The Perfect Mile: Three Athletes, One Goal, and Less Than Four Minutes to Achieve It

Rating:
Summary: Inspiring and Motivational
Review: This book is unexpectedly inspiring and motivational. When I learned that the first man to break the 4-minute mile trained for this feat during his medical residency, I realized nothing was impossible. "The Perfect Mile" will help you get in the mood to achieve the impossible.

Rating:
Summary: Captivating
Review: This is a fascinating book about the three men - Santee, Landy, and Bannister - trying to be the first to break the four-minute mile back in the early fifties. Although I knew who would prevail, the book remained suspenseful. All three had several heartbreaking close calls until one of them (I won't say who in case some readers don't already know) finally broke the four-minute barrier. The three subsequently raced each other (it turned out that only two of the three could participate in the race) and that was suspenseful provided you don't look at the photo section in the middle of the book that shows one of the runners decisively winning.

Evidently the author didn't have enough material for an entire volume, so the book is filled out with thirty pages of skipable footnotes and an over-stuffed fifteen page index (with entries like: "Empire Games - Bannister's mood before mile race at"), but that's okay - the book's length is just right and it is elegantly written.

Although I still think *Once a Runner* is the greatest running book of all time, *The Perfect Mile* wins the non-fiction category. Obviously this book will be more interesting to runners, but I think it might have a broad appeal - it is inspirational and entertaining.

Rating:
Summary: Fantastic sports story
Review: This is the account of three men--Wes Santee, Roger Bannister, and John Landy--and the race to break the four-minute mile. Though I vaguely recognized one name from my running days in high school, I was not certain who actually broke the record. Bascomb does an excellent job of keeping suspense at a high level. He also uses the story of these three to track the movement of sport to the commercial in the past half century. As I read this, I was reminded of the sheer joy of running. A wonderful and inspirational read.