book did not really deliver that.

Overall though, I'm very happy to have read this book. I wish there was more out there, since I think cross country is a fabulous sport that deserves close attention and there is drama and meaning in the life of a runner that the literature has yet to capture. Running with the Buffalos has the advantage of being a non-fiction account, but still lags behind Once a Runner as a capturing of the essence of distance running with pen and ink.

I hope more people continue to contribute to this neglected field of literature.

This book's behind-the-scenes look at elite collegiate runners is interesting even to a non-runner. It's fascinating to read about what people will do to achieve athletic greatness. That said, many segments of this book are repetitive and uninteresting, merely describing the team's daily workouts and listing the runners' goal times and actual times. Maybe serious runners find this information interesting, but laypeople do not.

In addition, this book is one of the worst-written books that I have ever read. The writing ranges from sophomoric to downright wrong (typos, grammatical mistakes, etc.). The writing is so bad that it actually hinders understanding or enjoyment of the story.½

As someone familiar with the dynamic of a cross country team, but unfamiliar with the University of Colorado's program, I found this book entertaining but somewhat limited. Following the difficulties -- including the tragic death of a teammate -- at one of the highest ranked running programs in the country was interesting because of the shared emotion that moved the team. It was limiting in that the book has little retrospection. The season is reported on in a journalistic fashion, which gets you the facts, but the book does little to advance one's thinking about large questions: is it really worthwhile to devote the enormous time and energy to this type of sporting effort (given the personal consequences and tradeoffs that occur)? Given the ups and downs of the season--some very dramatic--what lessons in life did the runners take away from it?

Overall, and interesting read, but not a fantastic piece of literature. (As an aside, I've heard good things about Halberstam's The Amateurs, and I may try to read that soon to see how it compares.)

This book chronicles a season with the University of Colorado Men's Cross Country team and their pursuit of the NCAA National Championship. While the events of this book are now nearly ten years ago, the story is still very compelling. Author Chris Lear spent the entire season with the team, including coach Mark Wetmore and All-American Adam Goucher. It is a fascinating read that delves into the personal dynamics of a team made up of individual performances and how the team comes together during the worst kind of adversity during their season. One of the truly enlightening things from a runner's perspective is just how close to the physical edge runners at this level live and train - constantly walking a tightrope between doing everything they can to reach their maximum potential without incurring a season-ending injury. The frustration of poor runs and the exuberance of breakthrough performances exist in the same race. It is a seldom-seen look inside a very tight knit group that doesn't let outsiders in. I highly recommend it to anyone with an interest in competitive running or sports in general.

Not really that interesting. Maybe the author got a poor break that Webb was injured for part of the time while he was "embedded". Nevertheless, you didn't really get much of a sense for what was in the hearts and minds of these runners. Seemed like, as a group, the individual runners and the coach would be interesting characters, but they didn't really emerge as sch on the page.

A real page-turner, this book was fun, sad, heart-warming, and very interesting. It follows the day-to-day trials and training of the team, giving just the right amount of detail. Lear's descriptions gave the season a lot more body then a simple training schedule or calendar would. An easy read. Recommended.

Lear spent a year at University of Michigan following Webb, the first high-schooler to go sub-4:00 in years, and his teammates. As he did in previous works, Lear forged friendships with the team members, which allowed him to gain more access than he might by just sticking around practice. A good read for running enthusiasts, although some think it portrays Webb in a poor light.½