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Alex Hutchinson
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Endure: Mind, Body and the Curiously Elastic Limits of Human Performance Hardcover – February 8, 2018

by Alex Hutchinson (Author)
4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 3,702 ratings
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‘This book is AMAZING!’ – MALCOLM GLADWELL

‘If you want to gain insight into the mind of great athletes, adventurers, and peak performers then prepare to be enthralled by Alex Hutchinson’s Endure.’ – BEAR GRYLLS

How high or far or fast can humans go? And what about individual potential: what defines a person’s limits? From running a two-hour marathon to summiting Mount Everest, we’re fascinated by the extremes of human endurance, constantly testing both our physical and psychological limits.

In Endure Alex Hutchinson, Ph.D., reveals why our individual limits may be determined as much by our head and heart, as by our muscles. He presents an overview of science’s search for understanding human fatigue, from crude experiments with electricity and frogs’ legs to sophisticated brain imaging technology. Going beyond the traditional mechanical view of human limits, he instead argues that a key element in endurance is how the brain responds to distress signals―whether heat, or cold, or muscles screaming with lactic acid―and reveals that we can train to improve brain response.

An elite distance runner himself, Hutchinson takes us to the forefront of the new sports psychology – brain electrode jolts, computer-based training, subliminal messaging – and presents startling new discoveries enhancing the performance of athletes today, showing us how anyone can utilize these tactics to bolster their own performance – and get the most out of their bodies.

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Previous page
  1. Print length
    320 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    HarperCollins
  4. Publication date
    February 8, 2018
  5. Dimensions
    6.26 x 1.18 x 9.45 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0008285098
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0008285098
  8. See all details
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  1. Just like a smile or frown, the words in your head have the power to influence the very feelings they’re supposed to reflect.
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  2. In a wide variety of human activity, achievement is not possible without discomfort.
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Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ HarperCollins (February 8, 2018)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 320 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0008285098
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0008285098
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.21 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.26 x 1.18 x 9.45 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 3,702 ratings

About the author

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Alex Hutchinson

Alex Hutchinson

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Alex Hutchinson (@sweatscience) is National Magazine Award-winning journalist who writes about the science of endurance for Runner’s World and Outside, and frequently contributes to other publications such as the New York Times and the New Yorker. A former long-distance runner for the Canadian national team, he holds a master’s in journalism from Columbia and a Ph.D. in physics from Cambridge, and he did his post-doctoral research with the National Security Agency.

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Top reviews from the United States

Kent R. Spillner
5.0 out of 5 stars Well-written and fascinating to read
Reviewed in the United States on April 10, 2023
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This book is very well-written and easy to read. The author interspersed gripping anecdotes with explanations of the latest scientific research into different aspects of the potential limits of human physical achievement. The author is very honest that this book is not prescriptive, there's no one tried & true solution or answer that will help people improve their performance, but there's still a wealth of knowledge in this book and a lot for any reader to chew on. Absolutely fascinating!
6 people found this helpful
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Duane Schneider
4.0 out of 5 stars Well-Researched but Maybe TOO Well-Researched?
Reviewed in the United States on March 4, 2019
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I've come to know Alex Hutchinson's writing through his fantastic articles in "Runner's World." He had some serious chops as a Canadian runner but he's equally (if not more) accomplished as a journalist. Hutchinson's interests tend toward the science-y, geeky side of running, and those interests are on full display in "Endure." It's likely I came into the book with a bias, being a distance runner and having heard "Endure" mentioned on various ultra-running podcasts. I assumed the focus would be on long-distance running, but Hutchinson touches on endurance sports of various types, including mountain climbing, cycling, free diving, marathoning, ultra-running, exploration, etc. A real strength of the book is that the author is able to tie these sports together, along with a wealth of scientific findings and summaries of clinical studies, so seamlessly. He moves effortlessly between Nike's 2-hour marathon project, Roger Bannister's 4-minute mile, record free diving attempts, Everest ascents, Antarctic treks, and "The Hour" (an all-out one-hour bike sprint that leaves its participants flailing in a pool of their own saddle sores, sweat, and tears). Hutchinson paints such a vivid picture of these efforts that you almost start to struggle for air along with the free diver or mountain climber. A lot of the book is arranged around these limits to human endurance, such as oxygen, heat, and fuel. The book springs to life when Hutchinson is describing mountain ascents or cycling races, but then just as quickly we're back in the lab for...another study. There were many studies summarized in this book, studies where athletes were poked, prodded, given pills and placebos, denied oxygen, given pure oxygen, denied carbs, given extra carbs, EKGs, and on and on. I tried to keep everything straight, but after awhile it was difficult to determine what I was supposed to take from all this, other than that people often push themselves to the brink of exhaustion but rarely does anyone die due to a "central governor" in the brain that starts shutting things down if we stray too far into dangerous territory. By the time Hutchinson got to the study about the cyclists shown a video of an Asian woman who forces herself to vomit and then eats it, I was ready to be done with studies. I think Hutchinson accomplished what he set out to do, which was to provide a survey of various extreme endurance achievements and explain the science behind them, and despite my own bias toward running I thought the stories about mountaineering, antarctic exploration, and cycling were fascinating. I just wish the author would've focused more on the details of these events, maybe focusing on four or five, describing them in-depth, and scaling back all the studies, which for me just blended together anyway. I also have a feeling these studies are going to make "Endure" seem really dated in about five or ten years. I ultimately came away thinking the book was interesting but not always a page-turner, and there's also not a huge amount you can easily take from it and apply to your own training/racing if that's your goal for "Endure."
94 people found this helpful
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Charles A. Duncan
5.0 out of 5 stars Informative and well written.
Reviewed in the United States on August 18, 2023
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If you are interested in the human body and its performance limits, which I am, this is a great read.
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Angela
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent writing, pages turn
Reviewed in the United States on July 22, 2023
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Took a chance on this and so glad I did. Very well written and researched. It reads like a story and I feel like I learned a lot. I only run casually but I feel this has changed me entire perspective on life and all forms of physical activity. Thanks to the author!
2 people found this helpful
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Angel Ortega
5.0 out of 5 stars Buy
Reviewed in the United States on February 26, 2024
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Informative and captivating. Nothing more nothing less, go buy. I need 11 more words this are just fillers. Right now
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Justin G. Mitchell
4.0 out of 5 stars Great book for anyone interested in the limits of human endurance
Reviewed in the United States on May 15, 2018
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I really enjoyed this book by Alex. I know him from Outside magazine and heard him interviewed on a running podcast, discussing the topics covered in Endure. This is really well written and engaging, filled with stories about amazing feats of endurance and the science behind them.

This book has a lot to offer those who aren't familiar with the mind-body connection and sports performance. Lots of tips and ideas to be gleaned from the pages.
One person found this helpful
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Sasha Baumann
5.0 out of 5 stars Inspiring
Reviewed in the United States on January 9, 2024
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This is a great gift for any athlete. Swimmer, runner, biker, doesn’t matter because the content applies to everyone, not even athletes. Amazing book
One person found this helpful
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Kindle Customer
3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting stories, but full of inconclusive scientific information
Reviewed in the United States on July 4, 2021
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My goal by reading this book was simple. I just would like to learn something new that I could use to enhance my endurance and, maybe, to cut a couple of minutes of my marathon personal best time. Unfortunately, it didn't took long to figure out 'Endure' was not a book useful for that. Because I've found the stories about climbing, diving, long trails and so on very interesting, I kept reading the book anyway. Besides the interesting stories, the author presents lots of scientific studies about what would be some of the aspects that determine one's limits, like oxygen, fuel, heat, and mind. However, too much science sometimes can be more confusing than helpful. For each paper supporting one hypothesis, one can find sever disproving it. So, the book presents a lot of information, but it is hard to get reach conclusion at all. The only point the author seems to support more strongly is the role of the mind in sports. That is backed by several researchs that support the idea that your brain would slow you or shut you down, sometimes unconsciously, way before you could cause any harm to yourself. That's make a lot of sense and it is the most useful information I've found in the book.
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Top reviews from other countries

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Janis Vaitkevics
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book for every sportsman
Reviewed in Germany on December 14, 2023
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Excellent book for every sportsman to find extra motivation to suffer more in training and competitions
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ali
5.0 out of 5 stars Dense
Reviewed in France on August 28, 2022
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This book is very dense and it does sometimes have so much information that it's hard to remember it all. That said, I thoroughly enjoyed reading it (at the gym no less) and learnt a lot about endurance.
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AndreaMB
4.0 out of 5 stars Ottimo libro!
Reviewed in Italy on January 31, 2021
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Libro ottimo di approccio al mondo della resistenza. La fatica mentale, le grandi imprese di resilienza riportate come esempio sono di grande ispirazione. Ottimo libro per conoscere i limiti del nostro corpo e fino a dove esso può arrivare. Chissà!
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Luiz Gustavo M C Manso
5.0 out of 5 stars Para atletas
Reviewed in Brazil on March 18, 2019
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Ótimo livro, de leitura fácil e com muitos dados técnicos, principalmente experimentos feitos aos longos dos anos na área de endurance. A leitura é perfeira para corredores e ciclistas. O livro elenca os principais fatores físicos que afetam o endurance, cita aspectos psicológicos e no fim fala sobre como treinar e tentar educar seu cérebro a ir mais longe ou mais rápido de forma “menos dolorida”. Li durante um ciclo de maratona e me ajudou muito e encarar de forma mais leve os treinos, impactando diretamente nos resultados que obtive.
9 people found this helpful
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Adriana
5.0 out of 5 stars Sobre el importante papel que juega la mente en nuestras actividades
Reviewed in Mexico on December 6, 2018
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Es un gran libro que habla sobre como el cuerpo y la mente pueden llevarnos a lograr cosas extraordinarias. Lo que me gustó es que divide el libro en diferentes capítulos que hablan de cosas específicas que nos afectan cómo atletas y qué parte juega el cuerpo y cuál la mente. Gran libro si buscas entender los distintos factores que pueden afectar tus desempeño deportivo.
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