Eat and Run: My Unlikely Journey to Ultramarathon Greatness by Scott Jurek, Steve Friedman
Authors: Scott Jurek, Steve Friedman
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attached to the station with a package of baloney or potato chips in his pants. I’m surprised we never got arrested. While I drove down the freeway in my old wagon, Dusty would hang out of the passenger window and high-five fellow skiers on their way to races. He loved the all-you-can-eat buffets. He taught me how to stuff my jacket full of slices from Godfather’s Pizza after our stomachs could hold no more.
When Dusty wasn’t stealing stuff, getting into trouble, or running, he was working at the Ski Hut, which sold ski gear. He would ride his bike to work (his skis strapped to his bike) in –15-degree weather. That guy could endure.
And of course Dusty always beat me on our runs. He was faster and stronger, and I—I remembered that broken ankle—would never be that tough. We both knew it. But we both knew that I was changing. Dusty skied a 90K training day every year during winter break, the week after Christmas. It was called “the 90K Day.” The guy who organized it was Rick Calais, the coach at St. Paul Central High School, whom everybody called “the Ricker.” Only the hardest of the hard-core skiers did it. The last year of high school, Dusty asked if I wanted to join him. Of course he beat me, but afterward he told me that he and the Ricker had been looking back every minute or so of the last 10 miles, amazed at how close I was. He knew I had never had blazing speed, and he couldn’t believe I was keeping up. To this day the Ricker says, “The 90K Day is what made the Jurker!”
Dusty still gave me shit—about college, about what a nerd I looked like in my polo shirt at NordicTrack, about how straight I was. I envied him. I wondered what it would be like to have no responsibility, no worries. I wondered what it would be like to have his life.
One night in March of freshman year, I came home a little later than I had said I would. My dad had told me that when I said I would be home at a certain time, I had better be home then. I told him he had to realize I had a life outside the house. I was working full time and going to school and I had a lot going on, but he didn’t want to hear it. He said, “If you don’t like it here, you can go live someplace else. This is the way we do things around here.”
I was sure he wasn’t serious about my living someplace else. But he was. He really meant it. He said, “I don’t want you around here anymore.” We were both yelling at each other and Mom was crying. Even when she was well, I don’t know if she could have intervened. I had a chemistry test the next day, so I grabbed my books—I didn’t even take any clothes—and threw them in my bag and walked out. I drove to an overlook at a nearby rise called Thompson Hill, pulled into a rest area overlooking Duluth, and just sat there. It was freezing. I didn’t think about where I was going to live or how my life was changing. I knew what I had to do. I pulled my car below one of the rest area lights. I pulled out my chemistry book and opened it. I started studying.
Long Run Pizza Bread
When I was an omnivorous teenager in northern Minnesota, the idea of pizza without cheese would have sounded like winter without snow: interesting, but impossible. As a plant-eating adult, finding a tasty vegan pizza is about as easy as clocking a three-hour marathon, off the couch (with no training): very rare. That’s why I make my own pizza. This one is not only delicious and hearty, it’s incredibly fast and easy. The secret ingredient is the nutritional yeast—aka hippie dust—yellow flakes that provide a buttery, cheesy flavor to anything they’re sprinkled on. As a bonus, they pack lots of B vitamins, including the crucial B-12.
Tofu “Feta”
8
ounces firm tofu
2
tablespoons light miso (yellow or white)
3
tablespoons nutritional yeast
1
teaspoon lemon juice or apple cider vinegar
Drain and lightly squeeze the water from the tofu. In a small bowl, combine all the ingredients and mash with a potato
When Dusty wasn’t stealing stuff, getting into trouble, or running, he was working at the Ski Hut, which sold ski gear. He would ride his bike to work (his skis strapped to his bike) in –15-degree weather. That guy could endure.
And of course Dusty always beat me on our runs. He was faster and stronger, and I—I remembered that broken ankle—would never be that tough. We both knew it. But we both knew that I was changing. Dusty skied a 90K training day every year during winter break, the week after Christmas. It was called “the 90K Day.” The guy who organized it was Rick Calais, the coach at St. Paul Central High School, whom everybody called “the Ricker.” Only the hardest of the hard-core skiers did it. The last year of high school, Dusty asked if I wanted to join him. Of course he beat me, but afterward he told me that he and the Ricker had been looking back every minute or so of the last 10 miles, amazed at how close I was. He knew I had never had blazing speed, and he couldn’t believe I was keeping up. To this day the Ricker says, “The 90K Day is what made the Jurker!”
Dusty still gave me shit—about college, about what a nerd I looked like in my polo shirt at NordicTrack, about how straight I was. I envied him. I wondered what it would be like to have no responsibility, no worries. I wondered what it would be like to have his life.
One night in March of freshman year, I came home a little later than I had said I would. My dad had told me that when I said I would be home at a certain time, I had better be home then. I told him he had to realize I had a life outside the house. I was working full time and going to school and I had a lot going on, but he didn’t want to hear it. He said, “If you don’t like it here, you can go live someplace else. This is the way we do things around here.”
I was sure he wasn’t serious about my living someplace else. But he was. He really meant it. He said, “I don’t want you around here anymore.” We were both yelling at each other and Mom was crying. Even when she was well, I don’t know if she could have intervened. I had a chemistry test the next day, so I grabbed my books—I didn’t even take any clothes—and threw them in my bag and walked out. I drove to an overlook at a nearby rise called Thompson Hill, pulled into a rest area overlooking Duluth, and just sat there. It was freezing. I didn’t think about where I was going to live or how my life was changing. I knew what I had to do. I pulled my car below one of the rest area lights. I pulled out my chemistry book and opened it. I started studying.
Long Run Pizza Bread
When I was an omnivorous teenager in northern Minnesota, the idea of pizza without cheese would have sounded like winter without snow: interesting, but impossible. As a plant-eating adult, finding a tasty vegan pizza is about as easy as clocking a three-hour marathon, off the couch (with no training): very rare. That’s why I make my own pizza. This one is not only delicious and hearty, it’s incredibly fast and easy. The secret ingredient is the nutritional yeast—aka hippie dust—yellow flakes that provide a buttery, cheesy flavor to anything they’re sprinkled on. As a bonus, they pack lots of B vitamins, including the crucial B-12.
Tofu “Feta”
8
ounces firm tofu
2
tablespoons light miso (yellow or white)
3
tablespoons nutritional yeast
1
teaspoon lemon juice or apple cider vinegar
Drain and lightly squeeze the water from the tofu. In a small bowl, combine all the ingredients and mash with a potato
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