WEBVTT 00:00:00.222 --> 00:00:03.571 Running: it's basically just right, left, right, left, yeah? 00:00:03.595 --> 00:00:06.024 I mean, we've been doing it for two million years, 00:00:06.048 --> 00:00:09.594 so it's kind of arrogant to assume that I've got something to say 00:00:09.618 --> 00:00:12.838 that hasn't been said and performed better a long time ago. 00:00:13.234 --> 00:00:15.792 But the cool thing about running, as I've discovered, 00:00:15.816 --> 00:00:19.401 is that something bizarre happens in this activity all the time. 00:00:19.425 --> 00:00:23.000 Case in point: A couple months ago, if you saw the New York City Marathon, 00:00:23.024 --> 00:00:26.612 I guarantee you, you saw something that no one has ever seen before. NOTE Paragraph 00:00:27.227 --> 00:00:31.064 An Ethiopian woman named Derartu Tulu turns up at the starting line. 00:00:31.762 --> 00:00:33.114 She's 37 years old. 00:00:33.138 --> 00:00:35.824 She hasn't won a marathon of any kind in eight years, 00:00:35.848 --> 00:00:37.276 and a few months previously, 00:00:37.300 --> 00:00:39.276 she had almost died in childbirth. 00:00:39.300 --> 00:00:42.791 Derartu Tulu was ready to hang it up and retire from the sport, 00:00:42.815 --> 00:00:44.687 but she decided she'd go for broke 00:00:44.711 --> 00:00:48.499 and try for one last big payday in the marquee event, 00:00:48.523 --> 00:00:50.138 the New York City Marathon. 00:00:50.162 --> 00:00:53.876 Except -- bad news for Derartu Tulu -- some other people had the same idea, 00:00:53.900 --> 00:00:55.754 including the Olympic gold medalist, 00:00:55.778 --> 00:00:58.876 and Paula Radcliffe, who is a monster, 00:00:58.900 --> 00:01:02.472 the fastest woman marathoner in history by far. 00:01:02.496 --> 00:01:04.773 Only 10 minutes off the men's world record, 00:01:04.797 --> 00:01:07.701 Paula Radcliffe is essentially unbeatable. 00:01:08.343 --> 00:01:09.876 That's her competition. NOTE Paragraph 00:01:09.900 --> 00:01:12.848 The gun goes off, and -- I mean, she's not even an underdog; 00:01:12.872 --> 00:01:14.687 she's, like, under the underdogs. 00:01:14.711 --> 00:01:16.756 But the under-underdog hangs tough, 00:01:16.780 --> 00:01:19.591 and 22 miles into a 26-mile race, 00:01:19.615 --> 00:01:22.511 there is Derartu Tulu, up there with the lead pack. 00:01:23.304 --> 00:01:25.995 Now, this is when something really bizarre happens. 00:01:26.019 --> 00:01:29.781 Paula Radcliffe, the one person who is sure to snatch the big paycheck 00:01:29.805 --> 00:01:32.876 from Derartu Tulu's under-underdog hands, 00:01:32.900 --> 00:01:35.297 suddenly grabs her leg and starts to fall back. 00:01:35.321 --> 00:01:37.732 So we all know what to do in this situation, right? 00:01:37.756 --> 00:01:40.442 You give her a quick crack in the teeth with your elbow 00:01:40.466 --> 00:01:41.965 and blaze for the finish line. 00:01:42.289 --> 00:01:44.479 Derartu Tulu ruins the script. 00:01:44.503 --> 00:01:45.952 Instead of taking off, 00:01:45.976 --> 00:01:48.225 she falls back and she grabs Paula Radcliffe, 00:01:48.249 --> 00:01:50.587 and says, "Come on. Come with us. You can do it." 00:01:50.611 --> 00:01:53.022 So Paula Radcliffe, unfortunately, does it. 00:01:53.046 --> 00:01:54.659 She catches up with the lead pack 00:01:54.683 --> 00:01:56.546 and is pushing toward the finish line. 00:01:56.570 --> 00:01:58.089 But then she falls back again. 00:01:58.113 --> 00:02:01.105 The second time, Derartu Tulu grabs her and tries to pull her. 00:02:01.129 --> 00:02:03.967 And Paula Radcliffe, at that point, says, "I'm done. Go." 00:02:04.511 --> 00:02:07.267 So that's a fantastic story, and we all know how it ends. 00:02:07.291 --> 00:02:08.581 She loses the check, 00:02:08.605 --> 00:02:11.530 but she goes home with something bigger and more important. 00:02:11.554 --> 00:02:14.050 Except Derartu Tulu ruins the script again. 00:02:14.074 --> 00:02:17.574 Instead of losing, she blazes past the lead pack and wins. 00:02:17.598 --> 00:02:19.260 Wins the New York City Marathon, 00:02:19.284 --> 00:02:20.918 goes home with a big fat check. NOTE Paragraph 00:02:21.677 --> 00:02:23.213 It's a heartwarming story, 00:02:23.237 --> 00:02:25.214 but if you drill a little bit deeper, 00:02:25.238 --> 00:02:28.646 you've got to sort of wonder about what exactly was going on there. 00:02:28.670 --> 00:02:30.805 When you have two outliers in one organism, 00:02:30.829 --> 00:02:32.203 it's not a coincidence. 00:02:32.227 --> 00:02:35.718 When you have someone who is more competitive and more compassionate 00:02:35.742 --> 00:02:38.719 than anybody else in the race, again, it's not a coincidence. 00:02:38.743 --> 00:02:41.186 You show me a creature with webbed feet and gills; 00:02:41.210 --> 00:02:42.858 somehow water's involved. NOTE Paragraph 00:02:42.882 --> 00:02:46.264 Someone with that kind of heart, there's some kind of connection there. 00:02:46.288 --> 00:02:48.855 And the answer to it, I think, can be found 00:02:48.879 --> 00:02:51.288 down in the Copper Canyons of Mexico, 00:02:51.312 --> 00:02:55.189 where there's a reclusive tribe, called the Tarahumara Indians. 00:02:55.213 --> 00:02:58.772 Now, the Tarahumara are remarkable for three things. 00:02:58.796 --> 00:03:00.271 Number one is: 00:03:00.295 --> 00:03:04.501 they have been living essentially unchanged for the past 400 years. 00:03:04.525 --> 00:03:08.139 When the conquistadors arrived in North America you had two choices: 00:03:08.163 --> 00:03:10.876 you either fight back and engage or you could take off. 00:03:10.900 --> 00:03:12.758 The Mayans and Aztecs engaged, 00:03:12.782 --> 00:03:15.228 which is why there are very few Mayans and Aztecs. 00:03:15.252 --> 00:03:17.237 The Tarahumara had a different strategy. 00:03:17.261 --> 00:03:19.125 They took off and hid 00:03:19.149 --> 00:03:24.004 in this labyrinthine, networking, spider-webbing system of canyons 00:03:24.028 --> 00:03:25.429 called the Copper Canyons. 00:03:25.453 --> 00:03:28.876 And there they've remained since the 1600s, 00:03:28.900 --> 00:03:31.503 essentially the same way they've always been. NOTE Paragraph 00:03:32.321 --> 00:03:35.478 The second thing remarkable about the Tarahumara is: 00:03:35.502 --> 00:03:38.630 deep into old age -- 70 to 80 years old -- 00:03:38.654 --> 00:03:40.631 these guys aren't running marathons; 00:03:40.655 --> 00:03:42.502 they're running mega-marathons. 00:03:42.526 --> 00:03:44.171 They're not doing 26 miles, 00:03:44.195 --> 00:03:46.817 they're doing 100, 150 miles at a time, 00:03:46.841 --> 00:03:49.310 and apparently without injury, without problems. NOTE Paragraph 00:03:49.956 --> 00:03:52.672 The last thing that's remarkable about the Tarahumara is: 00:03:52.696 --> 00:03:55.213 all the things we're going to be talking about today, 00:03:55.237 --> 00:03:58.042 all the things we're trying to use all of our technology 00:03:58.066 --> 00:03:59.404 and brain power to solve -- 00:03:59.428 --> 00:04:01.978 things like heart disease and cholesterol and cancer; 00:04:02.002 --> 00:04:05.600 crime, warfare and violence; clinical depression -- all this stuff -- 00:04:05.624 --> 00:04:08.096 the Tarahumara don't know what you're talking about. 00:04:08.120 --> 00:04:11.876 They are free from all of these modern ailments. NOTE Paragraph 00:04:12.728 --> 00:04:13.957 So what's the connection? 00:04:13.981 --> 00:04:15.719 Again, we're talking about outliers; 00:04:15.743 --> 00:04:18.034 there's got to be some kind of cause and effect. 00:04:18.058 --> 00:04:21.876 Well, there are teams of scientists at Harvard and the University of Utah 00:04:21.900 --> 00:04:24.480 that are bending their brains and trying to figure out 00:04:24.504 --> 00:04:26.447 what the Tarahumara have known forever. 00:04:26.471 --> 00:04:29.135 They're trying to solve those same kinds of mysteries. 00:04:29.159 --> 00:04:32.582 And once again, a mystery wrapped inside of a mystery -- 00:04:32.606 --> 00:04:35.725 perhaps the key to Derartu Tulu and the Tarahumara 00:04:35.749 --> 00:04:38.386 is wrapped in three other mysteries, which go like this: 00:04:38.410 --> 00:04:41.819 Three things -- if you have the answer, come up and take the microphone, 00:04:41.843 --> 00:04:43.672 because nobody else knows the answer. 00:04:43.696 --> 00:04:46.581 If you know it, you're smarter than anybody on planet Earth. NOTE Paragraph 00:04:46.605 --> 00:04:48.028 Mystery number one is this: 00:04:48.052 --> 00:04:50.806 Two million years ago, the human brain exploded in size. 00:04:50.830 --> 00:04:52.941 Australopithecus had a tiny little pea brain. 00:04:52.965 --> 00:04:56.011 Suddenly humans show up, Homo erectus, big old melon head. 00:04:56.035 --> 00:04:57.558 To have a brain of that size, 00:04:57.582 --> 00:05:01.185 you need to have a source of condensed caloric energy. 00:05:01.209 --> 00:05:03.830 In other words, early humans are eating dead animals -- 00:05:03.854 --> 00:05:05.186 no argument, that's a fact. 00:05:05.900 --> 00:05:07.117 The only problem is, 00:05:07.141 --> 00:05:10.731 the first edged weapons only appeared about 200,000 years ago. NOTE Paragraph 00:05:10.755 --> 00:05:13.450 So somehow, for nearly two million years, 00:05:13.474 --> 00:05:16.145 we are killing animals without any weapons. 00:05:16.169 --> 00:05:17.869 Now, we're not using our strength, 00:05:17.893 --> 00:05:20.251 because we are the biggest sissies in the jungle. 00:05:20.275 --> 00:05:22.317 Every other animal is stronger than we are, 00:05:22.341 --> 00:05:25.771 they have fangs, they have claws, they have nimbleness, they have speed. 00:05:25.795 --> 00:05:27.166 We think Usain Bolt is fast. 00:05:27.190 --> 00:05:29.534 Usain Bolt can get his ass kicked by a squirrel. 00:05:29.558 --> 00:05:30.709 We're not fast. 00:05:30.733 --> 00:05:32.224 That would be an Olympic event: 00:05:32.248 --> 00:05:35.085 turn a squirrel loose, whoever catches it gets a gold medal. NOTE Paragraph 00:05:35.109 --> 00:05:36.124 (Laughter) NOTE Paragraph 00:05:36.148 --> 00:05:38.866 So no weapons, no speed, no strength, no fangs, no claws. 00:05:38.890 --> 00:05:41.532 How were we killing these animals? Mystery number one. NOTE Paragraph 00:05:41.556 --> 00:05:42.997 Mystery number two: 00:05:43.021 --> 00:05:46.074 Women have been in the Olympics for quite some time now, 00:05:46.098 --> 00:05:48.906 but one thing that's remarkable about all women sprinters: 00:05:48.930 --> 00:05:50.685 they all suck; they're terrible. 00:05:50.709 --> 00:05:54.437 There's not a fast woman on the planet and there never has been. 00:05:54.461 --> 00:05:57.438 The fastest woman to ever run a mile did it in 4:15. 00:05:57.462 --> 00:05:59.680 I could throw a rock and hit a high-school boy 00:05:59.704 --> 00:06:01.200 who can run faster than 4:15. 00:06:01.224 --> 00:06:03.415 For some reason, you guys are just really slow. 00:06:03.439 --> 00:06:04.597 But -- NOTE Paragraph 00:06:04.621 --> 00:06:05.680 (Laughter) NOTE Paragraph 00:06:05.704 --> 00:06:08.450 But, you get to the marathon we were just talking about -- 00:06:08.474 --> 00:06:11.252 you've only been allowed to run the marathon for 20 years, 00:06:11.276 --> 00:06:13.547 because prior to the 1980s, medical science said 00:06:13.571 --> 00:06:16.935 if a woman tried to run 26 miles -- does anyone know what would happen 00:06:16.959 --> 00:06:18.392 if you tried to run 26 miles? 00:06:18.416 --> 00:06:21.032 Why you were banned from the marathon before the 1980s? NOTE Paragraph 00:06:21.056 --> 00:06:23.142 Audience Member: Her uterus would be torn. NOTE Paragraph 00:06:23.166 --> 00:06:25.694 Christopher McDougall: Her uterus would be torn, yes. 00:06:25.718 --> 00:06:26.958 Torn reproductive organs. 00:06:26.982 --> 00:06:29.241 The uterus would literally fall out of the body. NOTE Paragraph 00:06:29.265 --> 00:06:30.286 (Laughter) NOTE Paragraph 00:06:30.310 --> 00:06:32.129 Now, I've been to a lot of marathons, 00:06:32.153 --> 00:06:33.794 and I've yet to see any ... NOTE Paragraph 00:06:33.818 --> 00:06:36.727 (Laughter) NOTE Paragraph 00:06:36.751 --> 00:06:38.118 So it's only been 20 years 00:06:38.142 --> 00:06:40.521 that women have been allowed to run the marathon. 00:06:40.545 --> 00:06:44.566 In that very short learning curve, you've gone from broken organs 00:06:44.590 --> 00:06:48.391 up to the fact that you're only 10 minutes off the male world record. NOTE Paragraph 00:06:48.415 --> 00:06:50.720 Then you go beyond 26 miles, into the distance 00:06:50.744 --> 00:06:53.677 that medical science also told us would be fatal to humans -- 00:06:53.701 --> 00:06:56.067 remember Pheidippides died when he ran 26 miles -- 00:06:56.091 --> 00:06:59.359 you get to 50 and 100 miles, and suddenly, it's a different game. 00:06:59.383 --> 00:07:02.626 You take a runner like Ann Trason or Nikki Kimball or Jenn Shelton, 00:07:02.650 --> 00:07:06.077 put them in a race of 50 or 100 miles against anybody in the world, 00:07:06.101 --> 00:07:08.078 and it's a coin toss who's going to win. 00:07:08.102 --> 00:07:09.448 I'll give you an example. 00:07:09.472 --> 00:07:11.987 A couple years ago, Emily Baer signed up for a race 00:07:12.011 --> 00:07:13.701 called the Hardrock 100, 00:07:13.725 --> 00:07:16.287 which tells you all you need to know about the race. 00:07:16.311 --> 00:07:18.350 They give you 48 hours to finish this race. 00:07:18.374 --> 00:07:20.279 Well, Emily Baer -- 500 runners -- 00:07:20.303 --> 00:07:22.650 she finishes in eighth place, in the top 10, 00:07:22.674 --> 00:07:24.928 even though she stopped at all the aid stations 00:07:24.952 --> 00:07:26.847 to breastfeed her baby during the race. NOTE Paragraph 00:07:26.871 --> 00:07:27.885 (Laughter) NOTE Paragraph 00:07:27.909 --> 00:07:29.607 And yet, she beat 492 other people. 00:07:30.131 --> 00:07:31.288 The last mystery: 00:07:31.312 --> 00:07:34.096 Why is it that women get stronger as distances get longer? 00:07:34.120 --> 00:07:35.456 The third mystery is this: 00:07:35.480 --> 00:07:38.948 At the University of Utah, they started tracking finishing times 00:07:38.972 --> 00:07:40.632 for people running the marathon. 00:07:40.656 --> 00:07:44.463 What they found is that if you start running the marathon at age 19, 00:07:44.487 --> 00:07:46.740 you'll get progressively faster, year by year, 00:07:46.764 --> 00:07:48.741 until you reach your peak at age 27. 00:07:48.765 --> 00:07:52.741 And then after that, you succumb to the rigors of time. 00:07:52.765 --> 00:07:54.357 And you'll get slower and slower, 00:07:54.381 --> 00:07:57.970 until eventually you're back to running the same speed you were at age 19. 00:07:57.994 --> 00:08:00.235 So about seven, eight years to reach your peak, 00:08:00.259 --> 00:08:02.335 and then gradually you fall off your peak, 00:08:02.359 --> 00:08:04.637 until you go back to the starting point. 00:08:04.661 --> 00:08:07.881 You'd think it might take eight years to go back to the same speed, 00:08:07.905 --> 00:08:10.637 maybe 10 years -- no, it's 45 years. 00:08:10.661 --> 00:08:12.638 64-year-old men and women 00:08:12.662 --> 00:08:15.701 are running as fast as they were at age 19. 00:08:15.725 --> 00:08:18.713 Now, I defy you to come up with any other physical activity -- 00:08:18.737 --> 00:08:21.699 and please don't say golf -- something that's actually hard -- NOTE Paragraph 00:08:21.723 --> 00:08:22.771 (Laughter) NOTE Paragraph 00:08:22.795 --> 00:08:27.342 where geriatrics are performing as well as they did as teenagers. NOTE Paragraph 00:08:27.366 --> 00:08:29.166 So you have these three mysteries. 00:08:29.661 --> 00:08:33.638 Is there one piece in the puzzle which might wrap all these things up? 00:08:33.941 --> 00:08:37.029 You've got to be careful anytime someone looks back in prehistory 00:08:37.053 --> 00:08:39.359 and tries to give you a global answer because, 00:08:39.383 --> 00:08:42.170 it being prehistory, you can say whatever the hell you want 00:08:42.194 --> 00:08:43.353 and get away with it. 00:08:43.377 --> 00:08:44.743 But I'll submit this to you: 00:08:44.767 --> 00:08:47.468 If you put one piece in the middle of this jigsaw puzzle, 00:08:47.492 --> 00:08:49.870 suddenly it all starts to form a coherent picture. 00:08:49.894 --> 00:08:52.282 If you're wondering why the Tarahumara don't fight 00:08:52.306 --> 00:08:53.830 and don't die of heart disease, 00:08:53.854 --> 00:08:56.614 why a poor Ethiopian woman named Derartu Tulu 00:08:56.638 --> 00:08:59.467 can be the most compassionate and yet the most competitive, 00:08:59.491 --> 00:09:03.314 and why we somehow were able to find food without weapons, 00:09:03.338 --> 00:09:05.315 perhaps it's because humans, 00:09:05.339 --> 00:09:08.561 as much as we like to think of ourselves as masters of the universe, 00:09:08.585 --> 00:09:12.003 actually evolved as nothing more than a pack of hunting dogs. NOTE Paragraph 00:09:12.408 --> 00:09:15.862 Maybe we evolved as a hunting pack animal. 00:09:16.233 --> 00:09:18.809 Because the one advantage we have in the wilderness -- 00:09:18.833 --> 00:09:21.289 again, it's not our fangs, our claws or our speed -- 00:09:21.313 --> 00:09:23.638 the only thing we do really well is sweat. 00:09:23.662 --> 00:09:26.440 We're really good at being sweaty and smelly. 00:09:26.464 --> 00:09:29.702 Better than any other mammal on Earth, we can sweat really well. 00:09:29.726 --> 00:09:33.590 But the advantage of that little bit of social discomfort 00:09:33.614 --> 00:09:38.721 is the fact that, when it comes to running under hot heat for long distances, 00:09:38.745 --> 00:09:40.989 we're superb -- the best on the planet. 00:09:41.013 --> 00:09:43.098 You take a horse on a hot day, 00:09:43.122 --> 00:09:46.010 and after about five or six miles, that horse has a choice: 00:09:46.034 --> 00:09:48.687 it's either going to breathe or it's going to cool off. 00:09:48.711 --> 00:09:50.289 But it ain't doing both. We can. 00:09:50.678 --> 00:09:53.655 So what if we evolved as hunting pack animals? 00:09:53.679 --> 00:09:57.304 What if the only natural advantage we had in the world 00:09:57.328 --> 00:09:59.725 was the fact that we could get together as a group, 00:09:59.749 --> 00:10:02.737 go out there on that African savanna, pick out an antelope, 00:10:02.761 --> 00:10:05.270 go out as a pack, and run that thing to death? 00:10:06.016 --> 00:10:07.472 That's all we could do. 00:10:07.496 --> 00:10:09.473 We could run really far on a hot day. NOTE Paragraph 00:10:09.497 --> 00:10:12.697 Well, if that's true, a couple other things had to be true as well. 00:10:12.721 --> 00:10:15.550 The key to being part of a hunting pack is the word "pack." 00:10:15.574 --> 00:10:18.182 If you go out by yourself and try to chase an antelope, 00:10:18.206 --> 00:10:21.063 I guarantee there will be two cadavers out in the savanna. 00:10:21.087 --> 00:10:22.730 You need a pack to pull together. 00:10:22.754 --> 00:10:24.982 You need to have those 64- and 65-year-olds 00:10:25.006 --> 00:10:26.985 who have been doing this for a long time 00:10:27.009 --> 00:10:29.501 to understand which antelope you're trying to catch. 00:10:29.525 --> 00:10:31.626 The herd explodes and it gathers back again. 00:10:31.650 --> 00:10:34.018 Those expert trackers have to be part of the pack. 00:10:34.042 --> 00:10:35.506 They can't be 10 miles behind. 00:10:35.530 --> 00:10:37.714 You need the women and the adolescents there, 00:10:37.738 --> 00:10:41.130 because the two times in your life you most benefit from animal protein 00:10:41.154 --> 00:10:44.025 is when you're a nursing mother and a developing adolescent. 00:10:44.049 --> 00:10:46.699 It makes no sense to have the antelope over there, dead, 00:10:46.723 --> 00:10:48.976 and the people who want to eat it 50 miles away. 00:10:49.000 --> 00:10:50.583 They need to be part of the pack. 00:10:50.607 --> 00:10:53.444 You need those 27-year-old studs at the peak of their powers 00:10:53.468 --> 00:10:54.624 ready to drop the kill, 00:10:54.648 --> 00:10:58.079 and you need those teenagers who are learning the whole thing involved. 00:10:58.103 --> 00:10:59.259 The pack stays together. NOTE Paragraph 00:10:59.283 --> 00:11:02.639 Another thing that has to be true: this pack cannot be materialistic. 00:11:02.663 --> 00:11:06.092 You can't be hauling all your crap around, trying to chase the antelope. 00:11:06.116 --> 00:11:07.602 You can't be a pissed-off pack. 00:11:07.626 --> 00:11:11.065 You can't be bearing grudges, like, "I'm not chasing that guy's antelope. 00:11:11.089 --> 00:11:13.611 He pissed me off. Let him go chase his own antelope." 00:11:13.635 --> 00:11:15.876 The pack has got to be able to swallow its ego, 00:11:15.900 --> 00:11:17.678 be cooperative, and pull together. 00:11:18.019 --> 00:11:20.647 What you end up with, in other words, 00:11:20.671 --> 00:11:24.444 is a culture remarkably similar to the Tarahumara, 00:11:24.468 --> 00:11:28.047 a tribe that has remained unchanged since the Stone Age. 00:11:28.684 --> 00:11:30.311 It's a really compelling argument 00:11:30.335 --> 00:11:33.983 that maybe the Tarahumara are doing exactly what all of us had done 00:11:34.007 --> 00:11:35.165 for two million years, 00:11:35.189 --> 00:11:38.233 that it's us in modern times who have sort of gone off the path. NOTE Paragraph 00:11:38.257 --> 00:11:41.538 You know, we look at running as this kind of alien, foreign thing, 00:11:41.562 --> 00:11:45.031 this punishment you've got to do because you ate pizza the night before. 00:11:45.055 --> 00:11:46.747 But maybe it's something different. 00:11:46.771 --> 00:11:49.868 Maybe we're the ones who have taken this natural advantage we had 00:11:49.892 --> 00:11:51.220 and we spoiled it. 00:11:51.804 --> 00:11:54.348 How do we spoil it? Well, how do we spoil anything? 00:11:54.372 --> 00:11:55.936 We try to cash in on it. Right? 00:11:55.960 --> 00:11:58.726 We try to can it and package it and make it "better" 00:11:58.750 --> 00:12:00.139 and then sell it to people. 00:12:00.163 --> 00:12:02.657 And then what happened was, we started creating 00:12:02.681 --> 00:12:06.115 these fancy cushioned things which can make running "better," 00:12:06.139 --> 00:12:07.555 called running shoes. NOTE Paragraph 00:12:07.579 --> 00:12:10.511 The reason I get personally pissed-off about running shoes 00:12:10.535 --> 00:12:13.512 is because I bought a million of them and I kept getting hurt. 00:12:13.536 --> 00:12:15.513 And I think if anybody in here runs -- 00:12:15.537 --> 00:12:17.317 I just had a conversation with Carol. 00:12:17.341 --> 00:12:20.972 We talked for two minutes backstage, and she talked about plantar fasciitis. 00:12:20.996 --> 00:12:23.547 You talk to a runner, I guarantee within 30 seconds, 00:12:23.571 --> 00:12:25.200 the conversation turns to injury. 00:12:25.224 --> 00:12:28.511 So if humans evolved as runners, if that's our one natural advantage, 00:12:28.535 --> 00:12:30.008 then why are we so bad at it? 00:12:30.032 --> 00:12:31.643 Why do we keep getting hurt? NOTE Paragraph 00:12:31.667 --> 00:12:34.039 A curious thing about running and running injuries 00:12:34.063 --> 00:12:36.551 is that the running injury is new to our time. 00:12:36.575 --> 00:12:38.399 If you read folklore and mythology, 00:12:38.423 --> 00:12:40.424 any kind of myths, any kind of tall tales, 00:12:40.448 --> 00:12:44.056 running is always associated with freedom and vitality 00:12:44.080 --> 00:12:45.876 and youthfulness and eternal vigor. 00:12:45.900 --> 00:12:48.794 It's only in our lifetime that running has become associated 00:12:48.818 --> 00:12:49.973 with fear and pain. 00:12:49.997 --> 00:12:54.108 Geronimo used to say, "My only friends are my legs. I only trust my legs." 00:12:54.132 --> 00:12:57.751 That's because an Apache triathlon used to be you'd run 50 miles 00:12:57.775 --> 00:12:58.926 across the desert, 00:12:58.950 --> 00:13:01.562 engage in hand-to-hand combat, steal a bunch of horses, 00:13:01.586 --> 00:13:02.916 and slap leather for home. 00:13:02.940 --> 00:13:06.665 Geronimo was never saying, "You know something, my Achilles -- I'm tapering. 00:13:06.689 --> 00:13:08.249 I've got to take this week off." 00:13:08.273 --> 00:13:11.290 Or, "I need to cross-train. I didn't do yoga. I'm not ready." NOTE Paragraph 00:13:11.314 --> 00:13:12.717 (Laughter) NOTE Paragraph 00:13:12.741 --> 00:13:14.566 Humans ran and ran all the time. 00:13:14.590 --> 00:13:17.087 We are here today. We have our digital technology. 00:13:17.111 --> 00:13:19.022 All of our science comes from the fact 00:13:19.046 --> 00:13:22.876 that our ancestors were able to do something extraordinary every day, 00:13:22.900 --> 00:13:25.329 which was just rely on their naked feet and legs 00:13:25.353 --> 00:13:26.799 to run long distances. NOTE Paragraph 00:13:26.823 --> 00:13:28.622 So how do we get back to that again? 00:13:28.646 --> 00:13:30.858 Well, I would submit to you the first thing is: 00:13:30.882 --> 00:13:33.707 get rid of all packaging, all the sales, all the marketing. 00:13:33.731 --> 00:13:35.803 Get rid of all the stinking running shoes. 00:13:35.827 --> 00:13:37.780 Stop focusing on urban marathons, 00:13:37.804 --> 00:13:40.600 which, if you do four hours, you suck, 00:13:40.624 --> 00:13:42.577 and if you do 3:59:59, you're awesome, 00:13:42.601 --> 00:13:44.780 because you qualified for another race. 00:13:44.900 --> 00:13:47.900 We need to get back to that sense of playfulness and joyfulness 00:13:47.924 --> 00:13:50.794 and, I would say, nakedness, 00:13:50.818 --> 00:13:52.720 that has made the Tarahumara 00:13:52.744 --> 00:13:55.323 one of the healthiest and serene cultures in our time. 00:13:56.124 --> 00:13:57.745 So what's the benefit? So what? 00:13:57.769 --> 00:14:00.638 So you burn off the Häagen-Dazs from the night before. NOTE Paragraph 00:14:00.662 --> 00:14:03.084 But maybe there's another benefit there as well. 00:14:03.108 --> 00:14:06.241 Without getting too extreme about this, 00:14:06.265 --> 00:14:10.876 imagine a world where everybody could go out the door 00:14:10.900 --> 00:14:12.876 and engage in the kind of exercise 00:14:12.900 --> 00:14:15.876 that's going to make them more relaxed, more serene, 00:14:15.900 --> 00:14:17.205 more healthy, 00:14:17.229 --> 00:14:18.541 burn off stress -- 00:14:18.565 --> 00:14:21.754 where you don't come back into your office a raging maniac anymore, 00:14:21.778 --> 00:14:24.262 or go home with a lot of stress on top of you again. 00:14:24.286 --> 00:14:26.617 Maybe there's something between what we are today 00:14:26.641 --> 00:14:29.149 and what the Tarahumara have always been. 00:14:29.173 --> 00:14:31.402 I don't say let's go back to the Copper Canyons 00:14:31.426 --> 00:14:34.811 and live on corn and maize, which is the Tarahumara's preferred diet, 00:14:34.835 --> 00:14:36.915 but maybe there's somewhere in between. 00:14:36.939 --> 00:14:38.606 And if we find that thing, 00:14:38.630 --> 00:14:41.210 maybe there is a big fat Nobel Prize out there. 00:14:41.234 --> 00:14:46.121 Because if somebody could find a way to restore that natural ability 00:14:46.145 --> 00:14:48.317 that we all enjoyed for most of our existence 00:14:48.341 --> 00:14:49.912 up until the 1970s or so, 00:14:49.936 --> 00:14:55.327 the benefits -- social and physical and political and mental -- 00:14:55.351 --> 00:14:56.624 could be astounding. NOTE Paragraph 00:14:56.648 --> 00:15:00.717 What I've been seeing today is there is a growing subculture 00:15:00.741 --> 00:15:03.660 of barefoot runners, people who've gotten rid of their shoes. 00:15:03.684 --> 00:15:05.570 And what they have found uniformly is, 00:15:05.594 --> 00:15:08.121 you get rid of the shoes, you get rid of the stress, 00:15:08.145 --> 00:15:10.613 you get rid of the injuries and the ailments. 00:15:10.637 --> 00:15:13.427 And what you find is something the Tarahumara have known 00:15:13.451 --> 00:15:14.616 for a very long time: 00:15:14.640 --> 00:15:16.402 that this can be a whole lot of fun. 00:15:16.426 --> 00:15:18.253 I've experienced it personally myself. 00:15:18.277 --> 00:15:21.633 I was injured all my life; then in my early 40s, I got rid of my shoes 00:15:21.657 --> 00:15:23.876 and my running ailments have gone away, too. NOTE Paragraph 00:15:23.900 --> 00:15:26.458 So hopefully it's something we can all benefit from. 00:15:26.482 --> 00:15:28.524 I appreciate your listening to this story. NOTE Paragraph 00:15:28.548 --> 00:15:29.699 Thanks very much. NOTE Paragraph 00:15:29.723 --> 00:15:31.714 (Applause)