Who is the author of Endure?

The author of Endure is Alex Hutchinson.

Health & Nutrition

Endure Book Summary - Endure Book explained in key points

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Endure summary

Name: Endure
Rating: 4.4 (185 reviews)
Author: Alex Hutchinson

Alex Hutchinson

Mind, Body and the Curiously Elastic Limits of Human Performance

4.4 (185 ratings)

22 mins

Brief summary

Endure by Alex Hutchinson explores the limits of human endurance, challenging the idea that our physical limitations are predetermined. Through scientific research and stories of extraordinary athletes, Hutchinson delves into the power of the mind-body connection in achieving feats of physical endurance.

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Sports

Table of Contents

Endure
Summary of 8 key ideas

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Key idea 1 of 8

What’s in it for me? Find out what it really means to hit the wall of human endurance.

There’s a good chance you can summon a vivid image of a marathon runner crossing the finish line and then collapsing to the ground, visibly shaking, covered in sweat and barely able to function. You may have asked yourself, “How did they make it over the line? What kept them from collapsing a few minutes earlier?”

These are similar to the questions that have been on the mind of the author, Alex Hutchinson, ever since his grad-student days when he was running for the Canadian national team. Since then, Hutchinson has become an expert on endurance sports and finding out how we’re able to push our bodies to the limit, climb to the top of the highest mountains and cross those seemingly insurmountable boundaries of pain and effort.

Along the way, Hutchinson has unearthed intriguing science on just how far we’ve come toward understanding the biology of endurance, especially as it pertains to the involvement of the brain. In recent years, it’s become increasingly clear that the mind plays a very large instinctual role in telling the body when to pace itself and when to shut down. As Hutchinson has found, something as seemingly uncomplicated as running or riding a bike is, in fact, a fascinatingly complex process.

In these blinks, you’ll discover

what eleven-year-olds can tell us about marathon runners;
why you should avoid thinking too hard before a physical competition; and
why a marathon at the Dead Sea would likely produce record-breaking results.

Trying to test the limits of human endurance can have fatal consequences.

The British explorer Henry Worsley liked to test the limits of human endurance. Or perhaps it’s more accurate to say that he liked to push himself beyond the normal boundaries and set new limits.

One such boundary-pushing expedition began in late 2015 when Worsley attempted to walk across Antarctica all by himself. He made it a full 56 days before the journey began taking a dangerous toll on his body.

On the night of the 56th day, painful indigestion kept him from getting any sleep. So the next day Worsley tried to rest, but with 200 miles still to go, he couldn’t afford to take too much time off.

At midnight, with the polar sun still beating down upon him, he resumed his journey, the current leg of which involved climbing up the Titan Dome – a mountain of ice that peaked at 3,100 meters above sea level. Every step of the way, Worsley faced strong headwinds that drove sheets of snow against him as he gasped for breath in the thinning air. After 16 hours, Worsley had to stop for another break.

While Worsley was walking solo, he did have a satellite phone with him in case he had to call for help. This was something of a double-edged sword; it could save his life in an emergency, but it also gave him so much security that he was pushing his body far past any reasonable limit. Since his journey began, he’d already lost 48 pounds in bodyweight.

Remarkably, Worsley would last over another week before he finally used the phone to call his rescue team. At that point, he’d been walking for 70 days and was just 30 miles away from his goal.

The next day, Worsley was picked up and flown to a hospital in Punta Arenas, Chile, where he was quickly diagnosed with dehydration and exhaustion. But that wasn’t all. The doctors found signs of bacterial peritonitis, an abdominal infection that required immediate surgery – and things quickly took a turn for the worse.

The infection proved too much for Worsley’s weakened body, and on January 24, 2016, his organs shut down, and he died. This tragic death raised some important questions about the ethical and practical limits of such boundary-pushing expeditions.

It’s true that humans have safely returned from some unbelievable places, and in the blinks ahead we’ll look at the human body’s limitations, and why some feats are possible, while others simply aren’t.

We instinctively pace ourselves for that final push in long-distance running.

While the author was working on his PhD, he ran middle- and long-distance races for the Canadian national team. At one point, he noticed that he ran faster at the end of the race, even though this wasn’t part of his strategy. And it led to his wondering whether this happened to everyone.

In 2006, researchers Tim Noakes and Michael Lambert published a study of the patterns they found among the world’s greatest long-distance runners.

Having a tired brain can affect your physical endurance.

In 2013, Samuele Marcora traveled over six and a half thousand miles on his motorcycle, from London to Beijing, an endurance test that doubled as a continuation of his long-term study into the mental component of physical effort.

Indeed, the trip reinforced Marcora’s belief that the mind plays a big part in how much we can endure. In other words, fatigue isn’t just a physiological experience.

Athletes have a tolerance for pain that’s higher than normal, which improves performance.

Veteran cyclist Jens Voigt has worn the Tour de France yellow jersey twice, having been in the lead in the race. But Voigt is also famous for his love of physical suffering. As he puts it, pain is just a weakness to be overcome.

Voigt’s perspective may sound extreme, but there are many athletes who would likely agree. And it’s probably this willingness to suffer that accounts for the fact that athletes’ pain thresholds have been shown to be higher than average people’s.

Oxygen intake is a key factor in athletic performance.

A good coach can be a valuable asset to any athlete. And if there’s one piece of advice that every coach will give, it’s to breathe, breathe, breathe.

This is extremely important advice because the amount of oxygen you take in directly influences how well you perform.

Core body temperature also influences endurance.

One of the more dangerous risks for athletes is heat stroke, which has proved deadly for both professionals and amateurs alike.

Avoiding it is one reason why athletes pay close attention to the temperature inside their body, otherwise known as their core temperature. But the other reason is that science has shown a very real link between core temperature and endurance.

Mindfulness can lessen stress levels and improve athletic performance.

As we’ve seen, the mind plays a bigger role in physical endurance than was commonly believed among previous generations of sports scientists. But in the East, the mind has traditionally been at the center of athletic mastery, especially in sports such as martial arts.

Only recently have Westerners begun to look to Eastern philosophies like mindfulness for insights into achieving higher levels of endurance.

The areas of the brain most related to endurance are the insular and motor cortices.

We’ve all felt exhausted. But relatively few people know what the precise process is that causes us to hit a certain point and experience a full-body shutdown.

While scientists have spent decades looking into exhaustion as a purely physical reaction, neuropsychologist Kai Lutz was the first to think of looking at exhaustion from within the brain.

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What is Endure about?

Endure (2018) takes an in-depth look at what enables certain boundary-pushing athletes to hit the wall of pain and effort – and still keep going. Alex Hutchinson examines the multiple and complex factors that allow marathon runners and cyclists to keep breaking records and reaching new heights in human endurance.

Endure Review

Endure (2018) by Alex Hutchinson is an exploration of the limits of human endurance, offering a fascinating look into the mind-body connection and the science behind pushing ourselves to new heights. Here's why this book is definitely worth reading:

With meticulously researched insights, it uncovers the secrets behind extraordinary feats of endurance, challenging conventional beliefs and offering new perspectives.
By weaving together compelling stories from various fields and personal experiences, the book captivates readers, providing both inspiration and practical takeaways.
It delves into the psychological and physical aspects of endurance, shedding light on the interplay between the mind and body, and how we can push our limits.

Best quote from Endure

What is really interesting about people climbing Everest is that the majority dont die.

—Alex Hutchinson

Who should read Endure?

Athletes and coaches
Students of psychology and sports medicine
Anyone training for a marathon

About the Author

Alex Hutchinson is an award-winning journalist and contributing editor to Outside magazine. His work has also been featured in the New Yorker, the New York Times, the Globe and Mail and Runner’s World. With a PhD in physics from the University of Cambridge, as well as a true passion for the outdoors and running, he is uniquely qualified to research the science behind fitness and endurance.

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