Book review: Once a Runner

When John L Parker wrote Once a Runner, he couldn’t find a publisher. So he published it himself and sold it at races and through running shops.

It went on to sell 100,000 copies but then went out of print. It retained cult status, particularly among American high school and college runners, eventually becoming the most requested secondhand book in America, with even battered second hand copies costing hundreds of pounds. It’s now been reprinted in hardback. So what is all the fuss about?

The plot is straightforward (and a bit far fetched): Quenton Cassidy, a college miler, is banned from University competition following a protest against a newly imposed dress code for athletes. His friend, Bruce Denton, suggests he retreats to a country hut:

‘Move out here, Quenton, and train. Train your guts out. Drop out of school, forget that mess for a while, it’s nothing but trouble. There are great trails out here and a little grassy field for intervals. You can run barefoot on it the way you like to. It’d be ideal, a runner’s paradise”

Cassidy agrees and, in fufilment of probably many runner’s dreams, submits to life as a hermit to train for a mile race against the Olympic champion and world record holder (a very thinly disguised John Walker).

The author ran a 4:06 mile and trained with Olympians Frank Shorter (who makes an appearance in the book) and Jack Bacheler. The non-running sections of the book are a bit labored but most of the book is about training and racing and these parts are excellent.

The descriptions of Cassidy’s training, whilst at times overblown, evoke the experience of most runners: from the morning struggle to shake off the veil of fatigue that settles overnight, to the mental effort required to complete interval sessions.  The races, particularly the climactic final battle with Walker, are exciting and inspiring.

Most runners tend towards self obsession and it must be part of the book’s enduring appeal that it celebrates the traits that runners tend to have: Cassidy is compulsive, self-centred, introspective and yet engaging.

The qualities which runners are secretly proud of, but which the rest of the world stubbornly fails to notice, are celebrated. Cassidy eats prodigiously, looks dangerously thin, owns too many shoes, gets drunk easily and become antisocial and tired at parties. This is not only noticed but seems to make him magnetically attractive to women.

The book celebrates running as a secret club and no-one but a runner could really enjoy it. But that’s exactly why, if you are a runner, you will.