Book picks similar to
In a Single Bound: Losing My Leg, Finding Myself, and Training for Life by Sarah Reinertsen
running
non-fiction
memoir
memoirs
The Impossible Long Run: My Journey to Becoming Ultra
Janet Patkowa - 2019
One day… I wanted to explore the US in an RV. One day… I wanted to backpack in a foreign country. None of these things were happening because it seemed impossible to fit big adventures into a nine-to-five life. Until one day it hit me. One day was not just going to happen. I had to start taking the steps to make it happen and figure out how to fit it in. I got on the internet and searched for something to inspire me. I found the Becoming Ultra project. And thus began my journey to running a 50 mile race.
Life in a Jungle: My Autobiography
Bruce Grobbelaar - 2018
And yet, question marks have followed him around; question marks about his goalkeeping suitability after arriving on Merseyside; question marks about his integrity after match fixing allegations were laid against him. Here, Grobbelaar takes you to Africa, where nothing is at it seems; he takes you back to an era when Liverpool ruled Europe; he takes you to the benches of the Anfield dressing room, where only the strongest personalities survived. For the first time, he takes you inside the court room, detailing the draining fight to clear his name.
Running Hot
Lisa Tamati - 2009
Lisa Tamati was the first New Zealand woman to compete in the race alongside such legends of the sport as Dean Karnazes and David Goggins. But Lisa's story is so much more than that one race. At the age of 19 she suffered a crippling back injury and was told she should give up running. She took that as a challenge and, with her Austrian boyfriend, went on to run, walk, bike, and paddle her way across thousands of miles of Europe, Scandinavia, and Africa before taking on the ultimate challenge—an unassisted crossing of the Libyan Desert. What happened in that desert would change the course of Lisa's life and instill in her a love of desert running. Running Hot is a story of a life lived to the max—a story of challenges, setbacks, heartbreaks, and triumph.
Breaking Through: A Memoir
Isher Judge Ahluwalia - 2020
Born into a family with eleven children and limited means, where she was one of the first to attend university, she takes us through her journey to Presidency College, Delhi School of Economics and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.She chronicles her career as a young policy economist fighting against the Indian economic orthodoxy that underpinned the license-permit-quota Raj, as an institution builder leading the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER), one of India’s leading economic think tanks for over a decade, and also her most recent role in focusing attention on the challenges of urbanization in India.Narrated with candor and from the heart, this is also a story of a woman balancing career and family, and trying to stay close to her roots as her life path takes her through the power corridors of New Delhi, both through her own career, and through a 50-year-marriage to Montek Singh Ahluwalia. An outsider to Delhi, who ultimately became the consummate insider, Breaking Through is an account of a remarkable life that was witness to remarkable times.
TC
Tom Carroll - 2013
Inside turned the terrible wheel of drug addiction, part family curse, part legacy of the footloose surf culture he'd done so much to legitimise. Tom's family and friends struggled with him, kept his secrets, and looked on in anger and fear as the wheel began to grind him down.
Pushing the Limits: Life, Marathons & Kokoda
Kurt Fearnley - 2014
'You're going to have to be stronger than we are,' they told him, 'and we know you will be.'The boy from Carcoar was raised to believe he could do anything. At fifteen, he won his first medal. Then he conquered the world, winning three Paralympic gold medals, seven world championships and more than 35 marathons. A world-beater in and out of his wheelchair, Kurt is a true Australian champion.Inspiring, exhilarating and highly entertaining, Pushing the Limits takes us inside the mind of a kid with a disability growing up in a tiny town, a teenager finding his place in the world, and an elite sportsman who refuses to give up, no matter how extreme the challenge.
From Last to First: How I Became a Marathon Champion
Charlie Spedding - 2011
These were the athletes in the Olympic marathon. So how did he end up with a bronze medal? How did he win the London marathon? And why does he still hold the English record for the distance?In this remarkable autobiography, he explains how -- how someone who was almost the bottom of the class when he first went to school, and even worse at sport, eventually turned himself into a world-class athlete, competing in top marathons all over the world, and genuinely going from last to first.As well as the enthralling life story of one of our finest distance runners, this book is a wonderfully clear and inspiring piece of life coaching for anyone who wants to make the most of their talents. But more than this, as Spedding says at the start, 'I believe that on occasions you can create the circumstances in which you can perform at a higher level than your talent says you can.' Spedding's own story, and his chronicle of the big races he excelled in, proves it's trueFor anyone aspiring to run a marathon, or indeed anyone who wants to set themselves a goal they think beyond their reach -- and achieve it -- this is an essential book.
Can't Sleep, Can't Train, Can't Stop: More Misadventures in Triathlon
Andy Holgate - 2012
Now take those events and transfer them to a volcanic rock with cruel winds, searing sun, rough seas and nosebleed-inducing hills, and you have Ironman Lanzarote. Why, then, would Andy Holgate – who admittedly has never swum in the sea, who can’t cope with the wind, sun or even stairs – take on such an extreme challenge? Simple: Because he can. Can’t Sleep, Can’t Train, Can’t Stop! continues Andy’s inspirational journey from where Can’t Swim, Can’t Ride, Can’t Run left off, chronicling his attempt to complete two Ironman triathlons six weeks apart. Already in his fortieth year, would Andy make it to his forty-first? Would Lanzarote prove one triathlon too far – or will Andy succeed against the odds and live to swim, ride and run another day?
The Street or Me: A New York Story
Judith Glynn - 2014
Michelle Browning is 33, drunk and a former beauty queen who nears death after six years of homelessness. Judith Glynn is divorced with grown children and struggles to support herself in her adopted city. After their first hello, neither woman is the same as they embark on a remarkable journey for two years. This memoir is a raw yet enlightening read that graphically depicts the homeless subculture. But as Judith sets out all alone to rescue Michelle is her fixation worth the sacrifice? At stake is whether Michelle will choose possible death in a gutter over Judith's guiding light back into society. Enrolled in Kindle Book Lending that allows users to lend their book after purchasing to their friends and family for a duration of 14 days. For full details, review the Kindle Book Lending Program.
Rusch to Glory: Adventure, Risk, & Triumph on the Path Less Traveled
Rebecca Rusch - 2014
Known today as the Queen of Pain for her perseverance as a relentlessly fast runner, paddler, and mountain bike racer, Rusch was a normal kid from Chicago who abandoned a predictable life for one of adventure. In her new book Rusch to Glory: Adventure, Risk & Triumph on the Path Less Traveled, Rusch weaves her fascinating life's story among the exotic locales and extreme conditions that forged an extraordinary athlete from ordinary roots.Rusch has run the gauntlet of endurance sports over her career as a professional athlete-- climbing, adventure racing, whitewater rafting, cross-country skiing, and mountain biking--racking up world championships along the way. But while she might seem like just another superhuman playing out a fistful of aces, her empowering story proves that anyone can rise above self-doubt and find their true potential.First turning heads with her rock climbing and paddling skills, Rusch soon found herself spearheading adventure racing teams like Mark Burnett's Eco-Challenge series. As she fought her way through the jungles of Borneo, raced camels across Morocco, threaded the rugged Tian Shan mountains, and river-boarded the Grand Canyon in the dead of winter, she was forced to stare down her own demons. Through it all, Rusch continually redefined her limits, pushing deep into the pain cave and emerging ready for the next great challenge.At age 38, Rusch faced a tough decision: retire or reinvent herself yet again. Determined to go for broke, she shifted her focus to endurance mountain bike racing and rode straight into the record books at a moment when most athletes walk away. Rusch to Glory is more than an epic story of adventure; it is a testament to the rewards of hard work, determination, and resilience on the long road to personal and professional triumph.
The Doper Next Door: My Strange and Scandalous Year on Performance-Enhancing Drugs
Andrew Tilin - 2011
Soon wielding syringes, this forty-something husband and father of two children becomes the doper next door.During his yearlong odyssey, Tilin is transformed. He becomes stronger, hornier, and aggressive. He wades into a subculture of doping physicians, real estate agents, and aging women who believe that Tilin’s type of legal “hormone replacement therapy” is the key to staying young—and he often agrees. He also lives with the price paid for renewed vitality, worrying about his health, marriage, and cheating ways as an amateur bike racer. And all along the way, he tells us what doping is really like—empowering and scary.
No Holding Back: The Autobiography
Michael Holding - 2010
Despite having not laced his bowling boots since 1989, it remains a fitting sobriquet. As a commentator and administrator, Holding has delivered his views on cricket in the same manner that he played the game: he speaks softly with a rich Jamaican rhythm and is calculated in either criticism or compliment. This book charts his effortless transition from one of the great players to one of the great pundits. Holding graphically describes his days as a player, looking back at how he tried to deliberately hurt batsmen on the wastelands of Kingston and his first match for Jamaica when he almost collapsed from exhaustionafter only four overs!He alsodivulges what it was like to tour with West Indies, and sharesunmissable insights about sharing a dressing room with other legends of the game like Sir Clive Lloyd, Sir Viv Richards, and Malcolm Marshall.Holding does not shirk the bigissuesheexplores why West Indies have slipped following their halcyon days, openly assesses Brian Lara, and laments the hypocrisy over the state of the game in the region. The controversy surrounding the Allen Stanford $20m spectacle, the ICC's handling of the abandoned England vs. Pakistan match, player power, illegal bowling actions, and the threat of Twenty20 to the Test game are all subjects which Holding tackles with knowledge and class."
Occy: The Rise and Fall and Rise of Mark Occhilupo
Mark Occhilupo - 2008
Yet a spiraling descent into drug abuse and depression snuffed his flame out prematurely when he quit the pro tour at just 22. Faltered comebacks, spectacular bursts of free-surfing, and manic breakdowns followed as the surfing world watched a freakish talent self-combust. After years spent immobile and overweight on the couch, Occy eventually emerged from his cocoon, reborn and ready to tackle a whole new generation of surf stars. His celebrated comeback to win the world title in 1999 is a sporting fairytale without equal. In this no-holds barred account, Occy tells the complete, remarkable story of his spectacular rise, terrifying fall, and miraculous rebirth.
The Carroll Shelby Story
Carroll Shelby - 2019
He was born to
race
—some of the fastest cars ever to tear up a speedway.
Carroll Shelby wasn’t born to run. He was born to race—some of the fastest cars ever to tear up a speedway. The exciting new feature film Ford v Ferrari--starring Matt Damon as Shelby and Christian Bale as fellow racer Ken Miles--immortalizes the small-town Texas boy who won the notorious Le Mans 24-hour endurance challenge, and changed the face of auto racing with the legendary Shelby Cobra. But there’s much more to his high-velocity, history-making story.A wizard behind the wheel, he was also a visionary designer of speed machines that ruled the racetrack and the road. While his GT40s racked up victories in the world’s most prestigious professional racing showdowns, his masterpiece, the Ford Cobra, gave Europe’s formidable Ferrari an American--style run for its money. If you’ve got a need for speed, strap in next to the man who put his foot down on the pedal, kept his eyes on the prize, and never looked back.
Call Me Sister: District Nursing Tales from the Swinging Sixties
Jane Yeadon - 2013
Staff nursing in a ward where she's challenged by an inventory driven ward sister, she reckons it's time to swap such trivialities for life as a district nurse.Independent thinking is one thing, but Jane's about to find that the drama on district can demand instant reaction; and without hospital back up, she's usually the one having to provide it. She meets a rich cast of patients all determined to follow their own individual star, and goes to Edinburgh where Queen Victoria's Jubilee Institute's nurse training is considered the cr me de la cr me of the district nursing world.Call Me Sister recalls Jane's challenging and often hilarious route to realizing her own particular dream.