Endure: Mind, Body and the Curiously Elastic Limits of Human Performance
by Alex Hutchinson (Harper Collins 2018/2020)
The four minute mile, the two hour marathon. These iconic times are two of the most famous mythical barriers in athletic performance. But are the limits that constrain what a human can do primarily physical, or are they mostly in our minds?
Ladies and gentlemen, here is the result of event nine, the one mile: first, number forty one, R. G. Bannister, Amateur Athletic Association and formerly of Exeter and Merton Colleges, Oxford, with a time which is a new meeting and track record, and which—subject to ratification—will be a new English Native, British National, All-Comers, European, British Empire and World Record. The time was 3… <drowned out by noise of crowd>
Stadium Announcer Norris McWhirter (6 May 1954), making the crowd wait
Throughout this book Endure the author follows the progress of Nike’s “Breaking2” project to attempt to get a runner to finish a marathon in less than 2 hours. He has access to their secret labs and training facilities where he sees the research into nutrition, hydration, materials science (as Nike develop new running shoes) and wind-tunnel studies to develop optimum wind-shelter from out-runners and pace-makers. Nothing is left to chance.
Alex Hutchinson is a sports journalist but has also been a high performing athlete. He has an inside track on the methods of training, the experience of honing his body to improve his times and stamina. But he also has a scientist’s scepticism about the evidence that this or that product or approach has a provable positive effect, and the nous to read through the glossy hype of new techniques.
The book is not all all about sports, because the true limits of human endurance are encountered through stories of survival in extremis: the occasions when people survive in deserts without water or in freezing conditions far beyond reason and expectation. Or when extraordinary feats of strength are achieved out of desperation, such as lifting a car off a crash victim.
Part I “Mind and Muscle” explores the fundamental limitations due to lactis acid in muscles, or lack of self-belief. A survey of the attempts to explain the limits of human endurance range from the traditional “human machine” theory to the psychobiological model in which physical sensations are combined with non-physical influences to produce a sense of effort. The sense of effort in turn leads to a decision to stop (the “conscious quitter”) or push harder through the pain. This is a hot debate and the evidence is mixed.
Part II “Limits” examines the components which all need to be addressed and understood in order to improve performances in endurance sport. Pain. Muscle. Oxygen. Heat. Thirst. Fuel.
Shut up legs!
Jens Voigt
How much is someone prepared to suffer for that PB, that finishing burst, that podium finish? Geraint Thomas rode most of one Tour de France with a broken pelvis, in order to support his team to another famous win. Usually the brain protects us against excess that could damage (or even kill) us. But there appears to be a surprising amount of headroom in the mechanism, so that if the internal brakes can be even partially disabled, then sportsmen and sportswomen really can give “110%”! Part III “Limit Breakers” encounters the methods being developed to allow athletes to let loose and exceed their expectations.
One of the methods that Hutchinson tries out is training to improve response inhibition, which is a mental trait that governs how well someone is able to control their reactions to pain and discomfort. This involved doing mind-numbingly boring games and then exercising to exhaustion. Inducing fatigue in certain brain areas enabled significantly enhanced physical performance. Other approaches involved direct electrical stimulation of certain brain regions – but the author was not at all convinced by this, despite its adoption by some cycling teams and American footballers. He doubted the claims of manufacturers to be any more than a way to sell very expensive headsets to bolster a placebo effect.
But even without the fancy expensive gadgets, a proven advantage is obtained through visualisation and positive self-encouragement: it’s the subject of many a boring post-race interview that “I always believed I could do it”, and indeed the evidence points to that perhaps being the most important thing.
Nike’s hi-tech Breaking2 attempt to run a 2 hour marathon was unsuccessful, as Eliud Kipchoge ran the race in 2 hours and 25 seconds, but it had shown that advances in training methods, clothing, footwear etc. could make it happen. And indeed Kipchoge did crack the 2 hour barrier in the Ineos 1:59 Challenge 3 years later.
Elsewhere
- The Expectation Effect: How Your Mindset Can Transform Your Life by David Robson (Canongate Books, 2022) – BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week (18-22 July 2022)
- The Tour According to G: My Journey to the Yellow Jersey by Geraint Thomas with Tom Fordyce (Quercus, 2018) – this is a very readable account of Thomas’ 2018 Tour de France. It is a brilliant example of how a dedicated athlete will endure a life of monastic self-denial and willingly inflict pain on themselves day after day after day.
Links
- The Nike project to run a marathon in under 2 hours: Breaking2 – Wikipedia
- The later successful attempt by Kipchoge: Ineos 1:59 Challenge – Wikipedia
When a barrier is broken, other athletes quickly follow. The mile was a blue ribband event in pre-metric days, and runners had been aiming at the four minute barrier for at least half a century. Only six weeks after Bannister broke it, his great Australian rival John Landy lowered the record, and a few weeks after that Bannister and Landy both did it again at the Empire Games in Vancouver (Bannister won). Over the next three years fifteen runners ran the mile in less than four minutes.
Yes, Bannister himself reckoned that the 4 minute mile would have been achieved significantly earlier if the Second World War hadn’t intervened. In an interview in later life, he also downplayed the record and thought his achievements in medicine were much more significant. Modesty? Or a good perspective on life, in my opinion.
Roger Bannister’s race took place in the impeccably amateur surroundings of the AAA v Oxford University meet at Iffley Road Stadium, Oxford. About 3000 people were there, and in later life Bannister said he had since met all 20000 of them.
“…he had since met all 20000 of them.” – ha, that’s a great anecdote from Bannister, and probably some level of truth too!