This Is Not About Running: A Memoir by Mary Cain

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER By one of the fastest runners of her generation, an affecting, brutally honest memoir of elite sports gone wrong—and a clear-eyed call for how parents, coaches, and young athletes themselves can build a healthier youth sports culture. Few women have ever run 800 meters in under two minutes. Even fewer people have taken on running’s abusive training culture and won. Mary Cain has done both. She emerged as a running phenom at age 12, a straight-A student obsessed with Greco-Roman mythology and the freedom she felt when she ran fast. Like any middle-schooler, she just wanted to fit in, so she learned to run through the discomfort of hard training sessions, and the confusion of her coaches’ and teammates’ bullying. And she was overjoyed when, at 16, Alberto Salazar called to invite her to train with the famed Nike Oregon Project. Cain was poised to transform the sport, Salazar told her. She resolved to hold on to his favor, even as he insisted she lose weight and push through the pain of emerging injury. For years, she excelled, setting records against elite runners twice her age. The Olympics were in her sights. Read more