I just finished "Running Wild" by Pirie and thought I'd revive this thread rather than starting a new one. I thought it was a fantastic book. In the last year I've been reading a lot of books from the old greats and great coaches (Elliott, Snell, Halberg, Cerutty, Lydiard, etc) and was the OP of a recent thread about Elliott's "Golden Mile", and Pirie's book was among the most entertaining and informative. Thus far, I'd put Elliott's and Pirie's among my favorites from that era, though I have a few yet to go! Part of what I liked about Pirie's was that it was very much a no-holds-barred account, which was somewhat unusual in that era (e.g., as great as he was as a runner and person, Snell's book was a bit bland to me). As J.R. noted in an earlier post that is quoted below, Pirie was quite open and withering in his criticism of British amateurism and officials, and was equally strong in responding to his critics in the British press and among British officials.Clearly Pirie had strong convictions and perhaps was a difficult and arrogant person, though I think it was Halberg who candidly expressed disdain for what he perceived as standoffish and unfriendly British distance runners but made a point of saying that Pirie was an exception. It's a mystery to me why certain arrogant athletes are admired for their conviction and others are pilloried for their hubris. Pirie to me is like a Cerutty who was ahead of his time but had his flaws. (And with all that said, I haven't read Anne Audain's book and it sounds like Pirie acted unforgivably toward her).There was another thread some years ago at http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=3465715&page=0 where a poster under "Alf Shrubb" (old Alfie has been dead 50 years so I'll go out on a limb and say that it wasn't actually him) who claimed to have watched Pirie and met him later and, among his criticisms of Pirie, voiced a criticism that Pirie heard consistently throughout his career and which Pirie addresses in his book: that, in general, he overtrained and that, in specific, he blew his chances for gold in Rome and Melbourne as a result. From that thread, here is part of that post: "Again, just before the Rome Olympics, I saw him run a 53 last lap of a 5000, in great form. What did he then do? He went to Germany and went through a period of really intense training. Come the Games - and he was burnt out." This echoed the reports in the British press at the time (and was probably based on those reports). Pirie's response to the criticism for his poor showing in Rome strikes me as plausible: Rome is/was incredibly hot in August and he blamed the British governing body for not scheduling the team to travel to Rome early enough to acclimate to the heat. In fact, not only did the British team arrive in Rome only in time for the start of the games, but the British "dictators" denied Pirie's and other athletes' requests for permission to travel to Rome earlier at their own expense. As Pirie put it, they went from 55F degrees in England to 100+F degrees in Rome, and he had to run his 5000m heat on his 4th day in Rome. He also notes that none of the other British 5000m runners (incl Bruce Tulloh) qualified out of their heats when they were expected to do so, and further that such teams as NZ and Australia had arrived 3-4 weeks in advance to acclimate to the heat. In 1956, Pirie did win silver against a great Kuts (who was probably using amphetamines, but Pirie didn't say that), so it's hard to say that he blew his chances in those games. Pirie also thought that the Melbourne track was slow and that Kuts' run would have been a world record on a faster track.I really enjoy these first-hand accounts of racing and training from that era. The 50s seem to be the first "modern" training and the methodologies of that time underpin the training methodologies used today. It's also amazing to read about the conditions under which runners of that era raced, such as Pirie sleeping outside in his van during the Empire Games (I believe it was) rather than staying in the poor accommodations that were provided.
J.R. wrote:
part of the contents
1- My Critics
2- The inspiration of Zatopek and Gerschler
3- Training schedules for big events
4- The hypocrisy of British amateurism
5- The elderly dictators of British athletics: These men must go