The Endurance Artist: Lazarus Lake, the Barkley & a Race with No End

by Jared Beasley

A rare look into an enigmatic accountant from Tennessee’s backwoods who morphs into Lazarus Lake, the world’s most notorious race maker.

The Endurance Artist is an all-access pass to the world’s most extreme races and the mastermind behind them, where we witness firsthand the gears, the machinations, the egos, the surprising humanity.

The most grueling and ingenious races in the world are the creation of Gary Cantrell, better known by the nom de guerre Lazarus Lake. He has been described as a “hillbilly genius” and the “Leonardo di Vinci of pain.” His Barkley Marathons is known as the most difficult ultramarathon ever devised, a fight club in the wilderness run in secret. With books hidden in the woods, condolence letters, a cigarette-start, and elevation gain that amounts to summiting Mount Everest twice, it defies convention. Big’s Backyard Ultra pushes human beings to their absolute limit on a four-mile loop that is run every hour, starting on the hour until there is just one runner standing—most recently, a high school teacher who ran 450 miles without sleep.

Author Jared Beasley ferrets his way into the world of a recluse hell-bent on rewriting the rules to reveal a life reimagined and failure reinvented. Laz calls into question our obsession with winning and fairness, success and failure, and whether these ideas handicap potential.

Genres: Nonfiction, Biography, Sports, Audiobook, Adventure, Biography Memoir

304 pages, Paperback

Published September 16, 2025

About the author

Jared Beasley is a New York based author and journalist whose work has appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, Canadian Running, and Outside. Two of his articles were recognized among Runner’s World’s top ten stories of 2020, and he has been featured on podcasts such as Ultrarunner, Author’s Stories, Bad Boy Running, and The Shakeout Podcast. He writes a monthly column, “Detours of the Lost and Found,” for Ultrarunning Magazine.

His debut book, In Search of Al Howie, earned rave reviews and a Kirkus star for literary merit. Adventure Journal described it as a moving biography that recalls an unplugged era of human-powered adventure. Beasley has since contributed over 50 ultrarunning features to major media outlets.

Reviews

[Catherine Daigle · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve listened to many podcasts, watched documentaries, read articles, all trying to learn more about Lazarus Lake and his projects but still felt like everything was vague or curated in a way that was gatekeeping what the man and the events are all about. This book finally gave me what I wanted. The writing and storytelling are excellent and I couldn’t put it down.

[Lex Meszaros · Rating 5 out of 5]

Required reading for type 2 fun connoisseurs. This book reflects on deeply personal nonconventional achievement.

Favorite quotes:

- “Failure would be guaranteed, and success would be relative, defined only on personal terms”

- “It doesn’t always have to be fun to be fun”

- “He looked over at his wife wanting a hug but didn’t get one. Well, she said, matter of fact. Are you gonna get your act together? ……. When he returned he had more than a fun run, he had a realization: he was around the right kind of people, and he’d married the right kind of person”

[Shelby · Rating 5 out of 5]

i watched the iconic 2012 documentary following the Barkley Marathons 3 years ago as a distance runner at the dusk of my collegiate track career. I'd scoffed at ultrarunning before this, considering it a sport far too pretentious and self-important for its inherent ridiculousness. the documentary opened my eyes to another side of the sport, and an obsession with the Barkley Marathons was born.. and alongside it, a morbid curiosity for the story of its creator. I received The Endurance Artist as my most-anticipated Christmas present and read it in a little over a day. Beasley's writing, while choppy at times, has just the right dose of irreverence and wit to pull me into the headspace of Gary/laz, and his commitment to researching the man's life puts the substance behind the style. I remain in love with the twisted genius of the Barkleys and have gained a newfound interest (mingled with horror) in the format of the Backyard ultra.. seems likely that my poor judgement will get the better of me and I'll end up in a Backyard starting corall in 2026. 4.5 stars.

[Joao Mateus · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is like Laz (hard to read) and the Barkley (hard to follow). Nevertheless, a good story of a very peculiar guy and his quest for human limits and endurance

[Amyg · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this book to be full of disjointed sentence structure, minimal and weirdly placed punctuation, and uncommon word choice, all of which combined to interrupt the flow and make it a slightly annoying and difficult read. One paragraph often had nothing to do with the next. People are mentioned fleetingly and it’s hard to keep track of who they are and why they’re being talked about. Histories that could have added to the depth/understanding are entirely skipped. There was a whole chapter on the idiots run, and on the next page you read that it’s been dead for years, but there was no explanation of the how or why it ended, other than a mention about asphalt. How did we get from here to there? Stories are told out of order, and you’re constantly trying to figure out what he’s talking about. Names are dropped and you have to deduce who they are. It’s like he wanted it to be difficult to read? And/or didn’t have an editor? The lack of flow was really challenging for me - I could only get through a few pages at a time because of the writing style. I really wanted to come here and find some validation that someone else felt this way as well, but I’m definitely in the minority among many glowing reviews. For a topic I am very interested in, it was just a miss for me.

[Jonathan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I didn’t anticipate how wildly emotional I’d be reading this book.

I ran my first 100 on Laz’s property at Little Dog Backyard (a last runner standing race) where I met the author when he met Laz for the first time. Laz was hanging up flags is the start/finish chute and I was holding the flag box so Laz didn’t have to bend over as far to grab each flag. Beasley gave Laz a cold Dr. Pepper…I guess my hands were tied up with the box or else I’m sure I’d have been offered one as well 😂

Two weeks ago I DNF’d Laz’s Barkley Fall Classic - my only DNF at a race with less than a 5% finish rate. It’s gift to fail and have a goal for next year.

I’m beyond thankful for the way Laz’s influence has shaped my athletic life. It feels like the end of Laz will be the end of old school ultra running…when ultra runners were hard to come by and races were lightly organized rugged things. I entered the ultra running world at the tail end of one era and the jump into a new era.

[Kathrin Passig · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ich habe ein anderes Buch, das ich auch sehr mochte, mittendrin unterbrochen, um das hier sofort zu lesen. Es fing sehr gut an, fast wie von John McPhee (das wäre ein Traum, ein Buch von McPhee über die Barkley Marathons), wird dann aber bald zu einer Heldenverehrungsgeschichte im üblichen "der untersetzte 45-Jährige kraulte sich nachdenklich den Schnauzbart"-Stil. Aber viele interessante Details.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am fascinated by the Barkley Marathons, and this is a really excellent and interesting book about the history of Barkleys, the man who founded it, and some of his other races. It does occasionally skip around in annoying ways, and was a bit choppy in parts, but on the whole really satisfying and fascinating.

[Erin Burns · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting from start to finish. Laz remains a legend in ultra running and the stories never get old.

[Rick Eckhardt · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author was able to get close to the illusive Laz. Fascinating tale of a man who will not follow normal convention. He is responsible for concocting what has become some of the most sought after sporting events in the world. Particularly the Barkley marathon and Big's backyard ultra. Application to the Barkley is a secret, mysterious process, which involves writing an essay. Laz only accepts the most qualified, experienced runners in the world. And the acceptance you receive from him, is in the form of a condolence letter. The book is well written and enjoyable. I recommend watching the documentary: The Barkley Marathons: The Race That Eats Its Young

[Will Ortmayer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve read many books by runners who happened to write a book, this one is written by writer who happens to cover running. Both can be painful for their own reasons but this grew on over time. Turned out to be way more about Bigs Backyard than Barkley which was fun to learn about. Cool to have a background to Laz, certainly a guy worth a book.

[Rebekah Pass · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed the documentaries I’ve seen on the Barkley marathons - Laz is such an enigma in those. Really interesting to read more about him, and fun to read a bit about his many races and the runners. Now I want to go read the runners’ essays.

[Kayleigh Antenucci · Rating 4 out of 5]

As someone who has always been fascinated by Laz’s races, I loved learning about the creation of them and more about Laz himself. The story itself was captivating but the writing was a little less stellar for me.

[Eric Robichaud · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very well written story of an interesting character

[Max van Tongeren · Rating 4 out of 5]

Delen van dit boek zijn echt fantastisch. Maar er wordt wel heel breed verteld over zijn hond en de stijl die daarbij gehanteerd werd viel bij mij persoonlijk niet in de smaak. Desalniettemin fascinerend levensverhaal

[Adam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great read for runners of any level of experience, skill or interest. Belongs in the ranks of Born to Run in terms of great stories of the sport’s greatest legends.

[Chris van Dijk · Rating 5 out of 5]

Always love learning anything about Barkley, but this was so interesting to learn Laz’s story for the first time. Great read and account of the ultra world’s most interesting race director.

[Ethan Day · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you’ve seen the documentary, I don’t think reading this book will be as interesting to you. It provides more details and history around Laz but I think the documentary covers enough for most people. If you haven’t seen the doc, then you will probably enjoy this book more than me.

[Michelle Fraley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Laz/Gary is an interesting man. Even after reading the book I cannot decide if he’s a villain, a hero or something in between. His personality and behavior reminds me of an accident you just can’t look away from. The story of his long relationship with running and seeking challenge in unique ways was interesting for sure but for me the best parts of the book were about the ultra runners who came from all over the world who pushed themselves to extreme limits to participate in his races. I’d love a deeper dive on some of these people to know what motivates them to push their bodies to such extremes.

[David Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great pacing. Wonderful job weaving the two notorious races together with background and biography.

And yes I was crying in the epilogue when he narrated Jasmin finishing the Barkley.

[Hank Doster · Rating 5 out of 5]

I will forever be fascinated by Laz’s races and the otherworldly people who run them. Truly motivating.

[Jen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I did not have high hopes for this one given that the subjects (Laz and the races themselves) really lend themselves to film, and I have already seen documentaries and other race footage. But this was insightful and a fast and fairly easy read. While I very familiar with the Barkley, I didn't know too much of the history of the Backyards, which this book provides. I found I was most interested in how Laz designed and modified his courses, and would happily read / watch more on just on that subject. A good read for fans.

[Tal Taran · Rating 3 out of 5]

A deep-dive on Laz is a subject that everyone wants more of. Yet the approach was pretty frustrating.

The majority of this book is a highlights reel of Barkley and Backyard events—covering content most people interested in Laz would already be aware of. It's also written in a way that shows only a surface level understanding of many of these events. On the plus side, there is some content about Laz's childhood.

Things I would have tolerated:
Cryptic writing and purposefully misleading information.

Things I won't tolerate:
A lack of respect for the artist, the philosophy, and the reasons why you'd do any of this.

By inference, most other Barkley books actually tell you a lot more about Laz.

[Peter Derk · Rating 5 out of 5]

I fucking love Lazarus Lake and identify with the man SO HARD.
I'll give you a basic, quick version: Laz (can I call him "Laz"? I feel like I can because who is going to stop me! Don't call this parasocial, it's not, it's laziness in typing) was a distance runner who fared better the longer he went. What I mean by that is, he would get destroyed in a 100 M dash, an 800, probably even a 1600, but the longer the distance, the more successful he was.

This is definitely a thing in running. I was a runner like that. I mean, I still am to some extent, if we can generously call what I do "running" these days.

There are some people for whom a mile run is too much of a sprint. Like, we just don't have those gears in us to go that speed.

So, Laz invented some new running event types that didn't favor speed and instead favored endurance.

Big's Backyard Ultra is a good example, a race where runners have an hour to complete a 4.167 mile loop every hour. You can speed through and finish in 30 minutes, meaning you have 30 minutes to recuperate and run the next loop, or you can take it as a stroll and then have very little recovery time to do things like eat, change socks, and probably manage your blisties.

It's diabolical and simple, and most people probably look at it like, "4 miles an hour? That's a 15-minute mile, that's barely faster than walking!" And that's true, but the hell of it is that last year's winner did 114 yards (or loops). That's just a shade over 475 miles. That's 114 decisions to get back up and keep going.

Of course, there's the famous Barkley Marathons. I won't belabor that one, but get your hands on The Barkley Marathons: The Race That Eats Its Young. I think you can watch it free on YouTube, it's on Internet Archive, it's a good watch, even if you don't give a shit about running.

There's A Race for the Ages in which runners have a number of hours to complete as many miles as possible. The catch? Your number of hours is equal to your age in years, meaning that someone who just turned 80 will have 80 hours, where young whippersnappers who round the corner to 42 will only have 42 hours (anyone 40 and below gets 40 hours). It's often won by older runners. In 2019, Bob Becker racked up 230 miles.

There's something really fun and playful about these events. I mean, they're WILDLY grueling, only a tiny percent finish Barkley, and every year at Backyard, there's only a single winner, as is the rule. But, I don't know, they bring something really different to sports. They bring a different way of looking at them, of looking at why people do them and what it means.

I watched Laz give a TED talk, and it's beautiful. He speaks about how it was his dream as a teenager to play football. And he was not a big kid, he wasn't ever going to make the football team, but he kept trying. And towards the end of his talk, he says, "All these guys are coming in [during Backyards], and they'll say, 'This is a dream.' 'This is a dream.' 'This was my dream.' And I realized...I didn't get my dream. But...even better. To help other people have theirs."

I just really love this kind of person. The person who uses their unique ideas and spirit of fun to help other people do things they maybe never thought they could do. Not in a bullshitty motivational speaker way, but by challenging them.

There was something else he said. He said, at some point, that not every athlete is equal, but every athlete has equal value.

That's how I'd describe the mindset of my high school cross country coach, Woody, who I later coached with and we were very good friends.

He was always working with all the runners, and cross-country doesn't cut people, so there are some TERRIBLE runners on most teams. I can say this for sure because I was one of them. My biggest competition my first year was a kid with developmental disabilities on our team, not because I was his equal athletically, but because he would sometimes get a bit confused on the course and have to slow down for me to catch up and point him in the right direction, at which point he'd zoom off and leave me way, way behind. He would've been a pretty decent runner if I'd been fast enough to keep up with him, if he didn't have to wait for me.

He would dress up as Santa on Christmas and run a big loop of a bunch of the runners' houses, picking up everyone who was willing to come along and take a jog with no real route or agenda, just a "Who should we get next?" after every stop.

He wasn't an incredible runner himself. Because he was a former football player, and he was built like one. Whenever I see someone with huge calves, I still think of them as "Woody calves."

But he had a way of coaching. He knew which kids needed motivation and which kids maybe needed to hear a version of, "I don't think you can do it," usually delivered through a game of telephone where another runner "overheard" him saying that, or when he'd occasionally instruct a runner to say they'd heard Woody make that sort of prediction.

At the end of every season, he'd have a 10-miler. No special course, just an out and back in town, although at that time, you could cover a pretty good amount of town on a 5-mile stretch.

I did the 10-miler my first year. I was slower than shit, WAY behind everyone else. Woody drove out to the turnaround with water, and I grabbed some, and he looked at me in a way where I knew that I wasn't looking so hot.

"Do you want a ride back?" he said.

I told him No, I was fine, and I turned around and chugged back.

He met me again about halfway back, not something he normally did. He gave me a little more water, asked if I wanted to ride back, but there was no fucking way that was going to happen with only a couple miles to go.

By the time I got back to the school, almost all the other kids had left. Which I can't blame them for, it was a long wait.

Later, Woody told me that I looked like death, like a kid from the end of The Long Walk or something, my guts hanging out, pale, literally dying on my feet. He was...not UNconcerned that the distance was going to kill me.

All that to say, this is a great book, a book about someone who pushes other people, just a little, and gets them to do things they probably weren't sure were possible for them.

Laz Lake is a true original, a giant in the sport of ultrarunning, but just a giant of sports in general, kind of resisting the way things have become over-professionalized in so many sports. Keeping things fun for the rest of us who don't know what the fuck macros are or who aren't going to buy a goddamn $50 dollar electrolyte drink.

And his story is a damn good one. He has a wild medical situation as a kid, he gets shot during a race once, and, as the book closes, he's on a cross-continent hike, which I gather he successfully completed this year at age 70.

He's the best kind of fucking weirdo, and if we lived in a world entirely populated by people like him, we'd live fucking weird, great lives.

[Raelene · Rating 5 out of 5]

”Most people think fair is what’s best for them. The purpose of a challenge is to find differences. If you don’t fail, how will you know how far you can go?”

I first found out about the Barkley Marathons randomly on social media, and immediately was locked in to Keith Dunn’s Twitter updates. Over the years I’ve watched every documentary I could find & read the few books that exist just wanting to find out more about this fascinating race. I don’t even like to run, and but I fell into the rabbit hole and am still happily in it.

Everything I know about Laz has been from the Barkley research I’ve done. And while some things have gone a bit deeper into him, aside from knowing *of* Big’s Backyard Ultra, I feel like I knew very little. Going into this, I thought that I would have wanted it to be predominantly about the Barkley. After finishing this, I’m glad that it wasn’t. Obviously I will greedily take all of the Barkley information I can get, but while I’m sure there’s basically no way to learn everything about it, I do feel like I have a good grasp on a lot of its quirks / details / veterans (and their stories) so I really appreciated that I now also know so much more about Laz and also Big’s. His other races to an extent as well, although this focused a lot on Big’s. Also - Big! Did I expect to cry reading this book? No. But here we are.

I want to go back to learning more about Laz. There’s a quote from his daughter, Chrys, where she says “It’s entertaining to hear that they think he’s a mad-man. There’s my dad and there’s Lazarus Lake. That’s a different person.” What I knew coming into this was about Laz. And I love that I now also know about Gary. His life has been so interesting, and I think Jared Beasley did a really great job telling his story.

I do feel like at times this jumped around more than I personally would prefer. That could just be my impatience to learn about a certain topic though, and totally something that’s just a personal opinion. The only other thing I really thought of noting is that I feel like you have to have at least a basic knowledge of the Barkley to understand that section. I feel like as it’s gotten a little more well known and more media coverage in recent years that this could be picked up by people wanting to learn about it, and they could be a bit confused if they go into this knowing nothing other than that it’s a race in Tennessee. However, that might just be because the Barkley is such a collection of quirks (like blowing a conch shell as a one hour warning - that detail is in here, but I feel like it would seem SO random to someone who doesn’t understand where a conch shell comes in with this race). That being said, as someone who didn’t know much about Big’s Backyard Ultra, that felt more straightforward to me.

This has gotten longer than I anticipated but that’s probably not a surprise considering I can (and have) ramble about the Barkley Marathons for hours to anyone who will listen to me, so of course I’m going to ramble about a book involving them. But I love that this has just given me even more to tell people about. I can start with telling people about the race, then my 2nd hour can lead into some backstory. Love that, but I probably should wrap this up soon.

At the time of finishing this book and writing this review, the 2025 Big’s Backyard Ultra starts in exactly one month. I look forward to having far too much screen time for 3-5 days next month as I get locked in to online updates about that race like I do for the Barkley in the spring.

Oh! The epilogue! Apparently I’m not actually ready to wrap this review up yet. My name and photo on this review probably make it obvious that I am a woman & while I love seeing anyone finish the Barkley, I could not stop refreshing Twitter during the 2024 Barkley while Jasmin was still Out There. I had notifications on for Keith’s tweets, and literally cried in a Target fitting room when he sent out that she was a finisher. So when I first read that the author was going to the 2023 Barkley, I was a little bummed thinking that the 2024 Barkley wouldn’t be mentioned in this (because wow, what a year that was!) and I love that it was included. I’ve heard ‘controversy’ about Laz, including comments he’s made about women in his races, and I thought that the way it was discussed in this book was both clear and respectful and I really appreciated that. So I really liked both the combination of Laz’s comments and hope about seeing a woman finish, and then getting to read about Jasmin to wrap this book up.

Okay now I actually am wrapping this review up. Just read this book. I was planning on waiting for the audiobook so I could tandem read it, but decided I couldn’t wait once I had it in my hands. But I have the audiobook pre-ordered so will I be rereading this in a few weeks when that comes out? It’s probable.

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beasley did a great job with what was likely a very difficult subject: Gary Cantrell aka Laz Lake, someone with no fixed identity, someone who has been notoriously cagey with reporters, loose with facts, and silent about his private life. Surprisingly, the author gathers quite a bit of biographical info about Laz. More than anything I take from it is that Laz has suffered. As a teen, he had a tumor that led to surgeries, and the pain of recovery was excruciating. He butted heads with his straightlaced dad, which led to a period of itinerant hitchhiking and roaming. A blocked artery caused him to quit running, which was his passion. But all that backstory led to his career as a race director and his two biggest races, the Barkley and Big's Backyard Ultra. I really enjoyed how Beasley bookended "The Endurance Artist" with close accounts of both races. As Laz put it, in the Barkley the runners face brutal external elements but in Big's, a last man standing event, they battle themselves. People who want to learn more about Laz will also want to learn more about these races, as they are maybe the purest extension of who he is and what he stands for. Runners shouldn't have to pay for a lot of frills. They should be tested to their limits. Some have supposed that Laz is a masochist, but that doesn't come through here at all. He has a gruff exterior, for sure, but he genuinely loves his races and the competitors. I really appreciate the title of Beasley's book, because it sums up so perfectly what Laz is. Creativity is rarely carried to pursuits outside the arts. Even in the arts, it's often missing. But Laz is creative in what he wants to see in an event. He's an innovator, which I think comes from him being an iconoclast. He is one of those rare people who play by their own rules. I think that's what makes him so magnetic to others.

[Catie Markesich · Rating 5 out of 5]

Anything Laz - providing the content remains below the frenetic pop culture threshold- and I’m in. I was thrilled that this was not just about the Barkley. While I LOVE the Barkley marathons, the reason I love it so much is because of Laz. And this book is all about Laz. Laz is a misfit who enjoys humor, self-imposed suffering, other misfits, and watching people struggle and fail, as well as succeed. I am whole-heartedly similar in all of those ways. Whenever I watch some of the good documentaries about the Barkley with Frozen Ed, Laz, and all of the other endurance misfits that gather to do Laz’s events, I feel like those are my people. I just need to get over my self esteem issues and take a trip down to Frozen Head State Park some April soon and meet my extended family.

“It will be camping alright. With a stick in your eye.”

“‘Gary… he wanted everything to not be normal’, she recalled. ‘Gary was the epitome of not normal…[he] didn’t want to interact with people, and when he did, he said weird shit, often at the worst times… but he was really, really smart.’”

“He now lay on the gravel, beneath a blanket of stars, vomiting.”

“ While his predictor suggested he would do much better [faster]…the more he thought about it, the more he realized there was something about the whole experience that was just beyond numbers.”

“In the US, we like to say ‘good luck.’ But I like the way the Japanese say it: ‘May you run the race you prepared for.’”

“‘Do you know - where I can - go home?’” ***

“Each step slower now, like a toddler, trying to move his feet with his brain.”

“There’s a silent reverence around someone at the edge of themselves- it’s a space as much as seen.”

[Carrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read Endurance Artist after my running coach recommended it to me—she actually ran Big’s Backyard Ultra, one of the races created by Lazarus Lake. I had heard about Laz and his races before through my coach and from following ultra runners on Instagram, but this book gave me a much deeper look at the man behind them.

Laz is known for creating some of the most challenging ultra races out there, including the Barkley Marathons and Big’s Backyard Ultra. These races are not for the faint of heart—steep climbs, brutal terrain, minimal rules, and elevation gain that can add up to climbing Mount Everest twice. What surprised me most is how often older runners outlast younger ones, proving these races are more about mental toughness than speed.

I also found Laz himself fascinating. He had a tough childhood, and you can really see how that shaped his mindset and the way he designs his races. Add in his dark humor (like starting races with a cigarette) and wild stories—like a high school teacher running 450 miles without sleep—and this book kept me hooked. A really interesting read if you’re into running or endurance stories.

[Sophia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Until now, Lazarus Lake had only been captured in fragments — brief mentions in articles, glimpses in documentaries. This book connects those fragments into a full, three-dimensional portrait.

What struck me most was how much of this came from the author’s long-standing relationship with Laz himself. That closeness allows the book to show a man who is complex, deeply human, and far more than the myth. We also meet the elite runners who test themselves against his events and, in doing so, we see Laz’s own gaze fixed on the limits of human endurance. It isn’t sadism that drives him, but mischief, pure curiosity, and a genuine sense of awe.

Just as inspiring is the author’s own achievement: completing his personal “Barkley” — the long and grueling journey of writing and publishing this book. I’m grateful he pushed through that course and delivered a work that is both exciting and deeply thought-provoking. An exciting and thought-provoking read — not just for ultrarunners, but for anyone interested in the limits of endurance and life itself.

[Randy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Our library didn’t have it, nor was the e-book available on Hoopla (our library system’s digital app) but the audiobook was

This is the most in-depth study of Laz ever accomplished - or allowed - I’m sure; Jared must’ve made quite an impression on him, for Laz to grant such a passage into his highly protected history

Not only does it fully flesh out the little snippets we’ve heard about Laz (pulling his own teeth, for instance), but also a deep-dive into his childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. We learn how he came to adopt Big, and the genesis of the race that bears his name, as well as The Barkley, of course

Speaking of Barkley and Big’s, we are presented with highly detailed, loop-by-loop views of the 2023 races from inside camp, putting us practically at Laz’s elbow as those campaigns unfolded

As this was an audiobook, credit also goes to the narrator, who accomplishes Laz’s screechy voice with uncanny accuracy when required